Page 88

Focus,she told herself.

There was one rule she didn’t break in the games she played with her suitors. She might invite them back to her bedroom tocoax out information, but she never brought them into her bed. It was a line she didn’t cross.

Would that line hold with Gideon?

As he kissed along her jaw, the words tumbled out of her. “Do you want to come inside?”

“I …”

Rune glanced up, her body humming. His eyes were ink-dark and ravenous. This was happening. She was going to open the door and they were …

Gideon stepped back.

Cold air rushed into the space between them.

“Perhaps another night,” he said.

Wait …what?

Rune straightened, trying to recover from her shock.

“It’s getting late. I should go home.”

“Right. Of course.” The sting of rejection made Rune glance away. “I’ll have one of the servants fetch your horse.”

He shook his head. “There’s no need. I know where your stable is. I can fetch my own horse.”

She was about to insist—she would be a poor hostess otherwise—when he interrupted, catching her hand.

“Rune.” His thumb brushed across her knuckles. “Iwouldlike to come in, but I promised to go slow with you.” Lifting her hand, he kissed the sensitive part of her wrist, making her shiver. “And if I step through that door tonight, I’m afraid I won’t keep my word.”

A wild feeling swept through Rune. She didn’t want him to keep his word. She wanted him to take her upstairs. This instant.

“Good night, Miss Winters.”

Turning away, he headed for the stables. Rune watched himdisappear around the side of the house. Shakily, with her back to the wall, she sank to the terrace stones.

She could still taste him on her lips. Still feel the ghost of his hands on her ribs.

He doesn’t actually want you.

Her skin tingled everywhere he’d touched her.

You’re falling for his tricks.

Gideon was winning at this game. Because what they’d done tonight, Rune wanted to do again—for reasons that had nothing to do with rescuing witches.

“I loathe him,” she told the shadows in the garden, trying to remember all the reasons this was true.

But her voice trembled as she said it.

THIRTY-FOURGIDEON

GIDEON STOOD BEFORE THEfloor-to-ceiling window of his office listening to Harrow relay her most recent findings.

“The ship we found that casting mark on?” said Harrow. “An hour before it set sail, there was last-minute cargo brought on board: two barrels of wine delivered by an aristo.”

Beyond the window, the scarlet sun set over the capital. The Ministry of Public Safety perched on a hill in the center of the capital, giving a view to the harbor.