Page 109 of The Unweaver

Unsated hunger smoldered in his eyes as he drank her in. His gaze dragged over her body, committing every slender curve and shadowed hollow to memory. “Truth be told, I thought I was going mad from wanting you.”

Their gazes connected. In the last fragment of her imploding mind Cora knew she couldn’t trust the emotions throbbing inside her. But she’d never wanted anything, anyone, as much as she wanted him. The feel of his lips and hands lingered in wakefulness, temptingly thorough in their possession. Mounting a resistance against this mounting desire felt impossible.

She wanted to slake the craving his nearness brought to a fever pitch. Wanted to crawl into his arms and close all the distances between them. Thread her fingers through his hair and let his touch burn away the uncertainty. Splinter into a thousand pieces and reform into another version of herself. The girl she might’ve been, had her life taken another path.

His fingers grazed hers. Slowly, he lifted her hand and pressed a kiss to her palm, devouring her with his endless eyes. Awareness coursed where they touched—all the places they could touch. He curled her fingers inward as if to keep hold of his kiss. Then, with careful deliberation, he set her hand on the bed, withdrawing his own.

Brows knitting, she searched his features, concealed once more by shadows. She thought she glimpsed desire and restraintdueling for control. Wishful thinking, perhaps. “Don’t you ever think of me that way, Malachy?”

More than silence was between them, deepening with each beat of her racing heart. There were a hundred words in his eyes but only one on his lips.

“Yes,” he said. “Frequently. And in great detail.”

He angled closer. For a breathless moment, she hoped and feared he might kiss her. A beginning or end to this torture. Catching himself, he drew back. His gaze found hers, the corners of his mouth lifting in a mournful smile. “But I won’t.”

Her heart sank. Now he was the one saying those words. “Why?”

“It’s not for lack of wanting you, Cora. You want a kind of intimacy I can’t give you. Even if I did all the things I want to do to you, you’d only come to hate me for not giving you more. For not giving you what you deserve. I haven’t the heart to love you.”

A gentle rejection. Not born of disgust but conflicted self-restraint, or frustrated self-denial. Cora was just another woman who wanted too much from Malachy Bane.

Of course. It was reasonable. Sensible. Devastating.

Rationally, she’d already known the outcome. Logically, she’d told herself as much. But hearing it from his lips made it real. What scant pleasures they might share weren’t worth compromising theirlifelongworking relationship.

Cora had few expectations to be disappointed by, yet disappointed she was. Rejection was a bee sting with lethal accuracy. The war between his words and his body tempered nothing. His internal conflict was a weak salve for her wounded heart.

Unable to bear meeting his gaze and reconfirm the painful truth, she glanced down at their hands on the bed. Almost but not quite touching.

The scar on her bare wrist nearly shimmered in the night. She’d forgotten to put gloves on. Wrenching her hand away, she buried it under the covers.

Alarm smothered any lingering passion. He’d witnessed how she’d gotten those scars and all the darkest miseries of her life. He’d seen for himself how unstable she was, rebuilt from broken parts on an irreparably damaged foundation. It was enough to cool even the strongest of desires, and Bane had only a passing curiosity about her. A craving satisfied after one taste.

Last night, he had wanted to kiss her. Now, he knew too much to make that mistake again.

“What really happened?” he asked softly.

“Right.” The laugh tasted bitter on her tongue. “As if you didn’t just see the whole thing for yourself.”

“Tell me. Please.”

A word she never thought she’d hear out of the Realmwalker’s mouth. The undertow of those terrible memories threatened to abduct her. She stared down at the vining scars. The beginning and ending of Cora Walcott.

“I-I killed Felix. I wasn’t sorry then and I’m not sorry now. After they found me, I ran away and… died. For a while, at least.”Couldn’t even get that right. “I awoke in a hospital with Mother perched by my bed.”

“Did you sense Felix’s death beforehand? How much time between killing Felix and yourself? Seconds? Minutes?”

Her head snapped up at his insistent questions to find his gaze strangely intent. “I wasn’t exactly keeping an eye on the time. Does it matter? A few minutes, maybe.”

“How many minutes? Two? Five? Ten?”

She pulled the covers to her neck against the intensity of his attention. Gone was the blue-eyed man who’d comforted her in dreams. His black eyes burned with unfurling schemes.

“Maybe five. Why do you care? Don’t you have enough dirt on Cora Walcott?”

“I know there is no Cora Walcott.” Her breath faltered at his gentle words. “Cora Walcott doesn’t exist. The Sacred Heart orphanage registered Theodore Walcott’s twin as Theodora. Who died in 1906, on the same day as Felix Rabinowitz.”

Naming the orphaned twins Theodore and Theodora had been a small step up from numbering them, she supposed.

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