Chapter 14

Chapter Fourteen

In a bid to buy herself a little bit of time to compose herself, Petra arranged herself into a more comfortable position. Settled with her spine against the coffee table, she managed to reply, “That’s a tall order, Mr. Cuttcombe.”

The addition of, “ and one I’m unlikely to fulfill” went unsaid but not unheard between them.

She thought she detected real amusement in his amber-on-black eyes when he suggested, “Start with how it is a witch of no real rank or power went from a glorified Temple teacher to the head of one of the most powerful cathedrals in the UTA overnight.”

Petra fought the urge to swallow the lump in her throat. “How do you know I had no real standing? The Temple hierarchy is obscure even to those of us in it.”

“I know that someone in charge of initiates is basically the equivalent of a high school teacher,” he answered, “and I know that no one of real power is given a room the size of a broom closet.”

There it is. She knew what he implied when he said he’d taken a trip up the coast, but to hear him confirm that he’d been up to Seattle, that he knew where she used to sleep, was a chilling thing.

It was a power play, just like everything else he’d done, but it was also its own form of honesty. He wasn’t trying to entrap her in a lie. Silas was letting her know what he knew — or thought he knew.

Petra watched him closely, cautiously, when she chose her words. What’s it matter? There isn’t much time for him to use it against me, anyway.

And deep down below the fatalistic veneer, Petra just… wanted to tell someone. She’d been playing a character for so long that she was exhausted by the effort. The urge to connect, even shallowly, with another person was a deep, guttural scream in the cavern of her gut.

“I wanted the position,” she answered, “so I found a way to take it.”

Silas leaned forward until he rested his forearm on his bent knee. He tilted his head in that predatory, assessing way she was becoming used to when he asked, “What naughty thing did you do?”

“Nothing horrible.” She hated how defensive she sounded, how quick those words tumbled out of her. Petra had spent years unlearning so many bad lessons from her childhood that she felt a reflexive, cutting guilt whenever she recalled what she’d done to get her place in St. Emaine’s. Even knowing it was the right thing to do, the shame bit at her, ridiculing her for falling back on lessons she’d long ago left behind.

Silas pursed his lips, clearly holding in a laugh. “D’you think I’m gonna judge you? Little goddess, you could tell me you’d castrated someone and it’d only make me want you more.”

“That’s really troubling. You know that, right?”

“You don’t seem too troubled to me.” He bit the tip of his tongue between his teeth and offered her a cheeky smile. “I think you actually like me.”

Petra gave him the look that assumption deserved. “That’s pushing it.”

The demon had been nothing but trouble since she made the mistake of seeking him out. He was crude, cruel, and entirely uncontrollable.

But she could allow that she did feel more comfortable around him than she’d felt with anyone else since Max’s death. This wasn’t because she was particularly fond of him, nor because she was attracted to him. It was because for once she didn’t have to hide every little bit of her true self behind layers of masks.

She could never be vulnerable with him, but she could shake a little bit of the weight off. After all, he already knew she wasn’t what she pretended to be. What was the point in keeping up the ruse when she could just breathe for a second?

Averting her eyes from his ever-widening grin and that annoying beauty mark above his lip, Petra continued, “When the sovereign poked his nose into the High Gloriae’s business, my boss was asked to step in and help him see reason. Unfortunately, my boss’s assistant wasn’t able to make the trip, so I volunteered.”

Petra couldn’t look at him as she told the story, not because she worried she’d see disapproval there, but because she believed he’d like it too much. Instead, she buffed her thumbnail, covered in a semi-transparent pearlescent coat of polish, against her thigh and watched the fire.

“It was pure luck that my boss ate something that disagreed with him as soon as we got to the cathedral and that I just happened to be in the right place at the right time to intercept the sovereign and his consort when they came by looking for a wedding.”

She’d never forget how her hands shook as she addressed the sovereign like she was anybody worth talking to. She rode on a wave of pure adrenaline as she negotiated with him, even daring to withhold her services as their officiant if he didn’t help get her the seat.

Her, an orphaned street rat. A covenless witch with no connections, no family. All she had was a steely will and the ability to lie through her teeth.

Warm, callused fingers gripped the sides of her jaw. The tips of Silas’s claws pressed into her skin as he turned her face back to him. Petra’s breath caught.

He was close, crouched before her like an animal about to pounce. Those molten eyes held her own, unblinking, when he growled, “Did you poison and lie your way into your position?”

Petra licked her lips. “Yes,” she answered, soft but without the shame that wanted to force its way into every word. “I lied right to the sovereign’s face and then told him I wouldn’t marry them unless I got the seat. And, for the record, it was only barely a poisoning. They lived.”

“You went from no one to one of the most influential witches in the entire UTA overnight based on a bluff.”

She could feel her cheeks heating, but she refused to back down or break eye contact. No, she wasn’t proud of what it’d taken to get where she was, but sometimes doing the right thing in the wrong way was the only option.

“Yes.”

In hindsight, she probably should have seen the kiss coming, but even if she had, there was nothing Petra could have done to prepare herself for it.

Silas sealed their mouths together with all the heat and power of a welding torch. They fused instantly. Petra opened her mouth on a gasp, shocked by the roar of magic in her veins and the heady taste of him as he kissed her — consumed her. Silas’s tongue traced her bottom lip, hot as a brand, before it snaked into her mouth to seek hers.

He held her head in place, tilting her how he liked, as she scrambled to find something to hold onto. Her fingers curled into the fabric of his t-shirt, stretched tight over his shoulders. Her mind went blank in a white-hot rush of sensation.

The scent of him. The heat of his body. The slick glide of their mouths as the kiss got messier, more carnal with every second. The taste of him on her tongue as he tipped her head back and devoured her.

She forgot that they’d made a deal. She forgot that she was supposed to keep her head on straight and hold him at arm’s length. She forgot and she loved it.

It had been so long since she’d had any kiss at all. Even before she set out to uncover the truth behind Max’s death, she’d been leery about who she shared intimacies with. Relationships in the Temple tended to be fraught with expectation and political intrigue, making casual sex both commonplace and dangerous.

Her last partner had been a fellow initiate instructor. She’d liked him, but when he began asking leading questions about bonding, she was forced to end things.

Sex was certainly something she’d never risk in St. Emaine’s, so she’d simply cut herself off from thinking about it — no great hardship when every day was a trial by fire.

Petra didn’t even realize she missed the feeling of another person’s body until Silas stroked his tongue along hers in a deep, ruthless kiss. Heat seared a path down her spine and then out, sparking every nerve until the warmth matured, turning syrupy and insistent.

A swirl of molten desire settled low in her middle, building pressure in her core as he somehow arranged her so she was straddling his lap. He rocked her down, against the hard ridge of his erection, and made an animal noise of want so guttural, she felt it between her thighs.

Silas fisted one hand in her hair, knotting it at the base of her skull, and reared back suddenly. His lips were swollen and red, but the look in his eyes was indecipherable. It was like he couldn’t decide if he was turned on, delighted, or absolutely furious.

“Every fuckin’ time,” he rumbled, twisting his fingers in her hair until she was forced to tilt her head back, arching her neck. “Every fucking’ time I think I have you figured out, you trip me up. How?”

Petra’s brows pulled together. Breathing hard, she bit out, “Maybe you should stop making so many assumptions about me.”

He loomed over her, lips curled in a snarl. “I’ll stop making assumptions when I figure out exactly who you are.”

She couldn’t help it — she laughed. It was either that or she start crying the big, ugly tears she’d been holding in for so very long. Gasping for breath, she asked, “Don’t you get it yet? Gods, for someone who’s supposed to be so smart, you can’t see what’s right in front of your fucking face.”

The gleam in his eyes got even more unsettling when he brushed his lips against hers. It was a deceptively gentle gesture, contrasted sharply against the way her scalp stung. “Tell me, little goddess.”

Petra’s eyes closed automatically, against her will, as he whispered the words into her mouth in that silky drawl.

“I’m no one,” she murmured. “Honestly, truly no one. There’s no great truth to uncover in my past. I don’t have ambitions. I don’t want to be a member of the High Gloriae or play politics. I’m no one. Nothing.”

Silas pulled back slowly. In the glow of the fire she could make out a flush in his pale skin and a dark, dangerous look in his eyes. “I don’t believe you.”

“Why?”

“Because someone who’s nothing doesn’t lie her way into power. No one doesn’t have secret phones, secret accounts, and a past that begins halfway through their adolescence. No one doesn’t bargain with a fuckin’ king like it’s her right. No one doesn’t make me want to take you apart so I can finally fuckin’ know what makes you tick. You’re more than nothing, and you have a damn good reason to do what you did. So tell me.”

“Tell you what?”

The drawl deepened into a raspy growl. “Tell me what you want.”

At that second, all Petra really wanted was to feel his lips on hers again. She didn’t want to talk about the mess of her life or think about the rapidly approaching future. All she craved was the sensation of clawed hands on her skin and a cruel mouth forcing her to yield, to let go.

But something in the rigid set of his mouth told her he wouldn’t accept that answer, no matter how desperately his hard cock strained against her through the barriers of their clothing.

Petra curled her fingers into his shoulders, hoping he felt the bite of her nails into his tough demon skin.

Her eyes stung. She hadn’t realized how desperately she needed a tiny taste of oblivion until it was taken from her. Of all the things he’d done and said to her, this was by far the cruelest.

“I need to know who killed Maximilian Dooraker,” she admitted, each word like broken glass in her throat. “I have to know.”

Something cold skittered in Silas’s eyes. In a voice gone disturbingly light, he said, “The dusty friend I found in your room? Ah, yes, I wondered about that.”

It was a confusing experience, wanting to kiss and hit someone at the same time. Since it didn’t look like the kissing would be happening any time soon — and she was rapidly losing the desire to do so — Petra leaned into her anger.

She squirmed in his lap, trying to free herself from his unyielding grip. “Damn it, Silas, if you touched?—”

“Let me get this straight,” he drawled, speaking over her, “you did all of this for a dead man? You lied to Theodore Solbourne’s face, stole a powerful position, tracked me down, and traded yourself for a man.”

Petra stilled. It was a natural, instinctive reaction to the quiet menace that permeated every syllable, every soft word that left his lips. She wasn’t sure why she felt like she was suddenly sitting on a time bomb, but she knew it was true.

Hair still caught in his grip, it was all she could do to watch him as he digested that information, plucking out what he thought he knew and what he could only assume.

Her throat was almost too tight to get words out, but she did it. “I can’t tell if you’re jealous or disappointed.”

“Both.” It was a single, flat word, but it was somehow more terrifying than anything else he’d ever said to her.

Petra didn’t owe him any answers. If he wanted to believe that she’d risked everything for the memory of a lover, then that was his issue, not hers. But something in that blank stare, that flat inflection, the way he went almost preternaturally still beneath her… It wasn’t just scary. It bothered her.

A mean little part of her, embittered by the cruelty of the world, urged her to let him think whatever he wanted, but the part that had worked so hard to learn compassion felt almost bad for him.

It was ridiculous. He didn’t have real feelings. He didn’t care about her. He wanted to use her just as Antonin did. What did it matter if she saw something almost hurt in that immediate withdrawal from her? Even if she had all the time left on the Earth to try and fix whatever it was that was broken in Silas, she doubted she could.

But she didn’t like lying to him about this, either.

It pissed her off, but still, she said, “Well, don’t bother. Max and I weren’t like that.”

Silas didn’t thaw, but his fingers flexed in her hair. “What were you?”

“Family.”

If she expected him to soften, she would have been sorely disappointed. Silas appeared utterly unmoved. “What kind?”

“Does it matter?”

“Yes,” he answered, eyes narrowed until the amber centers were barely visible, “because you’re a liar.”

It stung because it was true. It didn’t matter that he said it without any particular judgment — which would have been rich, coming from him. She still felt the sting of shame.

Max had worked so hard to break her of the habit. “You’re safe now,” he’d gently coached her, again and again. “You never need to lie to me, Pet, when there’s no chance I’ll abandon you. No matter what you do or say.”

But he had. He’d abandoned her twice. And that wound had festered, pulling out old poisons until they oozed out of her in a constant, sour drip.

What would he think of me now?

“I’m not lying,” she snapped. “If you don’t believe me, that’s your problem. It doesn’t make a difference to me.”

Perhaps anticipating the direction of her thoughts, Silas stopped whatever it was she was about to say by pressing the pad of his thumb against her lips. He smoothed it back and forth when he growled, “If you think none of this matters, then you’re lying to yourself. There is a fuckin’ world of difference between you sending me to get information on a professional rival and you doing all of this because a family member was murdered.”

She saw it — the moment he put the pieces together. That dark, cold thing slithered back into his eyes. “Antonin Vanderpoel. You think he murdered Maximilian Dooraker.”

Petra had never spoken the words aloud. She didn’t dare. Even at that moment, when she believed no one would know except Silas, she hesitated.

“Petra.” Her name came out like the crack of a whip — not a shout, but with such quiet intensity she felt it land with all the snap of broken-in leather.

“Yes,” she finally forced herself to answer. “But it’s more likely that he ordered one of his followers to do it.”

“His followers?”

“The Protector of the Gloriae is in charge of investigations within the Temple, but he also commands the Ardeo.” She broke out in a fresh wave of cold sweat just saying the name aloud. Petra tugged on Silas’s shirt, trying to force him to really listen. “The Ardeo is what keeps every cathedral and every high ranking member of the Temple in check. They handle all Temple security and assets and secrets. They’re powerful, Silas.”

“The Ardeo was disbanded. Glory’s Temple hasn’t had a military since the seventeen hundreds,” he argued, infuriatingly dismissive.

“Publicly. Publicly they haven’t had a military since the Collapse, but they do. It’s not something most acolytes know, but we all feel it. Max told me— He knew it was real. They have eyes and ears everywhere. That’s why the entire cathedral is bugged. That’s why any one of my staff might report my suspicious behavior at any moment. Even if they can’t put a name to it, we all know.”

When he didn’t appear convinced, perhaps thinking her dramatic again, Petra’s desperation clawed up and out at last. Her voice was raw when she continued, “Max knew something about them. He said that there was something happening within the High Gloriae, that there’d been some shift after Antonin was appointed Protector. He said he was worried something really awful was brewing and then… And then a month later I got his ashes in the mail.”

She had to suck in a breath to stop her voice from breaking. Remember who you’re talking to.

“I don’t expect you to care about any of that,” she croaked, “but if you want the context, the truth, that’s it. Antonin doesn’t have a fixed headquarters. He travels from temple to temple, and that means he has to bring his shit with him wherever he goes — including whatever files he keeps. Your job is to find the proof that he ordered Max’s murder and deliver it to Elise Sasini at The San Francisco Light.”

Silas was dreadfully quiet for several beats. His expression was inscrutable. She had no idea if he believed her, let alone took her claims with even an ounce of the seriousness they deserved.

Just when she couldn’t take the silence any longer, Silas eased his fingers out of her hair to slowly drag his palm down the column of her throat. Speaking in a soft voice, he asked, “Why did he put a camera in your room, baby?”

Petra shook her head. “I… I miscalculated. I knew I needed to take Max’s place if I ever wanted a chance to figure out the truth, but I didn’t anticipate I’d draw Antonin’s attention as much as I did. He’s had his eyes on me from the moment the sovereign put my name in as his preference for the seat.”

That was the truth. Or at least most of it.

A certain amount of surveillance had already been in place when she arrived, but things escalated significantly after the Protector’s visit. Max’s warnings to keep away from Antonin meant little when the man himself sought her out.

And she could do nothing but keep the horror and disgust under a thin veneer of calm when the look in the Protector’s eyes had gone from coolly assessing to avaricious.

Petra held her breath again, praying that Silas would take what she’d given him at face value. She didn’t want to have to explain the proposition she’d received, nor that the reason for the Protector’s visit was to get an answer from her — one way or another.

Something told her he’d take the news that another man sought her witchbond poorly. If he pressed, she would be forced to lie.

At length, Silas let out a long, put-upon sigh. “Looks like my little goddess has made a mess. I can’t tell if I’m annoyed or impressed by the sheer scale of your fuck-up. You really do need my help.”

A bitter taste filled her mouth, wiping out whatever remained of her lust. “If you’re referring to the fuck-up where I thought asking you for help would actually get me somewhere, then I agree with you. I’m also impressed by the scale of bullshit it’s brought me.”

Rubbing his thumb over her throbbing pulse, Silas gave her a long, mocking look. “Asking me for help was probably the smartest thing you could have done.”

“Why is that?”

He stooped to press a featherlight kiss to her pursed lips. It was as silky and dangerous as the flat side of a knife sliding across her mouth. “Because I would have killed anyone else you asked.”