He shrugged. “It’s the one I chose.”
So not the one he was born with. Come to think about it, did they all have the same mother? However, one glance at them and she refrained from asking. The subject might be too personal as of yet.
She glanced at Knight, the silent sentinel keeping his spot behind the bar. One could easily forget his presence. “Let me guess, also chosen.”
He simply shrugged.
Reaper said, “That’s his way of saying yes.”
Calliope leaned back in her chair and studied them. “You’re all the worst with driving conversation.”
“Naturally,” Reaper said easily. “Beasts usually are.”
“They seem to hold grudges as well,” she muttered. She’d hoped to glean a little insight into them, but all she discovered was they were utterly maddening. And their names were chosen by themselves.
Reaper just laughed.
Speaking of grudges, her thoughts drifted back to the slipper she left back in her living quarters.
Had Maxen found it? He would have said something if he had, wouldn’t he? Was Maxen even his real name?
*
Maxen closed thedoor to his chambers with a soft click, though the sound rang in his ears like a gunshot. He didn’t move. He just stood there, breath held as if exhaling might crack the threadbare grip on himself he’d managed to drag upstairs with him.
He had almost kissed her right there and then.
In front of his brothers.
He yanked his shirt over his head in one rough pull, the fabric sandpaper against his skin. He needed it off. The shirt hit the floor with a muted rustle. He rolled his shoulders. The old wound on his side pulled tight. He rubbed a hand across his chest, the leather oddly soothing over the slashes that served as reminders of darker days.
Every word, every syllable of her voice dug into him.
He braced his hands on the edge of the desk.
The blood in his veins pulsed far too fast in his neck, and the skin beneath gloves itched. It was one of those days when all the scars on his body throbbed. Usually, they were triggered by phantom memories crawling along his bones. This time, only her face filled his head.
Damn Reaper.
The man was a blazing menace.
One by one, finger by finger, he peeled off his gloves. He only evertook them off when he was alone. Removing them also felt like laying down a weapon. He tossed them on the desk and stared down at his hands, flexing them once. Twice.
Scars mapped his skin, ridged in certain places, red and twisted in others, a patchwork of burns and cuts and memories he had no wish to keep. Tattoos that covered most of the obvious ones. Most days, he forgot they were even there. But today, they itched. Itched like the time they were still healing. He flexed again, watching the burn scar that cut across his palm like a jagged grin.
What the hell was he doing?
With a growl, he dropped heavily on the edge of the bed, his elbows braced on his knees, head bowed.
Too much.
Everything was too damn much.
The fires. Serpent’s injuries. The unanswered questions stacking higher by the hour.
And her.
Bloody hell, her.
