Chapter 31

chapter 31

Maeve

Someday, somehow, I desperately want Lizzie in a bed that’s ours. Not a couch or mattress or bathtub belonging to someone else. It’s a fool’s desire. No matter what her words seem to indicate, she’s still leaving. She’s always been leaving.

But not tonight.

I press her down to the bed, thankful that it’s actually a decent size. It’s soft and fluffy, and Lizzie bounces a little on the mattress. Her expression is as open as I’ve ever seen it, and the naked longing written over her features makes my heart beat faster. I care about her so much. I love her, though admitting as much aloud would make me a fool in the worst way.

So I don’t.

I kiss her, filling each touch, each taste, with all the things I don’t dare put into words. The thought of attacking a C?n Annwn ship openly fills me with the kind of fear I don’t know how to combat. There will be no going back. If someone on the crew sees me, recognizes me, then my life as I know it is over. I can’t go home. To do so would put my family in danger.

It might not matter. Being related to me is enough to condemn them, though if the C?n Annwn try to take them, they’ll have the entire island up in arms. If I don’t go home, if they investigate my mother and grandmother and find out—truthfully—that they have nothing to do with any rebellion, it might be enough to leave them be.

As long as I never go home again.

“Maeve.” Lizzie cups my face, her eyes worried. “Are you okay?”

“I don’t know.” Perhaps I should lie, should keep this moment of unspoken feelings going. “So much is changing. The risks are so intense, the consequences for failure even more so. I believe in what the rebellion is doing, and I’m willing to sacrifice it all for the cause, but?.?.?.”

Understanding dawns. “Your family.”

“Yes.” I shudder out a breath, glad that I don’t have to explain. If there’s one thing Lizzie and I have in common, it’s that sense of familial obligation. We just?.?.?. go about it in different ways. “Doing this means not going home. Not for a long time, maybe not ever.” Saying it aloud does exactly what I fear—it makes it real. I might never be able to go home. As much as the shores of Viedna felt like they were smothering me at times, losing them is losing a vital part of myself.

Lizzie strokes her thumbs over my cheeks, lightly tracing her touch from freckle to freckle. “As a general rule, I don’t like noble causes.”

“Because martyrs,” I say faintly. I have her in bed, and we’re talking about death and loss. What a sad little excuse for a seduction.

“Because martyrs,” she confirms. “And because for so many people, being noble means their common sense and ruthlessness go out the window. Successful rebellions need that ruthlessness, they need leaders and people willing to do horrible, unforgivable things. I don’t want that for you. You’re so damn good.” She says it like it’s a revelation. “It would hurt you for that goodness to die, and I’m viciously opposed to you being hurt.”

From Lizzie, that’s practically a declaration of love. Or it would be if I were romantic and foolish enough to believe her feeling anything for me would be enough to keep her from leaving.

My eyes burn. “Things can’t go on the way they are, Lizzie. I understand that this isn’t your fight, but it is mine.”

“I know.” She sighs. “I suppose, in addition to keeping you alive, I’ll have to protect your goodness as well.” She brushes a light kiss against my lips. “It will mean you’ll have to ease your rules about murder, though. Do you think you can do that?”

I sit up, still straddling her, so I can see her face clearly. Surely she isn’t suggesting what her words seem to? “Lizzie,” I say carefully. “You’re leaving. It might take a little time to find the appropriate portal to get you close enough to find your way home, but it won’t be more than a few weeks. This conflict with the C?n Annwn, once it truly begins, could last for years.” That’s the best-case scenario, the one where the C?n Annwn don’t crush us within a few weeks. I want to believe we have enough resources to win, but my knowledge of the full extent of the rebellion has been intentionally limited.

Easier to protect the rebellion if I were taken in and tortured.

Her hands fall to my thighs, but she’s still painfully serious. “If the time difference remains as pronounced as it was between Evelyn going through the portal and me going through one, it’s been years since I left home. My mother likely thinks I’m dead.”

I study her expression, trying to divine her emotions. “But you’re not. You could still go home.”

“I know.” She lifts her hands a little and lets them drop back to my thighs. “I know,” she repeats. She seems to be working through something, so I stay silent, waiting. Finally, she takes a deep breath and speaks softly, almost tentatively. “But?.?.?. what if I didn’t? What if I stayed?”

My heart soars. It’s everything I can do to keep from shouting with joy. Surely she’s not saying she wants to stay for me. By all accounts, her mother is a monster, and escaping that environment is reason enough to never go home.

“You could stay.” My words are just as tentative, but they don’t sit right with me. The temptation to protect myself, to retreat from vulnerability, is nearly overwhelming. She’s baring a part of herself to me right now, something she’s never done before, and I refuse to do anything but match her energy. “I want you to stay. Not just in Threshold. With me. I want you to stay with me.”

Her hands tighten on my thighs. “We’re setting ourselves up for tragedy. My life span is significantly longer than yours.”

I frown. “What are you talking about?”

“I’ve already lived two hundred years. I probably have another few centuries in me, if my mother is anything to go by. I’m not exactly certain how long bloodline vampires live, but it’s long enough for this to be tragic.” She shifts up to cup my hips. “I won’t age. One day I’ll just?.?.?. be gone. But that will be far too long after you’ve grown old and passed painlessly in your sleep.”

She says it with such fierceness, as if she can will me to such a peaceful end. Happiness flickers in my chest, hope feeding it until it’s a roaring fire that makes me smile. Better yet, I finally have good news to share with her. “Selkies live a few hundred years, Lizzie. I know I don’t look it, but I’m fifty.”

She blinks. “What?” Her brows draw together. “You’re saying you’ve lived for fifty years, and I’m the first person who’s eaten your pussy?”

My skin heats and I shift, which only serves to remind me that we’re both naked and pressed together. “I don’t know what it’s like with vampires, but selkies take longer than humans to mature. I was only considered a proper adult ten years ago.”

“That’s still too long.”

Despite everything, that startles a laugh out of me. “You’re getting distracted.”

“I suppose I am.” She drags her thumbs over my skin. “I love you, Maeve. I might not care about the rebellion for my own sake, but I care about it for yours.”

She loves me.I want her to want it for her sake, too, but I realize that’s a tall ask for Lizzie. She’s only been in Threshold for a few months, and she doesn’t seem overly inclined to care about this sort of thing in general. Or at least she didn’t use to. I study her face. “I think you might care about it more than you think. Otherwise, you’d just kidnap me and haul me off somewhere until the coming conflict had ended.”

“Don’t give me ideas.” She smirks, but the expression melts into something softer. “And don’t start getting the wrong idea about me. The C?n Annwn piss me off. I’d be happy killing them even if there wasn’t a rebellion involved.”

“If you say so.”

She pulls me back down onto her. “Don’t say it like that. Like you don’t believe me.”

I don’t believe her. But Lizzie has taken a huge leap of faith in even having this conversation, so I’m not going to push her. I kiss her. There’s every possibility that we won’t survive the coming attack. I don’t like thinking it, and I know better than to say as much, but it’s the three of us against one of the most dangerous ships the C?n Annwn have to offer. If Siobhan wasn’t desperate, she never would have tasked us with bringing it down on such short notice and with so few people.

But that’s a fear for tomorrow. Right now, I have Lizzie in a bed that’s not ours but will suit us just fine. More, she’s confessed to loving me. Something I hardly dared dream would happen. “I love you, too,” I whisper against her lips.

There’s no more time for talking, for anything but pleasure, sealing our words in a way as old as time itself. Or that’s what it feels like when Lizzie rolls us so she’s on top and pulls me so close, I’m not sure where she ends and I begin. I don’t need to know. Not right now. Maybe not ever.

There’s no rush. We’re all gently questing hands and ragged gasps. We taste and touch and weave pleasure that’s only more intense for the steady build. By the time I make my way back to her mouth, our kiss tastes of both of us, a combination I never want to lose. My body shakes, sweat glistening on my skin. For her part, Lizzie is no less affected. She stares down at me, her eyes swallowed by crimson.

Her fangs peek out, just a little. “Maeve.” There’s a wealth of meaning in my name on her lips. An agony of wanting. “I’ll kill anything that hurts you. And that includes me.”

That’s about enough of that. I dig my fingers into her hair. “I trust you.”

“You shouldn’t.”

I tilt my head to the side, baring my neck. “Lizzie?.?.?. I trust you.”

She licks her lips. “It’s a bad idea.”

“I want you to.” But I don’t pull her head to me. I wait, giving her time to work through what she wants versus what she fears.

Finally, a small eternity later, Lizzie meets my gaze. “Are you sure?”

“Yes.” There’s no question. I realize it’s not realistic to have her only feed from me, but being deprived of her bite is agony. I hate that she’s been holding part of herself back from me. I want all of her.

She doesn’t ask again. She eases down slowly and kisses my neck. When she does bite me, it’s so soft at first that I hardly realize it’s happened. Only the pleasure gathering in response to the nick of her teeth conveys that she’s broken skin. A single swallow of blood is all she allows herself. A single pull that echoes through my entire body, sending me sweeping into an orgasm that curls my toes and bows my spine.

I cling to her as she licks the small wounds, healing them with her blood. She lifts herself enough to stare into my face, obviously searching for signs of fear or regret. There’s only love.

I smile, feeling a bit goofy. “Told you.”

“You’ve very cute when you’re smug.” She smiles as she says it. “I like it.”

I drag my thumb over her bottom lip. “It’s greed. I want to keep going.”

“Mmm. Yes.” She settles down on top of me. “But I like you greedy just as much as I like you smug.” Her hand delves back between my thighs. “Morning will come soon enough, Maeve. I mean to have my fill of you until then.”