Page 71 of Ember and Eclipse
Finally, he said, “I don’t want to fight you.”
He stepped carefully toward her. At first, she took a step back, but the look of pain that flashed across his face and sliced through her was so overwhelming that she moved forward again.
“I don’t want to hurt you,” he said as he closed the distance between them. His fingertips danced softly over her cheek, down the line of her jaw, before he fit his large hand around her neck.
The feeling was tantalizing. Exquisitely so. Her essence sparked through her. This she could do.Thiswas familiar. The fight, pushing everything down and away, the singular focus of destroying or being destroyed.
“But maybe that’s what you want. Because pain feels more familiar than comfort. Chaos more suitable than peace. Hatred a safe haven for your heart.”
It felt like she had been hit. “How dare you?”
But he didn’t look ashamed at all. “Is this what you want from me? A fight?”
She tried to jerk away, but his hand closed tighter around her neck even as she glared at him.
Devdan easily pulled her closer. “Answer me. Is it what you want?” He loosened his hold around her throat so she could speak.
She slapped him instead. The sound of it echoed around them. His eyes were all burning silver as he curled a lip to bare his teeth at her.
She lifted her hand to slap him again, but he caught her wrist. “You won’t be hitting me a second time, my love.”
Calling her his love in his low, gravelly voice was enough to undo her.
Still holding her gaze and his features softening, he brought her hand to his lips and kissed her palm.
“I have contemplated a thousand times why it is you.” He kissed her pinky finger.
“You are stubborn, infuriating, incapable of allowing yourself to feel anything that could later hurt you.” The next two fingers.
“You are under the belief that I only began to care about you because I found out you were my mate. But you’ve enchanted me from the moment you made me dance in Gavenport. I have ached for your smile, dreamt of your laugh, though I have only ever witnessed it once, craved your touch and scent. I was a madman while you were in that fucking carriage on the way to Romul, and even more so when you were in Asear’s clutches.” His voice grew raspy with emotion.
“Since Gavenport?” she breathed.
His chin tilted down in answer.
The truth of it was there.
“I couldn’t do anything. It was the first time I’ve ever felt truly powerless. If I got too close to you while another Lunae was around, they’d be likely to scent the bond, and I couldn’t risk that either.”
“And I know”—his brows furrowed in sadness—“how hard it is. This isn’t easy for me either. I’ve never been in this position before. And I’ve spent too much time trying to figure out if I have the ability to make you happy, if I even deserve you. If I can be worthy of you after everything that has happened.” His lips brushed over the space between her thumb and pointer finger.
Rel tracked the movement, tears gathering in her eyes without warning.
“You don’t belong to me, and I’d never ask that of you. But I belong to you. Youaremy fate. More than all of that, you are the only person I am absolutely terrified of. You have all the power here, Rel. You are my executioner, and I will not ask you to stay your hand. In fact, I’d kneel at your feet if only to make it easier for you to slit my throat.”
He placed her hand over his heart before letting go of her wrist.
“We are two strangers that Fate threw together by way of you hunting me down. I don’t know anything about you,” she said incredulously.
“Nothing? What do you want to know then?”
“And you don’t know anything about me.”
“I know some things.”
“We would fight all the time and hate each other.”
“You just said we don’t know anything about each other, so how can you be so certain?” A smirk played on the edge of his lips.
