Deryn snatched the kitten from Paloma’s lap and slammed the door to the suite shut behind her. The last thing Paloma heard was a loud yelp, as no doubt the claws came out yet again.
Well. That was educational. Paloma sat on the couch for a few more minutes, rewinding the evening in her mind. She had just come back from the office, spent and weary. The signal from security that Ms. Crowhart was on her way up had seemed to immediately energize her.
She wanted to tell Mason to send the woman away, on purpose. Because her body’s reaction was too much, too urgent, and too…familiar. She knew what this reaction meant. It was the same one that got her to forsake sanity and seek out Deryn at the Rooster.
She didn’t stop Mason from letting Deryn use the private elevator. She didn’t hide in her suite. She opened the door, and there Deryn had stood, the gray kitten in her hands, confused and a little angry. And those shoulders a touch stooped—holding the weight of the world in them.
Paloma wanted to slam the door in her face. She told herself she couldn’t because of the kitten. Her love for cats was something Elinor teased her mercilessly for. She was known to drop everything—business, pleasure, anything really—if there was a cat in the immediate vicinity. And yet, she had never allowed herself to keep one.
Paloma reasoned it away as being too busy, too in demand, traveling too much?—
Her brain screeched to a halt at the list of excuses. They were exactly the same ones Deryn used just thirty minutes ago. How the tables had turned.
Still, the vision of Deryn at her door, with the adorable gray fuzzball in her strong, capable hands…
“Paloma Allende, you are a mess, amiga. Why is it always hands for you?” Her own voice echoed with fatigue in the emptiness of the room, and she finally allowed herself to take off her heels. The Manolos dropped heavily to the carpeted floor, and she stretched her legs, her toes curling at the pleasure of having a lazy evening all to herself.
She’d read. She’d take a luxurious bath, then she’d lounge in front of the fire…
A memory intruded of her and Deryn on the soft blanket in front of that very fireplace. Naked, sated, in between bouts of sex.
Paloma shook her head. She really should’ve found a different place for their encounter. Everywhere she looked in her suite was now filled with memories of sweat and skin and pleasure. Even the damn couch she was on now.
Mierda.
She picked up the phone.
“Yes, it’s me. Send the design team to 1326 in the morning. Tell them I need everything replaced. The couch, the carpets, the piano.” There was a gasp on the line. Paloma lifted her eyes to the heavens. “I know it’s a hundred years old, and before you tell me they’d need time to find another one, I know. I don’t care. Take the current one out. Donate it to the town’s elementary school. They give classes to those who want to learn on weekends. When I visited, their current instrument was falling apart. Thank you, that’s all.”
She ended the call and reclined back on the cushions. The orders did not give her satisfaction. In fact, they made her feel worse. Worse than what, she didn’t know, but it wasn’t a good feeling.
Restless, beat, and wired at the same time, she got up and decided that the bath was moving up on the list of activities.
As she watched the water and the bubbles fill the immense marble tub, Paloma ran through the events of the day in her head.
The outing to Market Square went better than she expected. She was not asked anything inappropriate or embarrassing. On the contrary, the idyllic image of her and Deryn had later been splashed all over theCawwith positive comments. And her tête-à-tête with Marsha was eye-opening in itself, with the older gossip for once acting kind and interested in what Paloma had to say.
All things considered, a worthy effort on everyone’s behalf, especially Deryn’s, who, despite not saying anything at all, was perfect for the role of arm candy.
Paloma lowered herself into the tub, sighing as the water caressed her skin. She relaxed, letting the heat and the lavender scent calm her senses.
Her mind returned to Market Square and the big, wide-eyed look Deryn kept giving her as they held hands. It felt a bit like a double challenge, to react neither to the eyes nor to the warm, slightly calloused hand in hers.
Those eyes were where the danger lay. Paloma knew it. She had almost given in to them today. One look, and the flames called to her, a sight she had seen before, a sign she had sought time and again, through wars and borders, through trials and death.
Paloma knew those eyes.
She remembered the look in them just days ago when Deryn asked why she wasn’t after a real partner. She also remembered being truthful, simply stating the facts—her wife’s death, Roxanne’s treachery. So why did it feel disingenuous back then and like an outright lie now?
It had been the truth, her truth. Her heart’s truth. So why was she now regretting it?
Because another betrayal is not what you’re afraid of…
She had framed it that way to Deryn, but Deryn didn’t know that Paloma had lost more, had lost everything—and not just once or twice before. Paloma had seen her life fall to the ground in blood and ash once again, eons ago. And that loss…
Paloma’s fingers trembled on the edge of the bathtub. She had no idea how to explain that death, or those visions, to Deryn. They weren’t real. They weren’t hers, so why did they hurt the most? Maybe Deryn would understand, or maybe Deryn would think her a fool.
Something told her it would be the former. Deryn Crowhart of the Dragons Crowharts would hear her, would know what she meant. That something was seductive. That something was very much like fire itself. Warm and tantalizing until it consumed you whole. Beautiful, till you could not take your eyes away from the destruction it wrought.
