Disbelief flickered across her face, quickly followed by something that looked dangerously close to affection. She narrowed her eyes into a scowl that didn’t quite hide the softness beneath. “Why are you so perfect, Rowan?”
“Oh, please.” I couldn’t stop the dry smile that tugged at my mouth. “We both know how ‘perfect’ we are around each other. Let us skip the charades.”
She gave a conceding nod and, to my disappointment, pulled her hand away from mine to put on the spare shirt. The loss of contact felt more significant than it should have. She hugged her knees to her chest, ice packs now forgotten, curling into herself and looking smaller. Younger. More fragile than the fierce creature who’d danced on that stage, who’d ground against me last night while I whispered in her ear.
“He’s someone who hurt me.” Her voice came out steady despite the tremor I could see running through her hands. “No—hebrokeme in ways I can’t explain. Ways I’m not ready to explain.”
Her hazel eyes found mine, holding my gaze with an intensity that felt like a physical touch. I held her stare, admiring the way morning light lit her caramel skin, catching gold in the undertones and painting her in warmth. The way those hazel eyes sparked with flecks of amber and green and something that looked like barely contained rage.
“Is he the one you fight in your nightmares?” Surprise and shame danced across her face as she turned away quickly. I waited for a moment before I prompted her. “Answer my question, Violet.”
She let out a long sigh. “Yes.”
So he dies. “Then I will kill him for you.” The words came out in an exhale, purging the anxiety that had been coiled in my chest since she’d first mentioned Oubliette.
Startled eyes opened to meet mine as relief washed through me, cool and sweet as spring melt.Her demon is mortal. A man. Just a man.
Men, I could hunt. Men I could track through cities and across state lines. Men I could corner in dark alleys or expensive penthouses. Men I could string up and bleed dry without losing a single second of sleep.
If it had been a vampyre lord with centuries of accumulated power, or a petty god lounging in divine indifference—that would have been infinitely more complicated. That would have required planning, resources, and knowledge I was still gathering about this timeline’s supernatural hierarchies. Regardless of the length of time, I would have burned covens and hunted demons for her.
But a man? A man who’d hurt her? That was as easy as breathing.
She made a disgruntled sound, somewhere between a laugh and a scoff. “Don’t act like you’ve killed before. Besides. . . it’s not that easy, otherwise I would’ve done it already.”
Oh, volchok, if you only knew.
She shifted against the headboard, the wood creaking softly under the redistribution of weight, and sighed. The sound carried exhaustion and frustration in equal measure. She closed her eyes, dark lashes creating crescents against cheeks still faintly flushed from last night’s fever. “I don’t need you to fix my problems, Rowan. I’ve had enough of men doing what theythinkis best for me.”
Dangerous words from such a fiercevolchok. Words that would have sent most men scrambling to prove themselves, to assert their dominance, to override her clearly stated boundary.
I am not most men.
I scooted closer, angling my body so I had to look up at her. Rested my head in the crook of my arm, deliberately making myself smaller, less threatening—not an easy feat given I was six-foot-five, and two hundred ten pounds of muscle, but body language mattered. Perception mattered. One of her complaints she’d voiced before, in sharper moments, was feeling overpowered by my presence.
“Violet, you told me this man hurt you. . . but is there more?” I waited, and I knew the answer when she stilled. “So this man touched you without your consent.” It was not a question. My voice came out calmer than I felt, but beneath that manufactured quiet, possession and anger simmered like magma under the earth. Waiting. Building pressure. “That is enough for me. You may be under my protection, but you are still your own woman. You are my equal in all ways, and I value your input.” I stopped, letting the words sink between us. “Violet, you are free to hunt him in the way you think is best. I am simply here to remind you that your current approach is flawed.”
She cracked open one eye and peeked down at me, her gaze assessing. “Oh, really?”
I nodded, fighting back a smile. “A little humility is an important skill to learn.”
She laughed then, genuine and warm and completely unexpected. The sound filled the quiet bedroom like light filling darkness, chasing shadows into corners. “And you havesomuch of it, Rowan.”
My breath caught in my chest, trapped somewhere between my lungs and my throat. I loved the way her laughter sounded. In my room. In my bed. With me. The intimacy of it, the casual domesticity, felt more dangerous than anything that had happened last night.
Fuck.
I looked towards the wall behind her, focusing on the dark television screen mounted there, willing myself to breathe steadily against the returning hardness in my sweats. My cock had barely softened since last night, and her proximity—the scent of her skin combined with the memory of her body arching into mine—was doing absolutely nothing to help.
“I am yours to use, Violet.” I forced the words out past the tightness in my throat, meaning every syllable with a ferocity that surprised even me. “If you do not want me to tell your father or Charlie what is happening, then you need to trust me. Let me help you hunt this man properly.”
She fisted the sheet tighter, her knuckles going white with pressure. The tendons in her hand stood out in sharp relief against her skin. After a long moment where I could practically hear her internal debate, she gave a tight nod.
“It’s complicated, but I’ll do my best.”
I shifted to sit beside her, both of us leaning back against the wooden headboard that was still faintly warm from where our bodies had pressed against it hours before. We stared at the opposite wall where the darkened television screen reflected our images back at us—two figures side by side in rumpled white sheets, our breathing the only sound breaking the heavy silence.
The quiet between us was not uncomfortable, but weighted with things unsaid. I heard the building settling around us, the faint hum of the heating system, and distant traffic from the street below. My heightened hearing picked up her elevated heart rate, the slight hitch in her breathing that suggested she was gathering courage for something.
