He gives me a terse nod. “Better to play the game and be ten moves ahead of him, to learn his weaknesses and to cut him where it hurts. If I simply lashed out and killed him, I’d have more than just his kingdom to worry about. I’d have the other royals banding against me. They’re nervous enough about my reign and my magic as it is. I have the wellbeing of my own people to consider. No one likes a rotten king, but it’s my people who would suffer, as well as the innocents in the other kingdoms if any of the monarchs strike out against me and force war.”
I can see the shifting marks of his power move beneath his skin, each one as thin as a hair strand. They move up his neck and disappear beneath his stubble like fishing line dipping beneath water.
I’ve offended him, that much is clear. And for a split second, I see the male beneath the crown. I see the way the world perceives him and the damage that can do to a person. If anyone knows about being made notorious, about being made into a thing, it’s me.
My chest hurts all of a sudden, my resolve jabbed-through with little pinpricks of pain.
His voice lowers, eyes bright and sharp, poking even more holes through me. “You think I wanted to sit there and do nothing while that asshole spoke to you that way?” he bites out. “You think I enjoyed his childish power play by ordering you to be carried to that harp? I wanted to leap over the table and crush his throat with my bare hands.”
As if to demonstrate his words, he lifts his arm, and his palm wraps around my neck. Except he doesn’t squeeze, doesn’t hurt. His dark words coil around my thumping heartbeat, while his touch encompasses my throat. His thumb brushes against my drumming pulse, not in a threat, but as a caress.
It takes a lot of willpower not to let my eyes flutter closed at the intimate touch, not to lean into his chest, though I feel the warmth of it like a blanket around my body. Aside from Midas, he’s the only person who touches me.
Every grip and stroke seems to fill an empty well inside of me. Despite the fact that he knows what touching my bare skin can do, he never hesitates. It’s like he can’t help himself, like he needs to feel me.
Midas never touches me like that. His touches are always placating—a pat on my head, a tap on my jaw. Either that, or it’s possessive. But with Slade, it’s neither of those things. He touches me like he can’t resist, like he can’t go one more second without feeling me.
Resisting him is difficult. But somehow, I don’t let myself surrender to th
at heat he spreads, don’t give in to that aching feeling that thrums to life between my legs. Instead, I slap his hand off me.
He lets go, hand dropping down to his side, and I take a mental fist around my ribbons, stopping them from reaching out. This close to him, it’s too hard to curb my feelings. So I turn my cheek, because I don’t want to get caught in the trap of his eyes or taste the lure of his words.
But as soon as I turn my head, he goes utterly still.
It’s an unnatural stillness. The kind that makes my breath shrivel up while confusion and fear slithers through me.
Fury pumps into the air around us, and then, with a voice as dark as the pits of hell, Slade says something that makes my eyes go wide. “Why the fuck is there a bruise on your cheek?”
Chapter 25
AUREN
I have to hand it to him, the fact that Slade is even able to see the faded bruise in such terrible lighting is a credit to his fae eyesight.
My hand automatically goes up to the spot he’s staring at, fingers pressing against my cheek, but just like I did to him, Slade knocks my hand away so he can see it better.
Turning my face, featherlight fingertips graze over the spot of burnished gold, like he doesn’t want to put any pressure on it in case it hurts me.
It wouldn’t, not now. It’s a hell of a lot better than it was. A few hours after Midas first struck me, it swelled up pretty badly. I went to sleep that night with a cold compress resting on it, made from snow I collected off my balcony and stuffed into a rag. It reminded me of Hojat.
The bruise is barely showing anymore. My gold skin always marks up darker, bruising in shades of bronze and rust before it fades back to my usual gleam. But at least nearly all of the swelling is gone. The darkened mark can be mistaken for a shadow if you’re not really paying attention.
Clearly, Slade is paying attention.
His touch makes my nerve endings come alive, and it feels like my chest is swelling far more than my cheek did.
“It’s nothing,” I say with a hard swallow before jerking my head away from his scrutiny.
“That is not nothing. Did someone put their hands on you?”
I just look at him warily, which I guess is answer enough.
“Who?”
“Slade—”
“Who, Auren?” he demands, his dark, seductive voice so contradictory to the violence held in his tone.