Chapter 28

Chapter Twenty-Eight

She believed she’d thought through every way the moment would go, but as Petra spooned tiny bites of apricot mousse into her mouth, she was at a complete loss.

The possibility that Antonin would discover her connection to Max had always been a risk. His insistence that they bond had also been a real threat. But never, not in all her anxious imaginings, had she thought they would go hand in hand.

She assumed that he would simply kill her once he found out who she was, but perversely, it seemed Antonin actually found pleasure in the connection. He chatted amiably as they ate their meal and praised her several times for taking the initiative and stepping up when her uncle faltered.

He casually mentioned that he considered getting rid of her after his discovery, but she impressed him so much that he changed his mind. “Who am I to snuff out such a bright light?” he’d asked. “I figured it would be a waste, especially when I could just bind you to my side instead. A win all around, wouldn’t you say?”

Petra endured it all because she had no choice.

There was no escape, not when the only viable exit was blocked by two armed guards. Her alternative was a quick trip over the railing of the tower — an option that’s appeal grew with every word out of his mouth.

Her panic was a thick, blanketing thing. It didn’t scramble her brain with a frenzy of possibilities and plans. It didn’t tell her to run, no matter how futile that might be. It held her there in her seat. It quieted her mind. It was a perfect sort of helplessness that allowed her to continue spooning mousse into her mouth. It was an acceptance that she imagined one might feel on a sinking ship — yes, she was afraid and wished there was a chance to escape her fate, but if she couldn’t do that, what was the point in screaming?

There was perfectly good food in front of her. She might as well enjoy it while the water rose.

Petra didn’t want to die, but a part of her had always assumed she would never get this far. Disbelief mingled with heavy, sluggish panic as the tart, sugary sweetness of the dessert melted on her tongue.

She wasn’t even aware that she’d finished it until her spoon clinked against the cut crystal bowl. Petra stared at the reflection of candle flames in the streaked crystal. Cool wind kissed her bare shoulders and exposed skin of her back. At any other time she would have bitterly wished for her jacket, but just then she didn’t feel the discomfort of the temperature. She barely felt anything at all.

“Absolutely delightful,” Antonin announced as he set his folded napkin onto the edge of the table. “Your kitchen staff is superb, my dear.”

She must have made some sound of agreement or appreciation because he clapped his hands together and pushed his seat back from the table. “Well, I think it’s about time we got on with the rest of our evening, don’t you think?”

A jolt of disgust ran down her spine, rattling her out of the haze that had insulated her.

The delicate silver spoon slipped from between her fingers to clatter onto the table. Petra sat back in her chair and watched as Antonin stood up. He passed a hand over his mustache and beard, smoothing both to perfection, before he stepped around the table to ease her chair back.

Her fingernails bit into the armrests, as if a good grip would save her from the Protector’s plans. As if anything, anyone could.

Silas’s face flashed in her mind, his lambent eyes burning with intent. Something deep within her twanged, a plucked chord of pure, nauseating yearning. It was absurd to imagine him as any kind of savior, but that didn’t stop her pounding heart from wishing.

A too-warm hand peeled her fingers away from the armrest. Petra forced the joints of her fingers to unlock as he helped her stand. He turned her to face him.

“So beautiful,” he murmured, stepping close enough that their chests brushed. His cologne, spicy and cloying, filled her nose. He skimmed the pad of his thumb over her clammy cheek. “I didn’t realize until tonight that you glow. The camera simply doesn’t do you justice.”

Her voice sounded thin even to her own ears when she asked, “You’re a luminist, too. Don’t you?”

His smile was wry. “I’m afraid I’m not nearly the same caliber as you, my dear. I’m but a humble brightling. A spark to your star.”

In the modern world, one didn’t need to boast the incredible magical power of a gloriana to be respected amongst witches, but still, it was shocking to hear that a man who so many feared sat at the very bottom of the power scale. Perhaps that was why he’d become so cunning.

Magic wasn’t necessary to become a member of Glory’s Temple, but the gifted were considered Glory’s favorites and therefore tended to have the most pull. Luminists even moreso. While Antonin had that on his side, she doubted it was common knowledge that he probably couldn’t even light a candle with his abilities, let alone burn so brightly from within it was as if he contained his own personal sun.

Ambitious but lacking in raw magical talent, Antonin had clearly turned to a different kind of power.

He cupped her cheek and leaned in close, until she could feel the tickle of his beard against her cheeks and chin. “I can’t regret it, though,” he whispered, “when it allows me to forge a bond with someone like you.”

And it won’t hurt having your own abilities boosted by my magic, I imagine.

Repulsion skittered down her back on light insect feet. It was like a thousand little bugs crawled out of his sleeves and over her, seeking a way in.

Her breath came faster. Her vision narrowed. I can’t do this.

Antonin picked up her limp hand and guided it into place just above his heart. Picking up on her obvious change in mood, he crooned, “Easy now, my dear. There’s no need to be nervous. We’re going to make marvelous partners, you and I.”

A scream was trapped behind her locked jaw — a primal, agonized sound of pure grief and the desire to escape a fate worse than death.

When his lips brushed hers, she tasted wine and apricots on his breath. Her stomach lurched. Everything in her rebelled against that familiar touch, the scent of him, the taste, the feeling of his body so close to hers. Even her magic, which had been so volatile around Silas, seemed to have curled in on itself, retreating into a protective ball in the core of her being.

It left her feeling cold, shaken. Helpless in a way that she hadn’t since she was a little girl huddled under trash in a stinking alley in Los Angeles, crying herself to sleep because the hunger pains were too much, her parents were dead, no one cared if she lived or died?—

“Do it, Petra,” he ordered, the gentleness in his voice hardening into a hammer.

Her heart beat so fast, she had the fleeting hope that it might simply pop, freeing her from the nightmare she found herself in. Maybe she’d pass out. Maybe she’d throw up all over him and he’d be so disgusted he’d leave her alone.

But those were childish, cowardly hopes. Petra knew there was no easy escape from the situation she’d put herself in.

She’d done this. She was the one who couldn’t let sleeping dogs lie. She couldn’t let Max’s murder go unanswered. She had to scheme and plan and dig up the truth, knowing it was a fool’s errand. Coming to Antonin’s attention was an inevitability, something she’d known would have to happen when all other avenues failed to provide the proof she needed.

Petra tried to summon some violent will. It’d been there when she was trapped in the closet, but now that fiery surge of determination was nowhere to be found. Even when she’d considered having Antonin killed, Petra never imagined herself doing it. She’d always assumed she wouldn’t have the opportunity, since he always had so many guards around, and even if she did, she didn’t have the stomach for murder. Just like when her parents were killed, just like whenever something horrific happened in the children’s home, she froze.

No matter how vehemently she attempted to talk herself into it, she couldn’t do it. She couldn’t move a muscle. She couldn’t speak. She couldn’t summon an upswell of fiery magic to end him.

Antonin pulled back just far enough to give her a stern look. “My dear, you’re going to learn I’m not a very patient man, and I suspect I’ll be a rather demanding husband. Let’s not start this off on the wrong?—”

A dull, metallic thwump echoed up the short staircase. Antonin dropped his hand from her cheek and half-turned to look at the dark shape of the opening in the floor.

Petra’s heart leapt into her throat. That sound, the temporary reprieve from the Protector’s penetrating gaze flipped a switch inside her. She sucked in a huge breath of cool air as a stinging rush of adrenaline scoured her veins.

One hand holding her upper arm, Antonin barked, “Sean, Val— What’s happening down there?”

When a moment passed and still no response came, the line of Antonin’s shoulders stiffened. His fingers gripped her arm a little harder, digging into her flesh, as he used his other hand to reach under his suit jacket.

His head swiveled to give her a narrow-eyed look. “What’s going on?”

“I have no idea,” she answered, eyes flicking down to where he still had his hand under his jacket. She’d once been the daughter of a prolific, if not particularly skilled, criminal. As a child, she’d been used to run cons and make deals more times than she could count.

Petra knew what it looked like when a man held a gun.

Antonin took a step closer. All the sultry warmth, the false gentleness, it vanished. The glow of the candles barely reached them this far away from the table, but tiny orange flickers danced in his dark eyes. When he spoke, it was in the patient cadence of an adult who already knew they’d have to discipline a child. “Petra, what have you done?”

An incredulous laugh tried its damnedest to bubble up her throat. “Nothing,” she gasped, twisting her arm hard enough to break his grasp. A crackle of heat came to life in her belly. “I don’t know what’s going on, but this— I’m not doing this. I’m never doing this.”

She backed up until she could almost feel the wide open archway of the one tower window behind her. A flash of white-hot heat rushed over her skin. Her fingertips tingled. Rage, an all-consuming fire, burned her fear to ash.

Now that she’d said it, Petra couldn’t stop the words from falling out of her mouth, each one a rolling boulder picking up speed as it careened away from her. “I’m not going to bond with you. I’m not going to have your children. Are you insane? You killed my uncle. You— you took the only family I had left.”

Antonin didn’t approach her right away. Instead, he slowly drew his gun out from under his suit jacket. He didn’t point it at her. He simply held it, the barrel aimed at the floor, and pressed the switch to turn off the safety. The low hum of the battery pack warming up was barely audible, but it was burned into her mind from so many secret trips to the firing range with Max that she would know it anywhere.

Speaking in a devastatingly calm voice, Antonin said, “I understand getting cold feet. This is a major life change for you. However, you seem to be laboring under a misapprehension — mainly that you can say no.”

The wind tugged her hair back, out towards the glittering night sky and the San Francisco skyline. Petra braced her palms on the cold, gritty surface of the window’s ledge and leaned forward. “I’d rather die.”

If that meant that she joined her parents — and probably Max, too — in dying at the end of a gun, then so be it. Anything was better than being Antonin’s perfect little bride.

He made a sucking sound with his teeth and tongue. “That is very disappointing, my dear.” His expensive leather shoes whispered across the floor as he approached her, gun aimed at her chest. His smile was small, sharp, and icy cold. “I wanted this to be a partnership, but if you can’t grasp that yet, then I have other ways of making you see reason. I don’t have time for this right now, not when everything is finally coming together. Looks like we’ll be making a trip to see a friend of mine in United Washington. I’d hoped to avoid it, but?—”

The sound of hinges squealing made her jump. Antonin spun around and, in one agile movement, was next to her by the window, the too-hot barrel of his gun pressed against her temple.

“Stop! Name and rank before you come up the stairs,” he barked.

There was no sound. No movement. For several terrible seconds, time seemed suspended, stretched into an eternity around her. Even the wind stopped blowing, leaving them in a suffocating stillness there at the top of the belltower.

And then the candles went out.