Strong lips captured theentin pertinent. Magic pushed and I answered. The vow marks on my wrist pulsed, and I moved into the demanding kiss. My fingers wound into his hair.
He was right. I couldn’t deny it. Food, comfort, and security had restored much of me. I’d never felt as safe as when he was close. And wasn’t that a scary thought? To entrust those feelings to a man who already held all the power. Even when we were arguing about a woman’s journal—
I pulled away, pushing into the chair’s back. Every thought purged from my head by a few skillful kisses. Manipulated.He manipulates women with little effort. When had I forgotten that the statement applied to me as well?
“Whenever you don’t want me to do something, you seduce me.”
“As if it is that easy. The snap of my fingers and you are seduced?” His face was a mixture of irritation and something else. Guilt?
My heartbeat galloped. “With your kisses! With your proximity and searing looks. With your declarations that I am yours.” Thoughts started to roll faster. “You are trying to control me. Spirits. Could my emotions have confused things so badly? I thought I wassafe.”
I was feeling a little hysterical as one thought crashed into another ripping my safety net apart—a web broken from its bindings.
His eyes were hooded, his face dark. “You know little of what you speak.”
“You are good—fantasticat seduction—of that there is no doubt. How many women have told you no? Very few, I’ll bet!” Hysteria built. Sharp and uncontrollable. “And to a one, I’m sure they were very happy with their choice. But I won’t allow myself to be controlled.”
“Interesting.” He circled me. “So you will deny yourself pleasure because you want to be the dominant one?”
“There you go again with your games and dominance.” Frustration tangled with my hysteria and I craned my neck to see him as he passed behind. I was so light-headed I felt close to passing out, erratic energy coursing through me more powerfully than usual. The lights flickered. “I don’t know what you are on about, but why can’t you just benormal?”
A lopsided, broken smile lifted his mouth, reflected in his eyes as he stopped in front of me. There was something in that smile, in the self-loathing gaze, that made me want to snatch back my words.
“Yes, why can’t I be normal?” Every lamp extinguished—throwing us into darkness. “It’s an excellent question. One I ask myself frequently.” The lights turned back on slowly, one by one.
He turned. “I’ll see you in the morning.” It was clipped, polite, informal. Like a butler to the mistress of the house.
It wasn’t until I heard his door click closed down the hall, sealing me out, that I realized he had taken the journal with him.
Chapter 13
MARIETTA
I looked straight ahead, trying not to sneak glances at Gabriel. My shop girl skirt snapped around my legs as I tried to keep pace.
I disguised a look at him by pretending to watch a carriage clatter past. The rising sun set half of his features in the light and half in shadow.
The cityscape changed to a dingy gray as we entered the East End and were enveloped by the aetheric drift. The pollution made estate magic and subsidized infrastructure harder to hold. No onechoseto live in the East End if another option was available. Gabriel was dressed again as a dock worker, but the cocky walk he’d adopted before was clipped and edged.
He had retreated into the cold man he’d been when we’d first met.
I fought to keep from rubbing my eyes. The night had been wretched. And lonely. Muddled and confused thoughts vying with irritation and betrayal. Was manipulation the price of feeling safe?
And was I being unfair? The thought had made me toss and turn. Just remembering the look in his eyes before he walked from the room left me numb. But he had to give mesomething—allow me to understand what he was thinking—or else I was going to continue to feel used. After we finished here, I would find a way to ask.
The numbers along the street increased until we were standing before a drab three-story building that matched the address written in Octavia’s note.
Papers and food scraps littered the stairs of the walk-up. I followed Gabriel to the top. His fist rose to knock, but before his knuckles made contact with the wood, the door opened.
A man with a long scar curving under his chin stood in the frame, obviously on his way out. He opened his mouth to say something, perhaps “Pardon me” or “Good day.” Gabriel cocked his head to the side to receive the comment and his body moved fractionally to allow the man to pass.
Then their eyes met.
The moment suspended.
