Page 57 of Claimed In Darkness

I don’t feel hatred.

I feel want.

Something base, something carnal, something I cannot afford to touch but ache to sink my teeth into.

This is the moment she changes.

This is the perfect timing she stops trying to be the girl she used to be.

The moment I know, without a doubt, that I will never let her go.

"Clean her up," Zareth continues, rising from his throne. "And then bring her to us. We have much to discuss."

Nairaposture locks, her fingers still slick with red, her lips still painted in someone else’s death.

I don’t give them a chance to say anything else.

I move before they can, stepping toward her, grasping the bloodied wrist that still clutches the dagger.

She does not resist.

She does not fight.

I guide her from the chamber, past the dead weight on the floor, past the leering eyes of the council, past the knowledge that they think she is theirs now.

She isn’t.

She is mine.

The private bathing chamber is silent except for the steady drip of blood against stone.

I stand at the threshold, watching as she steps beneath the cascade of hot water, her dress soaked through, turning black against her skin, the fabric clinging in ways I should not be noticing.

The silence is deafening.

She only scrubs.

Her hands work over her arms, her throat, the ridges of her knuckles, but the blood does not leave easily.

It never does. Not the kind that stains you on the inside.

I move before I think better of it, stepping behind her, reaching for the basin of oils set beside the bath.

Her shoulders tense at the change in the air.

She knows I’m here.

She just doesn’t stop me.

The aroma of cedar and spice fills the space between us, curling into the steam as I dip my fingers into the oil, rubbing it between my palms before reaching for her.

She still doesn’t stop me.

Not when my hands slide over her shoulders, working the soap and oil into her skin, rubbing slow, deep circles into the tense line of her back.

Her breathing is too steady.

She is trying to control it.

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