Page 18 of To Vanquish Darkness

"I know. I don't want to complicate things. I could come over lunch if that's better. We could go to the café?"

Florent shifted in the grass. "And what about the girls?"

"I could ask Maurielle to watch them."

"She'd do that?"

Rachel shrugged. "She'd consider it, I'm sure."

"On such late notice?" He pushed forward and settled next to her, his thigh pressed against hers. Slowly, he lifted his hand and reached behind her head, grasping the pin that held her hair in a knot. "May I?"

Rachel's heart fluttered against her rib cage. She nodded, and he pulled, allowing her hair to pool in soft waves over her shoulders. This wasn't wrong. He wasn't asking to pull her trousers off for glory's sake, he only wanted to see her hair let out. She watched his eyes travel over her, tracing the swirls of her hair, then meandering back to her face.

"Beautiful," he whispered.

"Florent—"

"I want to see you at lunch, of course I do, but there's an unspoken tradition there with the other men. I'm barely provingmy worth. Would you be willing to give me a couple of weeks more to settle in? Then I don't think they'd bat an eye at me meeting someone."

Rachel's resolve slipped through her fingers. Of course that made sense. Of course that was why he'd been meeting her alone. He was only establishing himself in a new place. She nodded. "That will give me time to talk to my brother. I want you to meet him, and I know it may go poorly at first. He has rigid ideas of who belongs in this family, and I don't agree with him. He's going to have to come around because . . ."

Florent reached out and lifted her hand from her lap, then turned it, placing the hairpin in her palm. "Because what?"

Rachel gazed into his eyes, his hand still cupping hers. Pleasure rippled through her at his touch, sending heat under her skin. She struggled to form words since the only thoughts in her head were far too forward to speak aloud to a man she'd only known for a few weeks.

Florent curled her fingers over the pin, then trailed his hand up the backside of her arm until his fingertips reached the ends of her hair. Rachel couldn't stand it any longer. The heat building at her center exploded into fiery need, and she reached for him, gripping his shirt and pulling him close.

Rachel's lips parted, her silent plea for him to cover her mouth with his. Florent curled his arm around her waist, and when she thought she might split at the seams, he finally acquiesced.

His kiss was hungry, and Rachel reveled in the rough brushes of his tongue, the pressure of his hand against her back. She wanted more. All rational thought fled at the taste of him. He was sweet and warm, and?—

Florent pushed back, breaking their mouths apart with a groan. “I must go.”

“But—”

“I must go.” He stumbled to his feet, and before Rachel could see straight, he disappeared into the trees.

She heaved for breath, her lips raw and buzzing. She pressed her palms against the flattened grass and squeezed her eyes shut. It was only then that she noticed the metallic taste of blood.

9

1836 MORDELLES, FRANCE

The biting chill of the night seeped into Amalie’s bones as she lay huddled on the rough stone floor wrapped in a musty potato sack she’d found in the corner. She’d stripped off her damp clothes the second she was sure Theo was gone.

She could only shiver to warm herself. There was the box of matches, but there was nothing to light besides the wood beams of the shed itself. Part of her wanted to shatter the oil lamp and allow the flames to lick across the fuel and shoot up to the thatched roof. To breathe in the smoke until her lungs seized and her heart stopped beating. But if a stake to the heart didn’t kill Theo, perhaps all she’d be left with was pain and char for the rest of eternity.

She didn’t know how long it had been since Theo disappeared—it could’ve been five minutes or thirty. Amalie pulled her knees closer to her chest, her breath blooming in front of her. At least her nose no longer ached. She’d always healed quickly, though Uncle Oren forced her to stay home whenever she hurt herself. A cut, a scrape, a bruise, it didn’t matter.

“You heal when you rest,”Oren always said.“You must be careful with your blood.”

Truthfully, she’d been glad for the excuse to skip her daily chores. She clung to her thoughts and memories, but they were sluggish, numbed by the cold. Eventually, Amalie drifted in shadows tinged red.

The creak of hinges slashed her consciousness, and her eyelids flickered.

“That doesn’t look comfortable.” Theo’s voice struck like a slap, and Amalie’s body tensed until her bones cracked. His shadow stretched across the room, and she squinted to find the source of the light. Another lamp. It sat on the rough-hewn table.

She flinched at a sudden clatter and pressed her forearm against the stone to gain her bearings, then gasped as the potato sack didn’t come with her. She scrambled to cover herself, but Theo didn’t so much as glance her direction. He was wholly focused on stacking wood in the ancient hearth across the room.

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