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“My father,” he murmured with a humorless laugh. “I was within my reach. I—could have killed him.”

Layala swallowed hard. He had the opportunity and didn’t take it? “What?”

He looked away as if reliving the memory. “He was feet from me. It was strange to see him near when I had mourned him and felt the guilt of killing him. He was conversing with my mother.” His beautiful, soothing voice dropped lower. “They spoke about making—amends.”

“Amends?” Layala balked, cheeks flaring hot with frustration. She balled her hands into fists at her sides. “Amends! Between you and him? They can’t be serious.” The shadows of confusion and doubt were written all over his face. He ran his fingers across his loose dark-brown hair. “You’re not…” Oh Maker above, he was. “You’re thinking about that? Considering it?” She couldn’t fathom it. After everything Tenebris did. The elf king was immoral, wicked, a fiend and deserved no sympathy, least of all from Layala or Thane.

“I,” he paused, sliding his palms down his face. “I don’t know. I want him gone but—I thought I fed him to pale ones, and a part of me is relieved he didn’t suffer that way.”

She remembered walking into his tent one night when he’d dreamed of the day he brought his father to the Void and the guilt that ate away at him. Shefeltit then. She didn’t now, and maybe that was why her jaw still dropped, why she couldn’t understand. Tenebris had a list of unforgivable offenses a mile long.I can’t believe this is happening. Layala wanted Tenebris dead almost more than anything.She would take her revenge, the thing she’d been trained to do her entire life despite Thane’s conflicted, twisted relationship with his father.

“He’s the worst person imaginable, Thane! Release this guilt. It’s unwarranted!”

“You don’t understand because he’s not your father.”

That felt like a slap to the face. “I don’t even have a father because of him!” she snarled. “You insensitive prick.” She turned away, stalking down the beach, seething. She shoved her fingers into her hair, scraping her nails over her scalp. He saw his father one time and suddenly changed his mind about this? How could they live in a world where the three of them existed? Tenebris who would use her, Thane who lived to protect her, and she, the source of conflict in between.

Large fingers wrapped around her bicep and spun her around. “Laya, stop. I’m sorry. Iaman insensitive prick. I wasn’t thinking.”

“I’m never going to forgive him.” She jerked out of his grasp, taking one step back, two. “Never. He’s dead one way or another.”

“I’m not asking you to forgive him. I never would.” The storms in his very eyes were as dark as the booming sky above.

He reached for her, and she pushed his hand away. “But you’re asking me to let him live, aren’t you?”

“No,” he said gently. The rain streaked down his face, and the sag of his shoulders looked to hold the weight of the world. “I’m asking you to understand. Understand why I couldn’t kill him. And my mother was there and I—I couldn’t.”

She didn’t know her parents but if Aunt Evalyn was evil, she didn’t think she’d be able to kill her when it came down to it. Especially if she wanted to ask for forgiveness. Killing a stranger was much easier than a loved one. But would he stand by and watch as Layala did it? Would he try to stop her? This situation made the knots in her stomach worse.

She sighed, turning toward the forest. Would he hold it against her if she did kill him? Was she going to have to choose between killing Tenebris and loving Thane? “You won’t have to. I will. You can’t rob me of this. He almost took you from me. For power, Thane. And you’re defending him.” She shook her head, thinking of Tenebris’s boot smashing her hand in the dining hall, grinding her bones. She started to walk away again.

He stepped in front of her and took her face in between his hands. “I’m not going to fight with you, and you’re not just going to walk away.” Then he smashed his lips to hers.

She gripped his wrists, kissing him back. He was as infuriating as the day she met him, but she melted in his arms.

He pulled back and rested his forehead against hers. “I will always choose you, Laya.” His voice was gravelly and full of emotion. “I want you to know that.” And he had proved that time and again.

She looked up into his eyes. He tentatively lowered his lips closer to hers, a breath away, this time waiting. After a few beats she gave in again, kissing him deeply, wrapping her arms around his neck. The rain poured down, soaking through their clothes. She would normally be cold in this stormy weather, but his hot kisses trailed down her neck, warming her body. With frenzied desire building inside, Layala dragged him down on the wet grass. Callused hands slid around her waist, gliding under her top. She craved his touch like a drunk longed for booze, intoxicated in much the same way. “You promised,” she breathed, while his fingers inched below the hem of her pants at her waist and tugged them down, “to destroy anyone who hurt me.”

“And I will.” He dragged his hands roughly over her bare thighs. The thunder boomed with the ferocity of an angry god. With eager longing, Layala watched his deft fingers pull his belt loose. “I will,” he swore.

A moment later, she pulled him on top of her, wanting, no, needing him. His kisses were intense, full of hunger and command, as was the way he moved against her. Everything in her felt a little hazy and heavy like the horizon dotted with mist and as she arched his thumb tugged down her bottom lip. His touch might have been embers igniting her flesh. Every kiss left its heated mark on her. Every sound she made, a call for more. As she watched the forked lightning streak across the stormy sky, it could have been her, crackling with blazing heat, illuminating the dark, and finally bursting into thunder where hot and cold collided.

* * *

The sun peekedout from behind the angry clouds, warm and soothing. She lay on Thane’s chest, absently running her fingers over his bare skin. “Were you ever tempted to sleep with anyone else?”

“Is this a trap?”

She chuckled and lifted her head, propping her chin on her folded hands. “No. I’m serious. Was it hard to wait for me?”

Bringing up his arms behind his head, he took a deep breath. “Well, I am an exceptionally attractive elf and there were many females groveling at my feet.”

She lightly pinched his chest. “Arrogant pig.”

He laughed, a deep rumble that seemed to move through her. “Of course it was hard. There was more than one occasion that I came into my room to find a mostly naked, if not fully nude, maiden there waiting on my bed.”

Layala’s mouth dropped. “Who?”