“How’s this?”
Carefully, I slip my arms around his shoulders. My leg around his hip. I watch in the mirrors as we come together, fitting in all the right places.
“Tighter.”
We stay in that twisted embrace.
We lie in the comfortable silence of a house much too grand, too old for two people. Beyond the stone walls, the wind claws. It howls and rages against the glass. I think how often I heard that exact sound while pressed down the length of Ames’s front with Eliah curled around my back, even breaths warm against the nape of my neck.
That last morning, I woke with his mouth over my naked breast while Eliah rubbed lightly at my clit. No one spoke. We barely moved. Even when they brought me over, they held me like they knew it would be our last time.
The knowledge pours fuels through me all over again. A righteous and vengeful surge of heat that momentarily rattles my last shred of sanity.
It can’t end this way.
This can’t be how I let their memories fade.
I stare up into the eyes of the woman clinging helplessly to the solid weight of the man molding her into the mattress. The weight of a man who she knew would move heaven and earth for her. A man who had never been good at keeping his true feelings from his eyes.
Lenora Usher may be naive in many ways. Sheltered and protected from the evils of the world. But she has never been stupid or blind. She was raised to stand at the shoulder of an Usher man or be used as a pawn to form an alliance. It is the way of things.
But it’s always been clear — submission is weakness.
Weakness is shame.
I will not allow my boys to die in shame.
“Uncle Marcus?”
“Oui, mon petit?”
Tentatively, the way one might touch a spooked cat, I brush my fingers through his hair. I watch the gentle glide in the mirror overhead. Watch his shoulders stiffen.
Then relax.
I repeat the stroke.
“If I ask for a favor, will you grant it?”
He doesn’t even pause to consider my request.
“You know I will give you anything—”
I shake my head. “A real favor. The kind you make with the Family.”
His sharp inhale catches across the flex of his back.
“Linny…” His head lifts. “I know what you’re going to ask, but—”
“Please,” I cut in. “I don’t trust anyone else.” Carefully, I let my fingers drift to his face. I cup the stubble lining his jaw. “I’m not afraid.”
His brows furrow over eyes hard with concern. “It’s not about being afraid. It’s about sense. What you’re asking is dangerous.”
“It’s you,” I point out. “You won’t hurt me.”
“Of course I won’t hurt you. That is not the point.”
I skim a kiss to the tip of his nose. Light. Simple. The gesture brings our faces dangerously close. His mouth hovers inches from mine.
