Page 52 of Til Death Duke Us Part
PESKY RELATIVES
Eleven days later
The rhythm of Victor’s heart beneath Persephone’s ear was music. Her favorite thing to wake to, and she’d woken to it eleven mornings in a row now. Another rhythm she’d become to adore? The one that brought her from the alchemist cemetery to West London every night, straight into her tub then directly into his bed where he fed her whatever he could scrounge up.
She never asked where he got the money for provisions. He never asked her about the graves she dug or about her parents. They did not talk about the past in those heartrending kind of ways, when you dissect yourself to show your every scar, to reveal just how your heart works, hoping all the while the person you’re trusting won’t use those fragile secrets to hurt you.
They’d already done that in those first three hectic days. A road trip could make confidants of strangers. And eleven days outside of time could make lovers of confidants.
There she went—getting philosophical again. She chuckled, loving how the skin of her cheek slipped against the dusting of hair on his chest.
She knew exactly when he woke up. He rolled and stretched as he wrapped himself around her—one hand in her hair, the other on her hip, his long, heavy leg slung over hers, his nose rooting out the way to her lips with his eyes closed.
This too a now familiar and beloved rhythm. The gentle way he brought them both to climax as he woke, as if to wake were to need release in her body, a natural mechanism of living.
He held her close when they were done, but he went all… playful, tickling her ribs and caging her between his big body and the mattress, kissing her as she laughed, pressing the muscle of his thigh into the apex of her legs, making her squirm. And ache. Finally, he dropped down on top of her, his eyes dark and dancing.
“Get off me, you giant.” She tickled his ribs. It barely moved him.
“I don’t want to leave.”
“You must. You’ll soon compress my lungs entirely.” She loved the weight of him. Loved it. Loved it. So few days left.
She’d begun to hope he might… But he’d never said those three words. Did a man like him have it in him?
Yes. She rather thought he did, but… perhaps not for her. An alchemist’s daughter who dug graves.
An heiress.
She could tell him.
But she didn’t want a marriage for money. She wanted something else entirely.
“I have to leave,” he groaned. “Today is a busy day. I have to?—”
She silenced him with a finger across his lips. “We don’t talk of those things.”
He rolled off her and stared, glowered, at the ceiling. Then he rolled off the bed and began to dress. She watched him—muscles rippling, movements jerky, a scowl so fierce bringing a storm cloud into the room.
Fake rain began to pelt her.
She laughed. One thing she’d learned in the last eleven days—sometimes he produced glamours without thought. Whatever he was feeling or thinking about or imagining so fiercely would simply pop up into the world.
He turned around to see the gathering clouds on the ceiling, the raindrops that spliced over Persephone’s head, leaving her dry. They disappeared.
“Apologies,” he grumbled. “I never used to do this. Lose control of the glamours. You’ve ruined me a bit.”
She gathered the blankets over her nakedness and pulled herself up against the headboard. “I like it. I can see what you’re thinking when it happens. Like right now. You’re angry.”
“I don’t know why you’d think that.” A bolt of lightning struck behind him.
She pulled the edge of the blanket up over her mouth to hide her smile.
“Damn.” He swung back around, continued to dress. When he’d done, he strode to the bed, raking his fingers through his hair, trying to tame it. “Stay here today. I want you home when I return.”
“But—”
He kissed her, one knee on the bed, his entire body engulfing her as his lips, his tongue, swept away every cogent thought.
