Page 230 of The Devil's Thorn

I raised a brow, stepping further into the room. “That sounds like a very carefully rehearsed answer.”

“It’s the truth.” He held my gaze. “Men like Cormac… they deal in power. And in our world, power means bloodlines. Control. Legacies they can breed into obedience.”

He said the wordbreedlike it tasted wrong in his mouth. And I felt something cold curl in my chest.

“But they don’t offer wives because they care about marriage,” he continued. “They offer control. Influence. A tether.”

My arms folded loosely over my chest as I leaned against the opposite wall. “And here I thought this was all just romantic old-world chivalry.”

That earned me a low chuckle, barely audible. “Hardly. I’ve been offered daughters, nieces, once even a mistress who was ‘trained to keep quiet and smile.’”

I blinked. “Jesus.”

“Exactly.”

His gaze dropped for a moment, then lifted again—this time heavier. More deliberate.

“They offer women to men like me because they think we’re missing something. That without a family, without an heir, we’re vulnerable. Replaceable. Easier to erase.”

I swallowed. That made sense. Too much sense.

“So you’ve never considered it?” I asked, voice quieter now.

He was still for a moment. Too still. “I considered it once,” he said. “A long time ago. Before I knew what it cost.”

I waited, letting the silence stretch. But he didn’t elaborate. And I didn’t push. Instead, I asked the other question that had been burning in the back of my throat since Cormac first opened his mouth.

“You don’t have a wife,” I said slowly. “And you don’t have an heir. So… do you even want that? Kids. A family. All of that.”

I wasn’t sure why my chest tightened as I said it. But it did.

He didn’t look away. “I don’t know,” he said honestly. “I used to think I did. Then I saw what happens when people bring children into a world like mine and expect them to survive it.”

There was something heavy in his voice now. Something old. Wounded.

“I’ve seen too many men raise sons to be soldiers and daughters to be currency. And I swore I’d never be one of them.”

My throat ached, but I forced the words out. “But that doesn’t mean you wouldn’t be different.”

He looked at me—really looked at me—and something shifted in his eyes. Not softness. Not vulnerability. Something deeper.

“If I ever had a child,” he said, voice lower now, “I’d want them to be free. Strong. Ruthless if they had to be—but only because they chose it, not because I gave them no other choice.”

I felt the weight of that settle in my chest. Because I knew he meant it.

I stepped closer, slow and quiet, until we stood only a breath apart. “And what about now?” I asked. “Do you think you could want that now?”

His gaze didn’t move from mine. “With the right person… maybe.”

I didn’t smile. But I didn’t look away either. Because somehow, despite everything—despite the blood, the history, the fire still smoldering between us—this felt more intimate than anything that had come before.

Not a kiss. Not a touch. Buttruth.And I wasn’t sure what scared me more—what it meant for him… Or what it meant for me.

He didn’t move. Neither did I. We just stood there in the stillness of that study, beneath the flicker of a sconce that cast shadows along the curve of his jaw and the dark glint in his eyes. Something shifted in the space between us—not sharp or sudden, but slow… like the pull of gravity. Unavoidable.

My heart thudded, steady but hard, my body thrumming with something I didn’t want to name. Because naming it made it real. Made it matter more.

His gaze dropped to my mouth, and I felt it—that pause—before he lifted his hand. Fingers brushed against my cheek, and his thumb rose, slow and deliberate, to trace along my lower lip.