A long stretch of silence followed his question. Silas waited with all the patience he was capable of before he gave her nape a quick squeeze. “Did you fall asleep?”
“Unfortunately, no.” Petra’s chest expanded with a deep inhale. She held it for a moment, her breasts a soft pressure against him, before she released it slowly. “That’s a complicated question.”
Silas rolled his eyes toward the ceiling. “I’mshocked.”
“What’s that supposed to mean?”
“It means that for every damn question I get answered, ten more take its place.”
Her fingers curled into a small fist against his back. “I’m really not that interesting, Silas. Everything you think I am — it’s all smoke and mirrors.”
“You let me decide what’s interesting about you,” he deadpanned, “because so far you’ve had shit judgment on the subject.”
“For the love of?—”
“Quit stalling and answer the question, baby.”
Petra took her sweet time, but eventually she said, “It’s something I do to help with anxiety.”
Anxiety?Silas’s eyes narrowed. “Explain.”
“It’s a long story that I’m way too tired to get into right now, but suffice it to say I spent most of my formative years without regular access to food. It wasn’t so bad when I was really young, but after— well, when I was a teenager I’d go days without food. So I learned to ration and snatch whatever I could for the days when things were thin.” Her shoulders shrugged under his arm. “I haven’t gone hungry in decades, but I get… anxious when Idon’t havesomethingaround, just in case. Having my caches helps me not think about food all day.”
Dissatisfaction again, worse than ever before. Silas was stunned by the force of it. The squirming in his gut was more like the lash of a whip inside him.
I ate some of her food.A wave of pinpricks rushed over his skin. It was an ugly feeling, the thing that whipped him again and again. Bad. Very bad.
The animal in him choked. It could hardly comprehend the reality that she’d revealed to him. Not only was she threatened in the present, but she’d been vulnerable all her life.Hungry,deprived of the most basic of needs. If that hadn’t been met by the people who should have protected her, then what other horrors was she keeping locked away in her murky past?
Silas floundered. He had no idea how to make the ugly feeling go away. All he knew was that he needed to fix this in some way — by any means necessary.
Voice rough, he promised her, “I’ll get you more.”
She’d never have to think about food again. He’d make sure her cabinets were never less than bursting, her fridge overflowing with fresh fruit and takeout and fancy cheese and anything else her heart desired. He’d pack caches himself and place them in every room of the house.
He had to, because the thought of Petra worrying about something as fundamental as whether she’d go hungry tomorrow caused him a near-physical discomfort.
Hislittle goddess, radiant and powerful and cunning, anxious about her next meal? Petra motherfucking Zaskodna, the witch who outshone everyone she met?Hiswitch, who’d connived her way into power despite having no coven, no name, no family? The woman who held the adoration of an entire city and one fucked up demon who couldn’t get enough of her?
Over my dead fuckin’ body.
Petra seemed to hear some thread of that intense feeling in his simple promise. Her breath hitched as her blunt nails dug into the meat of his muscle. “Silas…”
“I won’t take your food anymore.” The memory of how he’d gleefully eaten those chocolate candies on her bed and how she’d cried as she carefully scooped the packages off the floor was like acid churning in his stomach.
“I didn’t mean?—”
“And,” he bit out, “I’ll make sure you never have to think about it again. Not once. Clear?”
Petra was quiet for the span of several heartbeats before she whispered, “You’re forgiven, Silas. Really.”
That drew him up short.
He stared at the opposite wall, unblinking, and rolled the words over in his mind.You’re forgiven, Silas.
Was he asking for forgiveness? He’d never done it before, so it hadn’t occurred to him that maybe the ugly thing in him wasn’t just dissatisfaction, but guilt.
Huh.
