Page 44

I’m not that girl. Ican’tbe. But I want to be—for tonight. For him.
Elias is all lazy limbs and a wicked grin, his hand casually abandoned on my thigh like it belongs there. Which, unfortunately, it does. He hasn’t looked at me in a few minutes, like he’s giving me space to think, but I feel him tense just enough to notice when I shift.
He knows I’m spiraling.
“You thinking about how to ditch the rest of our cult so we can sin properly?” he murmurs under his breath, voice so low I feel it rather than hear it.
My gaze flicks to him. His lashes are too pretty, his smile too smug. I roll my eyes, but he knows me better than I want to admit.
“I don’t want to make this worse,” I whisper, and I hate how small that truth feels on my tongue.
Elias’s expression doesn’t change, but I feel his grip on my thigh tighten slightly—just enough to make my pulse stutter. He doesn’t mock me. Doesn’t give me a joke to fill the silence. He just leans in, lips nearly brushing my ear, and says, “Then letmefix it.”
“What do you mean?”
He straightens and stretches—full, lazy, absolutely exaggerated like a cat in a sunbeam—then turns toward the bar with an almost-too-loud groan. “Gods, I’m drunk. I think I’m gonna puke. Someone’s gonna have to hold my hair back.”
Silas cackles from across the room, mid-chorus of whatever song he’s massacring. “Please don’t die in the toilet again! It was traumatizing.”
“Onetime,” Elias mutters dramatically, pushing away from the table, swaying slightly on purpose. He lingers a beat longer—just long enough to catch my eye.
The bond pulses once between us. A private pull.Come with me.
And then he’s gone, staggering through the crowd toward the back corridor like a man on a mission to disgrace himself publicly.
Silas leans in. “You should check on him,” he says, trying to sound helpful and failing miserably at hiding the grin playing on his lips.
“I really shouldn’t.”
“Wouldn’t want him to choke on his own shame.”
I glance around. Lucien is deep in conversation with Orin, who’s studying a piece of parchment with furrowed brows. Riven hasn’t moved, his eyes half-lidded in that I-see-everything silence he wears like armor.
I sigh, push back my chair, and murmur, “I’ll make sure he doesn’t ruin the plumbing.”
Silas salutes me with his ale. “You’re a hero.”
But as I follow Elias through the crowd, slipping into the darkened hall behind the bar, I don’t feel like a hero. I feel like a girl chasing heat. Like I’m ready to lose myself—for a night, maybe longer—to the man who’s waiting for me at the top of the stairs.
And if anyone asks?
He really did look like he was going to puke.
I don’t see him in the hallway, but the bond between us is magnetic, a pull that coils down my spine and tightens behind my ribs with every step. The tavern’s noise fades behind me, swallowed by the creaking hush of wood and torchlight. One door. Closed. Waiting. I don’t knock.
It swings open like it’s been listening for me.
Then Elias is there—no smirk, no slow approach. Justmovement, swift and sharp. He grabs my wrist, yanks me inside, and before I can blink, I’m pressed against the door, his body crowding mine, hands braced above my head. His mouth is a whisper from mine. And all I can think is—oh.
“You moved,” I breathe, caught somewhere between shock and laughter. “Fast.”
“You say that like I’m not in my prime,” he mutters, but his voice is husky, rougher than usual. He’s not joking. Not now.
This version of Elias—the one who moves with purpose instead of sarcasm—is a rare, deadly thing.
His breath brushes my lips. “So, are you going to say something smart, or just keep staring at my mouth like you want to sit on it?”
It short-circuits my brain. I panic. Iflounder.