Page 59

Chapter thirty-six

ATALIIA

Static was buzzing in my head like a frantic hive of bees.

They were dead.

They were all dead and I was free of them.

The tears still streaming from my eyes were those of relief, of sheer fucking joy that those men could no longer hurt another soul. I knew that the buzzing, the rigidness of my muscles, was from shock. A symptom of the memories that still haunted me, even after their creators were snuffed out.

Those would never leave, but eventually, I think they would fade. Or maybe I would just find peace with them as a new part of who I am.

“Ataliia.” Andrues’s voice echoed from behind me, his hands sliding down my arms as I leaned into his warmth. “You should get this blood off of you.”

I nodded, stepping from the threshold where I stood between rooms. I didn’t remember coming home. Didn’t remember making my way up the stairs and past my library into my bedchamber.

Andrues slid into the lavatory behind me, flicking his fingers toward the hearth in the corner and I watched as the flames danced to life, casting an autumn glow over the grey marble surfaces.

My fingers worked to strip the blood-soaked leathers from my body, a metallic scent wafting through the room as I tore them from my limbs. Steam lifted from the surface of the freshly-filled tub and my fingers caught around Andrues’s wrist as he turned to step from the room.

I didn’t have to ask; I didn’t have to tell him what I needed.

He slowly turned back to me, slipping his hand into mine, and guided me toward the water, helping me step into it.

A shiver skidded over my body as I lowered myself into the hot liquid, letting the warmth soothe my skin.

Andrues knelt beside me, dipping a single finger into the water and clearing it of the blood that had already soaked into it.

My hands wrapped around a sponge resting on the ledge, dipping it into the water before turning toward him and lifting to my knees.

He watched as I hesitantly reached for him, his eyes never leaving mine as my fingers wrapped around his jaw.

I brought the sponge to his face, gently washing the blood from his skin and the scars that lay atop it.

His jaw flexed as my fingers slid over the cut of it, slowly turning his head from side to side to make sure I had cleaned every bit of crimson from him.

I let them linger there for a moment, a moment that was longer than any friend would have allowed, as I swallowed back the urge to pull his lips to mine.

His eyes flickered as I finally pulled my hand from him and lowered myself back into the water, letting it lap against me as I pulled my knees to my chest.

“May I wash you?” Andrues asked, his voice hushed as his hand slipped into the water and pulled the sponge from my fingers.

I nodded, setting my chin against my knees and watched from the corner of my eye as he reached for the pitcher on the bathing table beside us and dipped it into the water, filling it.

He spilled the contents of it over my shoulders, and began to wipe away the evidence of the lives that I had taken.

“Thank you,” I whispered, shifting my cheek to my knees so I could look at him.

He nodded, his fingers brushing over my skin—my scars—as he poured more water down my back.

“Why did you do it?” I asked, my eyes falling to the clear liquid swirling around me. “You are not one for unnecessary violence, you could have just thrown them into the prisons once you found them. Why let me kill them?”

“Lean your head back,” he requested softly, but did not answer my question as he lathered soap into my hair. His fingers brushed through the raven strands, cleansing them as I waited silently, anxiously, for his response.

Another pitcher was filled and poured into my hair as he washed the soap from it before he responded.

“I know you well enough to know you would have gone after them one way or another,” he started, gently turning my body so that my back was facing him. His fingers ran through the damp stands, splitting it into sections as he began braiding it down my back.

“What happened tonight was necessary, and I know you needed it to feel safe. But you also deserved it.” His voice was a low growl now, his hands still weaving through my hair. “After what they did to you . . . you deserved to be the one to kill them.”

His hands slipped from my hair, tracing down the column of my neck.

“When Hyacinth told me—when I learned what they had done to you . . . I have had centuries to learn how to hone my rage, but I am still a violent man, Ataliia.”

His hands flexed around my shoulders, his forehead falling to meet the top of my head.

“There is nothing I would not do to keep you safe, no act of violence I would not commit to avenge every wrong that has been done to you.”

The only sound was the fire crackling in the corner of the room as my chest heaved at his words. My breaths grew short and rapid as his fingers began tracing small patterns down my arms.

“Kiss me,” I breathed, my eyes locking on the wall in front of us as I felt his head slowly lift from mine.

“Ataliia—”

“Kiss me, Andrues,” I said again, cutting him off as I turned to face him, his hands never leaving my skin.

His eyes darkened as they met mine and I swallowed.

“We are friends.” The words left his lips in a rasp as his eyes fluttered to my mouth.

I tilted my chin toward him, my fingers grasping around the curve of the bath’s copper edge. “Then kiss me as your friend, but kiss me either way.”

The words barely made it off the tip of my tongue before his lips crashed onto mine. His hands slid to cup each side of my face as he pulled me closer, uncoiling me from the water as he stood. A flame burst to life inside my chest as my fingers reached for him, burying into his hair and holding on.

I would not breathe. I would not think.

I would not give him a chance to pull away from me .

A growl escaped his throat as my dripping body pressed against him and his hands slid from my face down each curved side of my body, falling to the back of my thighs as he lifted me against him.

My arms wrapped around his neck, my fingers gliding over every ridge of the scar that stretched around his skin as our tongues tangled together. He walked us into the bedchamber without ever letting his lips leave mine.

The heavens exploded behind my eyes as he twisted my braided hair into his fist and pulled my head back.

His lips traveled down the expense of my throat as he lowered me to the bed.

His body pressed against me as his mouth trailed back up to mine and his teeth caught my bottom lip between them.

A moan rolled from my lungs as his hand locked around my jaw and his lips fully collided back onto mine in a kiss that trapped every ounce of our combined need between us.

It was greedy, demanding— fucking breathtaking .

His fingers slipped from my jaw and loosed around my hair, trailing down to my hips, digging into my skin as he pushed onto his knees and let his head fall between my breasts, taking deep, strained breaths.

My fingers slipped back into his hair, cradling his head as my chest rose and fell in sync with his own breathing.

I knew this couldn’t go further when I asked him to kiss me, knew I wasn’t in a place to give him the kind of love he deserved. I could not lose him as my friend, not now. But I had to taste him.

Had to know how it felt to be kissed by him.

“Ataliia,” he whispered, pulling his head from my chest and letting his eyes fall to mine. They swirled back at me with such a bottomless depth of longing as his hand slid up the side of my neck.

“I know.” I nodded, lifting my hands to cup his face in my palm, my thumbs grazing over the scars across his cheeks. “I know.”

He lowered his head, his lips lightly tracing mine, leaving me with one last breath of him before he slid off of me and onto his back. I pulled the blanket over my naked body as I rolled onto my side to look at him.

He stared silently up at the ceiling, one hand tucked behind his head as the other rested across his abdomen, his thumb twirling the rings along his fingers. I reached my hand out to him, pushing my fingers through his as his head fell to the side and his gaze locked on mine.

“Will you stay with me?” I asked across the quiet distance between us. His chin dipped in silent answer as he pushed himself under the blanket and dragged my body into his chest.

I didn’t care that I was wholly naked.

Didn’t care that his hands were on this skin, my skin .

I just wanted to be near him.

To feel him close.

His lips lowered into my hair, and as he took in the scent of me I thought maybe, one day—I might let myself love again.