Page 54 of Her Dark Promise

He laughed as he rubbed the back of his head. “I apologize. Sometimes I get a little carried away.” He set the leatherbound book to the side of him on the floor. “May I please ask you a question, your grace?”

Changing tactics, are we?

I gave him a guarded look. “Now what?”

“Bastian said that you both made a deal. May I ask what that entails?”

I smiled, seeing this as my chance to rile him up a bit. I leaned forward, resting a hand on my knee, placing my chin on my palm.

“When he first arrived I thought that he was here to bring harm to this castle and its inhabitants, but it turns out that it was all a misunderstanding. Though as you know that doesn’t matter, so he made a wager. We would fight, and if he won, he would leave with my head, but if I won, he would stay…and be mine.”

He contemplated everything I told him, and I waited, staring at him to catch his disgruntled reaction, but it didn’t come.

“Why didn’t you make a similar deal with me?”

“I didn’t need to. You were already willing to stay to save your sister.”He nodded, then asked, “Could we make a deal?”

“You have nothing to offer me.” He placed a hesitant hand on my knee, the knot at his throat bobbed. “What do you think you’re doing?”

“Is this the deal that you made with my brother? Isn’t this what you want?” It all felt mechanical. He was hesitant, not knowing what to do, as he lifted onto his knees and leaned toward me. “I would like to be your whore.”

He was shaking. I knew that he was infatuated with me, his eagerness gave him away, but this felt wrong. I placed my hand on top of his to stop him and asked, trying to redirect the conversation, “And what would your brother think?”

He lifted his hand from my thigh and bowed his head. “Take me instead of Bastian. He—” There was a pause, heavy, lingering. “He doesn’t need another reason to hate himself.”

What the hell did that mean? Did I sense self-loathing in Bastian? Yes. But I didn’t understand where it came from, and why it continued to grow in my presence.

“You are presumptuous. I’m well satisfied with Callum.”

“If that were true, you wouldn’t look at Bastian the way you do.”

My mouth went agape. “I look at him and you the same way. Inconvenient little deer that wandered onto my property, and every day I contemplate gutting for meat.” I stood from the chaise lounge and was about to leave when his hand flew out and he gripped me around my wrist.

“Wait.” I looked down and raised an eyebrow, waiting for him to continue. “I have nothing to offer you. All I have is my mind, my intellect.”

His mind.

I remembered what he said yesterday about traveling the world. I briefly imagined it—all the things he’d seen that I couldn’t. Maybe he did have more use.

“Your mind, you say?” I turned my body around to face him. I placed my hands on his shoulders, pushed him back against the back of the lounge, and lifted a knee to rest against one leg.

“I thought you didn’t want me as your whore.”

“I don’t. But this,” I rested the other knee against his other leg, straddling him, and roved my hands up his neck and into his hair. “I want this.”

“My hair?”

He was so smart and yet so simple. I laughed.

“Your mind.” He opened his mouth to ask me to elaborate but then shut it as my hand covered his. “You want to make a deal? Fine. Mind for mind. I will answer one of your questions if I can see your memories willingly. One question for each memory.”

I dropped my hand.

He asked, “What are you hoping to see?”

I felt myself slip; my gaze lost. “Everything. I want to see what you’ve seen during your travels. But you will keep this between us. A word of it to anyone, even your brother, and I’ll—”

“Gut me for meat?”

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