Bathing in her.
The level of connection was scary and sexy all at once.
After so long alone, I’m his lifeline. His everything. Probably not healthy.
Well. How healthy can you be while you’re dead and trapped in a crumbling house?
Grace made coffee while hot blood rushed to her cheeks and her nether region.I’ve been so wrapped up in this house, this plan, that I might as well be trapped here, too.
I’m okay with that—I think.
Sex wasn’t supposed to equate any sort of love. Well, in her heart of hearts, she had the dream of love coming first, then sex, and then marriage, and maybe kids, or at least a long, fulfilling life together. She knew that the “modern, liberated” woman was supposed to just enjoy pleasure for pleasure’s sake.
And she did!
But never the way she’d enjoyed it with Nyx.
“I miss you,” she whispered the words into the blackness of the burbling coffee pot.
Instantly, shadows wrapped around her waist, and a hard chin rested on her shoulder.
“I missed you, too. You... You are in danger here,” Nyx’s low voice rasped against her ear. “I’m selfish to keep you here. As long as I exist, I must stay. As long as this place stands, I exist. You should...”
Grace rounded on him, mouth open. “What? Are you seriously trying to do the morning-after-epic-sex-break-up with me?” she shrieked.
“What? I don’t even know what that is!” Nyx didn’t push her away; he clung to her more tightly.
Grace could hear his breathing, labored and pained. “What? What is it?”
“I don’t want you to get hurt. There is danger here. From me. I remember. I remembered... I caused Cynthia’s death. I killed her. Not with my own hands, per se, but—”
“She fell from a horse!”
“I scared her horse! I scared her!”
“I’m not scared of you! I like you! I l—” Grace’s teeth met her lip so hard she tasted traces of blood. “Ow.”
Nyx pushed himself back to arm’s length to regard her. “What were you going to say?” he gasped.
“Nothing! I... Well, something stupid. Silly. I know it’s not like love-love. But I love being with you like we were last night.”
“Oh. The pleasuring. You love that. Well, I confess I do, too, but not enough to risk your life.”
“That puts you in a surprisingly small group of men these days, I’m sorry to say,” Grace said drily. “There are a lot of sickos who put their pleasure above pretty muchanythingelse, including their partner.”
Nyx’s face seemed to pale from shadowy black to ashen gray, features sharpening as he shook his head, a troubled frown on his face. “I never put her at risk. I... We...” He scraped narrow fingers through his lank hair. “The woman I was with was in no danger.”
Grace waited for more of an explanation, but none came. “I’m sure you didn’t mean to hurt Cynthia,” she finally whispered, patting his arm.
Nyx shook his head, eyes narrowed. “I very much did.”
“But honey... You frightened her? Or the horse?”
“Right.”
“How?”
“I kept appearing to them, I believe. Behind her one second, then in front as she raced through the woods on the old bridle path.”
