He’d give her everything.
Only fair, wasn’t it? Since he’d taken everything away from her. All in one blink. Gone, gone, gone… “S-sorry,” he stuttered to her. He’d wanted to tell her before. That terrible night when the bullets had torn into her. But there had been no time for apologies. There had been no time for anything but a deal that changed both of their lives. And the damn thing was, even knowing how wrong it had been, he still thought he’d do the exact same thing.
Her tongue licked over his neck. “What for?” Her voice—it was husky and sensual. Not weak at all.
He forced his head to lift. Forced his gaze up. She wasn’t pale any longer. Her eyes were bright. Her lips were red and plump and he knew she wasn’t in danger. She wasn’t going to die.
He pushed away from the wall. She caught his hand—the hand that he’d driven into the tile again and again, sending chunks of marble raining into the shower as he tried to hold back his dark need for her. She lifted his hand to her mouth. Licked the blood away.
His beautiful Rose. She’d chained his beast. She’d never meant to do it. She didn’t even know she had.
His eyes started to close. His body slumped.
“Julian?” Alarm sharpened her voice. “Julian!”
He was going to pass out. Maybe he’d even die. He’d given her all that he had, given so much that his body was dangerously weak now, but Julian had no regrets. She’d survive—survive whatever hell Leo’s blood had put her through. It was a fair exchange, Julian figured, considering what he’d done to her.
“No, no, no! What did I do? What did I do?” She held him tightly. “I took too much…you should have stopped me! Julian, why didn’t you stop me?”
Didn’t she know? Did she truly not understand? He tried to keep his eyes open just a moment longer.
If he was headed to hell, he wanted to take a memory of heaven with him.
“Julian?”
He tried to smile but it was too late.
Chapter Twelve
“Hey, angel…”
Lila was sitting on the floor of her cell. Her wings had wrapped around her body. She was so cold. Her shivers wouldn’t stop.
“What does it feel like…” The muse stood near the bars of her cell. “When he takes your feathers?”
Lila glanced at her wings. “Pain.”
“Yeah, okay, I guessed that…but…what exactly, is the pain like?”
Lila hadn’t known any pain, not until a few months ago. Now it was all she knew. The first thing she’d ever felt—pain. The thing that would forever mark her now. “For you, I imagine…it would probably be like getting chunks of your skin cut away.”
“Oh, hell.” The witch scrambled toward the bars of her cell. “That bad? But… you don’t make a sound when he takes them.”
No, she didn’t. “Am I…supposed to make a sound?” She rose and moved closer to her own bars so that she could better see the other women.
The witch’s voice gentled as she said, “When it hurts, it’s okay to cry out.”
“No!” The muse made a sharp denial. “Don’t give him the satisfaction, you hear me, angel? You keep that pain inside. You don’t let him hear your pain. Freaks like him get off on that. They like making others hurt.”
She touched her wing. “Is that why he’s doing all of this? Because he…likes pain?”
The muse pressed her forehead to the bars. “No. No, as crazy as this may seem, he believes what he’s doing is for love.”
Lila shook her head. “This is love?”
“It’s not.” The witch’s voice seemed to echo around them. “I know love. Love is good and strong and it doesn’t hurt. It makes you better. It makes everything in your whole world better.”
Now the muse sighed. “Are we going to hear about your husband again?” She was mocking. She often seemed mocking. Not cruel but…not exactly kind.
The witch didn’t speak.
Lila sank down onto the floor once more.
“Because I want to hear about him,” the muse continued quietly. “Tell me again how your Thomas convinced you to marry him. Tell me about him again…so that before I die, I can know that at least someone was happy, once.”
“You aren’t going to die,” the witch told her.
The muse laughed. “What else would he do with us? For his love to come back, you know we have to die.”
They both knew more than she did. They’d been in their cells when she was first brought to the facility. She should question them but…she didn’t want to know if death was all that waited. Not right then. “I’d like to hear more about Thomas,” Lila whispered.
How long had it been since they’d had food? None of the guards ever came in to check their cells. The Collector had left strict orders that no one was to enter this domain. He’d been gone for days. If he didn’t come back soon…
He will, though. He’ll come back and the pain will just start again.
Her head lowered. “Tell me about love.”
Because all I know is pain.
“I met Thomas when I was sixteen…” the witch began, her voice soft. “And the first thing I did was curse him.”
Chapter Thirteen