Chapter 17

Chapter Seventeen

Petra was fairly certain she was self-destructing. That was the only reason she could come up with for why she would do what she’d done with Silas.

She didn’t exactly feel shame about it, but she wasn’t proud, either. Particularly when she woke up with him watching her like a cat who’d gotten the cream.

Sure, she knew there was a not-insignificant chance she was going to die in twenty-four hours — or at least wish she’d died — and that meant she had some leeway in regards to sexual expression and bad choices, but that one seemed extreme even for her.

Because now that she’d opened that door, there was no closing it.

Silas made himself comfortable in the center of her bed, one arm thrown behind his head as he watched her scramble around for her robe. He let out a low chuckle when she grimaced at the odd, tacky pull of her skin around her thighs and belly.

“Why the face?”

Petra shot him a glare as she cinched her bathrobe around her waist. “Shut up.”

It was deeply unsettling how Silas so effortlessly embodied both boyish charm and menace. His chocolate curls were tousled around his horns, his eyelids were lowered to a drowsy half-mast, and everything in his posture screamed of perfect ease. Even the damn stupid, wonderful beauty mark above his lip added to his air of early morning effortlessness.

But one couldn’t miss the glow of his eyes, molten bronze on black, nor the twitch of his smile — an expression that on anyone else might have been soft, but on him was as beautiful and deadly as a sharpened knife.

“You have the day off today,” he drawled. “Come back to bed. Now.” He smoothed his free hand over the side of the bed that should have been hers. In reality, he’d hogged the whole mattress all night and used her as his personal body pillow, manhandling her this way and that depending on his preferences every few hours.

She had a crick in her neck, she hadn’t gotten the amount of blankets she preferred, he breathed in her ear all night?—

And it was the best sleep she’d had in three years.

I’m losing my mind.

“My breakfast will be delivered any minute,” she explained, “and just because I technically have the day off doesn’t mean I don’t have things to do.” Petra paused, adjusted her robe with another grimace, and muttered, “I also need a shower.”

“You shower my scent off and I’m just going to put more on you.”

He said it so calmly, almost cheerfully, that it took her a moment to hear the threat there. Her hand rested on the doorknob of her bedroom when she craned her neck to glare at him over her shoulder. “And what would that entail, demon?”

She had no idea why she asked. She knew what he meant. The man had been alarmingly gleeful as he rubbed his release into her skin the previous night. She had absolutely no doubt that he’d try it again, whether she washed it off or not.

Silas’s smile melted into a sensual curl of his lips over sharp fangs — the same fangs that had left little streaks of fire along her jaw and down her throat. It was that smile that reminded her exactly why she’d lost her mind the previous night.

Because that Silas, that look… It wasn’t just the end of her life hurtling towards her that made desire a constant pressure in her stomach. It was the way he looked at her like his sole focus was to watch her come.

As if he knew that his look alone said it all, Silas purred, “Go get your breakfast, baby, and hurry back to me.”

“Why do you keep giving me orders?”

“Because you like it.”

Petra didn’t dignify that with a response. Internally, however, she grumbled, I hope they only brought enough for me.

And then, of course, she felt a pang of guilt at the thought of him being hungry, which sent her spiraling into yet another whirlwind of silent complaints about how he’d wedged himself into her life.

She didn’t have grand plans for her final days, but Petra also never thought that she’d spend them sparring with a demon apparently just as determined to get into her underwear as he was to use her magic.

Doing her best to act normal for the cameras in her sitting room, Petra quietly closed the door behind her and padded toward the entrance of her suite. Like every Saturday, a simple cart waited outside the door, laden with a spread of breakfast foods, fruit, and coffee.

The cathedral was closed to the public on Saturdays, allowing for a day of rest for the staff. An initiate was responsible for bringing Petra her breakfast, but the rest of the day all the acolytes were free to do as they pleased. She suspected the cathedral would be even more abandoned than usual. With how hard everyone had been working and the pall that hung over them, she wouldn’t have been surprised if every last acolyte got as far as possible from the premises on their day off.

Petra’s stomach turned as she pulled the cart into the suite and shut the door. Antonin will arrive tomorrow.

Suddenly, whatever appetite she’d woken up with vanished. Normally her anxiety over wasting food or missing a meal was far greater than any worry she might have entertained, but when the Protector’s face flashed to the forefront of her mind, her stomach went as heavy and solid as a boulder.

She swallowed the bitter taste of bile as she stared down at the tray. Would it be the second-to-last breakfast she ever had? Or would she only wish it was?

Petra felt removed from the thought. It was as if she stood a great distance away from her own mortality — near enough to see it, certainly, but little more than that. She was simply an observer of her own fate.

No, I’m not an observer, she admonished herself as she pushed the cart toward the bedroom. I might not have a choice in the end, but I haven’t let the universe push me around.

It was a good reminder that there was still work to be done.

The finish line drew near, but she wasn’t quite there yet. One more push. One more great, terrifying hurdle, and it would be over — one way or another.

Steeling her spine, Petra opened the bedroom door just enough to slip the cart and herself inside. “Silas, we need to talk about?—”

Firm hands closed around her waist, drawing her back into a naked chest. Body heat radiated along her spine as Silas pressed himself against her. “That shower? I agree. I changed my mind and decided it would be a great idea to give you a scrub.”

Petra curled her fingers into his forearms, but she couldn’t tell if the bite of her nails was to urge him to let her go or to keep him close.

Her heart raced as he rubbed the top of his chin against the crown of her head, nuzzling her in an odd, animalistic way. A deep thrumming noise, more vibration than sound, rumbled against her back.

A sharp ache took up residence between her thighs. Not because the purr meant anything to her, really, but because her body seemed to have associated the memory of that sound with the crushing orgasm she’d worked out as she slid her body over his cock.

Silas’s deep breath was noisy and large enough that his entire torso seemed to flex against her back. “Mm,” he hummed, palms skating up her stomach to cup the undersides of her breasts. “That’s my favorite smell.”

Petra tried very hard not to wheeze. “Coffee?”

He tsked. “No. My little goddess’s wet cunt.” Silas tilted his head to run the tip of his tongue over the shell of her ear and down her cheek. Petra shuddered, toes curling against the cool wood floor, when he added, “Should I have that for breakfast, baby?”

Her body very much wanted her to say yes, but the existence of the cart before her, the fact that Silas was in her room at all, demanded she focus. As much as she would have liked to spend her final days having wild, borderline hateful sex with a demon who liked to torment her, she couldn’t .

Petra put her hands on the backs of his and was a little surprised when he let her pull them away from her breasts. It’s only fun if I give him the power willingly, she reminded herself as she turned to face him.

It was easy to forget when he was… well, him, but Silas showed her again and again that he respected her boundaries. Mostly. It helped when she knew what they were, which wasn’t always a given when she couldn’t decide if she wanted to live in debauchery for her final days or do the things she needed to do.

Silas watched her from under lowered brows, his hands hovering over her hips. He still had that sleepy look about him, which was awfully distracting. Especially when he was half naked, all of his pale skin, pink nipples, and smattering of dark moles on display.

“As much as I would like to say yes, Silas, I just don’t have time for any of that right now.” She hadn’t meant to put so much real regret into her voice, but there it was. Petra did wish she could let him have his wicked way with her. Carnal delights hadn’t been an option for her for so long, it felt criminal to pass them up now, with so little time left.

But that was precisely why she couldn’t.

“In the shower, then,” he drawled. “Let me clean you up so I can make you dirty again.”

Petra eyed his sturdy frame dubiously. “There is no way on Burden’s green Earth you and I will both fit in that shower. I don’t even know if you’ll fit in there on your own.”

“It’s worth a try.”

She shook her head. Needing to get some breathing room, Petra stepped away under the guise of pushing the cart toward the bed. Her gaze stayed away from him as she hopped onto the mattress and began filling her cup with coffee. “Listen,” she began in her most professional voice, “last night was— interesting. But the situation I’m in isn’t one where I can just fool around and do whatever I want. Until the Protector is handled, I can’t afford to play games with you. We have to make a plan.”

For a man of his size, Silas moved with shockingly little noise. Her only indication that he was near was the sudden dip of the mattress behind her. Petra’s breath caught as he slid into place at her back, caging her legs in with his own and reaching around her to pluck a wedge of apple from the bowl of fruit.

After a wet crunch and some contemplative chewing, Silas informed her, “I have a plan.”

Petra clutched her cup of coffee close to her chest as she twisted her torso, trying to get a good look at the suddenly clingy demon behind her. “You do? What is it?”

Silas curled one arm around her waist and hunched a little to offer her the other half of his apple slice. “Eat, baby.”

“What’s your plan—” He cut her off by tucking the juicy chunk of apple past her lips.

Watching her chew belligerently, he informed her, “If I could trust you not to do something reckless, I’d tell you. Since you’re a cute liar with a penchant for trouble, I won’t be telling you shit-all.”

Petra swallowed the bite of apple as quickly and furiously as she could. “You have no damn idea what you’re walking into!”

He shrugged and reached for a wrinkled slice of bacon. “Then tell me.”

“Oh, so you want to know my plan. How convenient.”

“You’re the one who needs this done,” he reminded her. “So you can tell me and hope I’ll take what you say into consideration, or you can watch me do whatever the fuck I want. Your choice.”

Petra took an angry sip of her coffee, immediately blamed him for the fact that she’d forgotten to douse it with sugar and cream, and lowered it again to scowl at the clawed hand rummaging around the cart.

For a moment, she strongly considered telling him off. But that was pride talking. She had no room for pride in her life now.

Letting out a cleansing breath, she forced out, “The Protector arrives at six PM tomorrow. He’s supposed to stay in the visitor’s suite, which was recently renovated. That means I’ve got blueprints for you.”

She ignored the rumbling purr at her back and its accompanying silky murmur of good girl.

It took another sip of bitter coffee to brace herself before she could continue. Tension made her desperate for some distraction, so she leaned forward to flavor her coffee as she explained. “I have a dinner meeting with the Protector at seven. That’s the only time I know for certain he’ll be completely occupied, so that’s when you need to sneak into his room and get whatever you can from his computer — or whatever else you find. Anything will help.”

Silas went very still behind her. “You’re having dinner with him?”

“Unfortunately.” She strove to sound calm, collected, but tension bled into her voice anyway. There was no hope of hiding it, only obfuscating its origin. “It’s not the first time I’ve had to. He stopped for a surprise visit several weeks ago — never told me why — and took the opportunity to inspect the staff, the buildings, and…”

“You?”

“Yes.” She found herself making her usual plastic, High Priestess smile reflexively, though he couldn’t see it. “He was very curious about me, probably for the same reasons you are.”

“Was he now?” The tangled mass of her hair shifted over to one shoulder. An incongruously soft mouth whispered over the side of her throat. It was a delicate touch, but shocking, even after the previous night, for someone who hadn’t been touched intimately in years.

Petra froze, the muscles of her abdomen tightening as opposing impulses roared to life. Three distinct wants clamored for attention: the desire to get as far from a predator like Silas as possible for the sake of self-preservation, the pressing need to see her task to the end without distraction, and the desperate sort of lust that begged her to take what he offered while she still could.

Seeing as they were all equally strong positions, she could do little more than sit completely still and make no choice whatsoever.