I breathed deep the smell of him – a hot, smoky scent, mingled with the fresh smell of the sweat he’d worked up fighting off the fae. Arthur reached up, his thick hand grasping my cheek, pulling me against him. I knew that hand could crush me in a moment, and that made him even more sexy.
Heat and emotions raced through my veins, my body begging for release. I reached up my own hand and tangled it in his hair, tugging at his collar, wanting his skin against mine?—
My parents are dead.
A rush of sorrow flooded my body as the realization hit me again. Only now, Arthur had released the vise on my chest, and the pain arced through me, raw and unhindered.
They’re dead, dead, dead.
I tore away in surprise as tears sprung in my eyes. Arthur’s kiss had unleashed a deluge. I raised my hand to my cheek. It was streaked with rivers of salty tears.
Arthur stared at me, his kind face crumpling. To see a guy that tough, that badass, look so completely crushed would’ve been totally endearing had I not been in the middle of some kind of meltdown. “Maeve, are you okay? Did I hurt you?”
“No, I…”
I gulped as thick, choking sobs clutched my throat. My whole body shook as the grief poured out of me, spilling through my body. “I just… it’s just hit me that I’m here… that all this happened because they’re dead. My parents are dead. I don’t… I shouldn’t?—”
“Did kissing me make you happy?” he asked.
I nodded, my body wracked by another choking sob. Arthur cringed away, as if my pain physically hurt him. He reached out a hand. It hovered in the air between us. I leaned forward, ready to fall into his arms, to pour out my pain against his body, but he pulled away and stood up.
“I have to go,” he whispered. “I’m sorry, Maeve.”
“But—” The idea of being alone right now, to sit with this horrible, crushing grief by myself, made me long for the numbness again.
“Hey,” Arthur placed a finger over my lips. “Don’t make that face at me. I want to stay, believe me. But I’m dangerously close to losing control here, and you’ve had a pretty intense day, all things considered. I don’t want to do something we both might regret. But we can pick this up another time, and then…” hisvoice got this rough growl to it that made my insides ache. “Maybe I’ll be able to kiss those tears away.”
All I could do was stare helplessly after Arthur as he backed out of the room, his eyes betraying how torn he was. He pulled the door shut behind him, plunging the room into complete darkness.
Alone now with only my pain for company, I collapsed against the sheets. My body shook as I let the tears fall, the beautiful and horrible release of all the sorrow and guilt I’d been stamping down and hiding away ever since that night.
Memories assailed me, dancing in front of my stinging eyes. Mom’s cringingly naive attempt to give Kelly and I a sex-education talk, which mostly consisted of her cajoling us to wear promise rings. Dad singing Beatles songs at the top of his lungs as he cooked breakfast for us every morning. Endless Sundays giggling in the back pew with Kelly while Dad delivered his sermons with great aplomb.
The tears rolled down my cheeks, dribbled over my chin, and pooled in my collar bone.
Why?Why did they have to die? I never got to say goodbye, to tell them how much I loved them for adopting me when no one else would. I never got to say that even though we didn’t see eye to eye on a lot of stuff, that I was proud to be their daughter.
And now I never would.
Pale moonlight streamed through the still-open windows, casting long shadows across the room. I lifted my hand up toward the dim light. In my palm was the tiny twig Rowan had given me. Just trying to think about what happened tonight made my temples ache. I couldn’t process it through the grief.
But that little twig…
Even though objectively, it was just a tiny piece of wood, I knew somewhere inside me that this wasimportant,that itcarried something of Rowan with him. It was almost as if this twig saved my life tonight.
Which makes no sense. But apparently I threw out all my scientific training when I came to England to live in a castle.
I slid the twig under my pillow. Maybe it would bring me peaceful dreams, free of the nightmares that were now playing out in my head. But I very much doubted it.
A twig was just a twig. And a castle full of beautiful boys who believe in magic was dangerous.
CHAPTER ELEVEN
BLAKE
Iwas on guard duty at the towering sarsen stones that marked the entrance to the human realm when Kalen returned from his assignment.
He toppled through the stones in his dog form, legs kicking in the air, mouth foaming. As soon as he hit the earth he shifted back to his preferred humanesque shape, but this was not the arrogant prince I’d known my whole life. Kalen lolled and moaned in the dirt, his collar torn and half his face eaten away. Green blood – presumably his own – splattered down the front of his coat.
