Shame burns through me. Shame and confusion.
“I’m sorry, I—”
He lifts my captured hand to his mouth, presses his lips to my knuckles. The kiss is soft, reverent, and it steals whatever words I was going to say.
“I wish I could stay,” he says against my skin. His voice almost breaks on the words. “You have no idea how much I wish I could stay with you. But I have to go. I’m already late.”
Reality crashes back like ice water. Of course. The Emperor.
“You have to go tohim.” The words taste bitter, and I almost laugh at the intense jealousy clawing at my insides.
“You think I want to leave you?” His hand slides along my chest, fingers mapping the planes. When his thumb brushes over my nipple, I can’t hold back the sound that escapes me—half gasp, half whimper. “He’ll kill me if I don’t. It’s that simple.”
The casual way he says it—like death is just another appointment on his schedule—makes my blood freeze.
“Do you hate him?” I need to hear him say it. I’m pathetic, a child asking for reassurance.
Marco’s hands frame my face, thumbs stroking along my cheekbones. When he speaks, his voice is low and deadly serious.
“With all my being.”
His words sink through me. There’s such venom in them, such pain. Five years of this. Five years of being used, owned, broken down piece by piece.
“Give me one more kiss,” he says, and there’s desperation in his voice now. “To last me.”
To sustain him. Through whatever’s waiting for him tonight.
This time when we kiss, it’s different. Desperate, yes, but also something deeper. I clutch at his shoulders, his back, trying to eliminate every inch of space between us. He holds me like I might disappear if he lets go.
We’re both breathing hard when he finally pulls away, our foreheads pressed together.
“You taste exactly how I imagined you would.”
My heart stutters. “Like what?”
But he only smiles—soft and secret and heartbreaking—then nudges me off him to gently rise to his feet.
And walks away.
Chapter twelve
Marco: Salt and Sand
It made me sick to leave Robin last night. A nausea only made worse by the three hours the Emperor kept me waiting. Three long hours in his formal lounge, as if I were any other guest. Three long hours that I could have been with Robin.
He had his streetwalker brought in while I sat there, paraded before me. Then he had me sent home via note, delivered by a servant, without looking in on me once.
He’s been doing this for weeks now. Ever since I stood him up that one time. A power play. A reminder of how unimportant and replaceable I am.
Yet he has no idea how preferable I find the arrangement.
I should be scared. I am scared deep down. I know what this means for me, how close to the line I am. Everything I’ve worked for is teetering on that edge, the lot of it ready to drop with one click of his filthy fingers.
He’d have me finish the season, I know it. That’s when he’d get rid of me.
I’m far too popular for public execution. It would be more his style to have me bludgeoned in a back alley somewhere, body thrown down a drain, never to be heard of again.
Yes, it’s dangerous. All of it.
