“Yet you’ve done everything to prove so far that that’s a lie, David.”
“Like what?”
“Like the way you treat me, and how much you hate me for telling you the truth.”
“I don’t hate you for telling the truth, Ara. I hate you for sleeping with my brother,” he said, leaning in so his face was right in front of mine. “And, as far as I’m concerned, I may have little reason left to live, but I’ve even less reason to let you or my brother live. I just can’t do it. I can’t rule this monarchy if I have to look at you every day.” He opened my door and shoved me inside. “You need to stay in here until I decide what to do with you.”
“David, wait.” I ran forward before he could close the door. And I wanted to argue or plead with him, but his eyes had gone completely black, like he wasn’t even alive in there anymore—as if the vampire had stepped up to save his heart from the complication of feeling, and completely wiped my David away in the process. I took a humble step backward and spoke to the floor. “I . . . I can’t get this dress off by myself. Can you send—”
“You can sleep in it,” he barked and slammed the door shut in my face. I heard the keys rattle in the lock, and when I tried the handle a second later, it wouldn't turn.
But my stomach did. I laid my hand over it, waiting for the quivering to stop. I could’ve ended it. I could’ve lied and told David the only reason I slept with Jase was to save his life—that I didn’t love Jason anywhere in my heart. But we’d founded our love on lies from the beginning: the truth I carried back then for loving Mike. The truth he carried for the man and the creature he was that he would never show me. One lie after another had come between us, and I just couldn’t look him in the eye and tell him I didn’t, and that I never loved Jase. I didn’t want to love him, but what did that mean, really? It was stupid and it couldn’t be classed as a real emotion in any way, shape, or form. But it was how I felt. I loved both of them equally once, and my love for David grew beyond what I felt for Jase. Only, now, David was killing that love off just a little bit every day. I knew he was hurt. I knew he needed time to deal with how he was feeling, but a part of me wondered if maybe this was just it—this was how it would be forever now.
How little could he have loved me before if he wasn’t willing to at least try to forgive me?
Then again, how little could I ever have loved him to expect that?
All I could hope for now was a quick and painless death for Jason. I didn’t even have a hope that I might join him one day, because as soon as my baby turned eighteen, I’d be killed, and my soul would belong to Lilith again. And the fact that I knew, so deep it was almost a part of me, that David would find comfort in my death made the heaving in my gut quicken. A blast of vomit spilled into my fingertips, landing in the toilet only by the pure miracle of the vampire speed I used to get to the bathroom. I sobbed as hard as I vomited, my stomach churning and burning like a hole was being ripped open inside me.
“Shh,” said a quiet voice, and my hair moved back off my face under soft fingertips. “Just breathe, sweet girl. Don’t cry.”
“Jase?” I coughed and spat into the toilet again, wiping my hand along my mouth.
“Just breathe.”
His smiling face was there waiting for me when I turned around. “How did you get in here?”
“Went out the window,” he said casually, a half smile turning one corner of his lip.
I stood up just a little, still cramped and sore. “You could get in big trouble, you know?”
He just nodded and said, “I know,” then handed me a facecloth.
“Thank you.” I blotted the smudged mascara from under my eyes first, then wiped my mouth clean.
“Come on then.” He spun me at the shoulders so I faced the mirror on the wall above the sink. “Let’s get this dress off you.”
“Do you know how to undo it?”
He stopped for a second and leaned forward to whisper in my ear. “I’ve undone my fair share of corsets, Ara.”
I laughed timidly, reaching down to hold the counter top. Pull by pull, the corset came loose and my lungs expanded, revelling in the simplest form of freedom. “You’re a lifesaver, Jase.”
His arm circled my waist, a flat hand holding the front of my dress to my ribs as he turned me slowly to face him, pressing a very warm, very sweet kiss to my cheek. “I’m sorry about what happened tonight.”
I closed my eyes and moved my face along his lips, feeling them brush so softly over my skin that it tingled. “Don’t be sorry, Jase.”
“But I am all the same. He shouldn't treat you like that.”
“I know.” I snuggled into his chest, holding my breath as his warm hands cupped my spine and the dress fell downward, held there by my hips, leaving my bare br**sts against Jason’s shirt. “I tried to defend myself against him, but he’s so. . .”
“Forceful.”
“Yeah.” I nodded.
“Well, he doesn’t own you.” He smoothed his hand down my waist and pushed the dress away, helping me step out of it. “If he keeps this up, I’ll kidnap you, and he’ll never see you again. I swear it on my mother’s grave.”
I laughed, tossing the dress off to the side. “I’d kinda like that.”
“Really?” Jase pulled me closer by my bare hips. “Because I’ve made plans, Ara. All you have to do is say the word, and we’ll be gone so fast they won’t realise it until we’re in another country.”
I thought long and hard in that few seconds as I laid my cheek to his chest and let out a breath. “I can’t run from my problems.”
“Of course you can.” He laughed, tangling his fingers in my hair and sliding a few pins out so it all dropped loosely down my back. “But, let’s just get some clothes on you and get you to bed for now. We’ll talk more about it when you’re ready.”
“That sounds good,” I said, but instead of moving away, I slowly lifted one arm, then the other, up to his neck and wrapped them tightly around him, angling my head so my crown wouldn’t chill his jaw. “Thank you, Jase. I really needed someone just now.”
He squeezed me a little tighter, breathing me in deeply. “I know.”
***
The song of summer birds was gone when I opened my eyes, having retreated with the day that began before this one. Only rain owned these skies now, leaving a very clear, very stern warning that winter was on its way. I’d never seen the snow at the manor, but people had told me there was nothing like it in all the world.