“Grace personified, I see.”
He waved me off and set the bottle aside. “And I told you those things because they were true.”
“True?” I scoffed. “You expect me to believe that poor girl is a witch, or a Conduit, or whatever you called her! And that I’m one, too!”
“You’re afraid of me,” he said, standing and wiping the moisture from his lips.
“I’m not afraid of anything,” I answered, and for just a moment, it was true. I was too upset to be scared. This man had lied to me. He had screwed with my mind, screwed with my heart. I had let him into me physically, mentally, and emotionally. And the truth was, I had no idea who he was. So no, I wasn’t afraid. I was angry, goddamn it. “I’m pissed, and I want answers.”
“You already got answers. You just didn’t like them.”
“You’ve got a lot of nerve,” I said through clenched teeth.
“I’ve got a lot of a lot of things,” he answered, still moving closer. “Call it the unintended spoils of a very long life.” His eyebrows arched. “And I never said you were a Conduit.”
“What?” I asked, half stunned and half exasperated. If he changed his story now, I might really snap. Forget claiming to never see him again, I might kill him on the spot.
“A Conduit—the witch counterpart you referenced. I never called you one.”
He couldn’t be serious. A part of me had actually considered this, had actually held onto that shred of trust in him. And now he was saying he didn’t say those things?
“You did!” I yelled, stepping toward him before remembering my resolve to stay as far away as possible. “Not that it matters,” I cut out, “since you’re batshit crazy. But you did.”
“I most certainly did not.” He’d taken a few steps of his own—or rather, more than a few—and was almost on me now.
His chest heaved as he neared, as if he was becoming increasingly short of breath. I wondered about the change, about the monster he became, and about how difficult he said it was to control himself once it took him over. Was that what was happening now? Was I about to be torn apart?
He stopped, his body language softening as though he sensed that fear I had just moments ago denied feeling.
“I didn’t say you were a Conduit,” he repeated, more lightly this time. “I told you what you were, but you didn’t let me explain before you ran off.”
“What am I then?” I asked, my voice quivering as much as the rest of me did.
“Other than a beautiful pain in my ass?” He grinned. “You’re a Supplicant.”
“I’m also a Virgo,” I said. “Doesn’t mean anything to me, since I don’t believe in that stuff.”
“You wouldn’t be here unless some part of you did,” he countered, and he was right. “And as much as you want answers, I want to give them to you.”
I let out a shaky breath I didn’t realize I had been holding. He was standing too close to me now, and my stupid heart was fumbling around in my chest like a teenage girl’s moments before her first kiss.
“Then give them to me,” I said, trying to exert confidence with my voice.
His head tilted to one side and his gaze bore into my own. “Conduits perform magic. Supplicants, Charisse—Well, Supplicants are magic.”
He ran his forefinger lightly down my arm, causing every cell to stand at attention. I should have been afraid. I should have slapped his hand away. But I was frozen, consumed by a desire for him to keep touching me.
“There’s a limited source of mystical energy in this world, Charisse.” His finger traced my palm, sending sparks through me. “Increasingly limited, as it turns out. Nowadays, it’s only found in ancient relics and specific geographical hotspots.”
His finger moved from my palm and rested across my cheek, flirting dangerously with my lips.
“And in people like you, of course. I told you there was magic in your blood, and there is. Resting inside of you, Charisse, is the essence of everything in this world that’s worth having.” He moved his finger and cupped the back of my neck with his huge hand. “All beauty, all wonder, everything that poets write about and painters try to capture with a brush—it’s all because of you. It’s all inside of you.”
I swallowed hard, cursing the way heat was spreading through my body, the way my skin tingled beneath his touch.
“You …” I started, my voice a whisper. “You look like shit.”
It wasn’t true, of course, though he was disheveled—a shell of the dapper old-school gentleman I had come to know. He was still him: magnetic, intense, and quite possibly completely irresistible.
Of course, I didn’t want him to know that.