Page 35 of Harvest of Sighs (Thornchapel 3)
“No. I told her. Today actually, before I left. I wanted so badly to bring her here with me to London, I need her so much, and I know she would’ve come if I asked, and yet—”
“You knew St. Sebastian needed her more,” I finish for him.
Auden nods miserably.
He’s right. And it’s the same thing I would have done if I had two subs and found myself in a similar bind. “How does Poe feel about the . . . you know . . . brother thing?”
“She wasn’t exactly chuffed that I hadn’t told St. Sebastian about it—she excoriated me quite thoroughly, in fact. And now she has to overlook that she’s in love with two of Ralph Guest’s sons, when it was already hard enough being in love with only one. But the actual consanguinity doesn’t seem to bother her.” Auden’s lips tilt up in a weak smile. “She said she thinks it’s rather titillating.”
“De gustibus non est disputandum,” I murmur.
Auden lets out a laugh as weak as his smile as he turns to search for his glass. “Quite right.”
“Auden, what do you want?” I ask as he walks over to the coffee table and retrieves his drink. “I mean, truly. What is it that you want from this?”
“Him,” Auden says without hesitation, simply and firmly and also with enough despair to raise goosebumps on my arms. “I want him.”
We stare at each other for a long moment, and it’s not the boy I grew up with looking at me. It’s Auden of Thornchapel, the Guest heir, the wild god.
It’s a king, and I don’t know how to feel about a king standing in my living room holding warm gin when kings are supposed to stay in the woods. Safely inside our little Thornchapel games.
But even kings need advisors, and so I give him my honest advice. “Maybe you know what you want,” I say. “But do you know what you’re willing to lose in order to get it?”
Auden’s lips part as he looks at me. And then he slowly shakes his head. “I don’t—I don’t think I do. Should I?”
“Yes. And be prepared to lose him anyway. Brothers, Auden. Brothers! And you lied to him about it?”
“It wasn’t lying—oh, hello, Pickles.”
Delphine has opened the door to the bathroom, letting out a cloud of steam and the animated chatter of her favorite podcast—something about romance novels and blooding?—and she emerges from the steam in a silk robe that clings to every soft curve of her. It’s short enough that when she turns to close the door, I can see the delectable curves of her arse.
“Just grabbing some turmeric and beet juice before I do my oil cleanser,” she says, and Auden and I both nod, as if this is a sentence that has any real meaning for us. She digs in her bag for a moment, pulls out a trendily packaged bottle of orange liquid, and then disappears back into the bathroom, like a busty phantom of self-care. But not before she loops by to drop a kiss on my cheek, which I intercept with a hand on the nape of her neck and a kiss of my own, right on her lips. Quick, hard, and ruthless, like I like. She’s pink-cheeked and bashful as she walks back into the bathroom and closes the door.
After her podcast starts up again, Auden turns to me and says, “Something’s changed between you two.”
I finish my drink and start walking toward the kitchen. “Yes.”
“Is this more than just kink?”
“More how? And don’t think I don’t know you’re trying to change the subject.”
He turns and looks at me, taking a long, insolent drink as he waits for me to answer my own question. Which I refuse to do. He may be my best friend, but Delphine is my business.
Mostly.
“You hated each other,” he says after it’s clear that I am not going to answer. “For years. All those awkward parties, Bex, do you remember? All those parties when you and Delphine would have to be in the same room and so you’d bicker nonstop?”
“I remember it quite well, Sir Guest. As well as I remember you wrestling St. Sebastian in front of your house because you hated him so much.”
His eyes darken. Another drink. “Point taken.”
The look on his face is almost enough to make me feel bad for bringing up St. Sebastian again. “Look, Delphine and I don’t hate each other now,” I say, although even as I say it, the words feel flimsy. Disingenuous.
She said she loves you.
“You don’t hate each other now,” he echoes. “Is that all? Is that the only reason she’s here getting kissed like that?”
I look at the window across from me, at the woman reflected there. Tailored clothes, lifted chin, perfect flat behind her. Everything as it should be. No chirpy blond tarts who cover sinks in lipsticks and bottles of micellar water. No shoulders hunched against unravelling feelings.
