Deadly Is the Kiss (25 page)

He clenched his jaw. “Just what the hell is that supposed to mean?”

“It means I know about the Burning!” she shouted.

Ashe staggered back, feeling like he’d been kicked in the gut. “How the hell did you—?”

Her eyes glittered. “You told me yourself. When you were under the influence of the potion Essie gave you.”

He swallowed, shaking, desperate to think of something to say…of a way to make this right. But in the end, only one hoarse, guttural word fell from his lips.
“Fuck.”

CHAPTER FOURTEEN

T
HEY
DIDN
’
T
SAY
MORE
THAN
a handful of words to each other as they traveled by train back to the coast, staying in one of the little seaside towns not far from Marseilles. In fact, Ashe hadn’t talked to her much at all since she’d admitted that she knew about the Burning. Juliana had sat beside him on the train, so close, and yet never had the distance between them seemed so vast. She told herself the rift shouldn’t have come as a surprise. After all, she’d known just how ugly his reaction would be if he ever learned the truth about the Medeiros and her relationship with Raphe.

But that didn’t mean that it hurt any less.

As they made their way inside the slightly upscale bar where Knox had arranged for them to stay, she breathed a quiet sigh of relief. The tense walk from the train station had only gotten worse when Ashe thought he saw one of his Förmyndare buddies tailing them as they’d made their way through the busy town center. He’d automatically yanked her inside a crowded nightclub, pulling her through the writhing crowd of half-dressed dancers. When they’d made it to the back of the club, he’d trapped her against the wall between two other couples and taken her mouth. The hard, anger-flavored kiss had been purely for cover, but Juliana had still responded, trying to tell him with her body what she couldn’t convince him of with her words. But he wasn’t listening. When he was satisfied that no one had followed them inside, they made their way through the club’s back exit and continued on, pretending the kiss had never happened.

But now she was done pretending…and she was done with the silence.

She held her tongue as they climbed the stairs up to their room on the second floor, but the moment Ashe had closed and locked the door behind him, Juliana slipped off her jacket and said, “Are you ready to talk yet?”

He shot her a dark look before tossing his own jacket onto the foot of the bed and walking to stand before the room’s large bay window, essentially turning his back on her. “Be careful,” he said in a low voice, the breadth of his shoulders accentuated by the way he stood with his hands pushed in his back pockets, staring out into the inky darkness. “Because I really don’t think you’re going to want to hear anything I have to say.”

“Ashe, please. Just listen to me,” she pleaded. “I’m sorry that I wasn’t honest with you before, but I swear that everything I’ve told you today is the truth. I never meant to hurt you. I just wanted to protect you, for as long as I could.”

He turned to face her, the look in his eyes so angry it made her flinch. “Are you sure it wasn’t Raphe Delacourt you wanted to protect?”

“I understand that you’re determined to think the worst of me right now, but I swear to you I’m not trying to help Raphe.” She lifted her hands in confusion. “I’m not even sure how that would be possible.”

So much fury was carved into the rugged, masculine angles of his face, it made something clench into a painful knot in her chest. The urge to shrink back from his anger was strong, but she forced herself to hold his hostile gaze as he said, “That worthless piece of shit needs to be taken down, and now I know how to do it.” He took a step toward her, his regard deep and measuring as he studied her expression. “What’s the real story, Juliana? Are you sure you didn’t want me to know about the Medeiros so that you could protect him? You still carrying some kind of torch for that twisted son of a bitch?”

Oh, God.

She pressed a fist to her chest, but she couldn’t stop the devastating well of emotion that suddenly poured up from inside her, nearly a decade’s worth of anguish and grief twisting her features. “Just stop!” she screamed, her throat clogged with tears. “You don’t know what you’re talking about. If you had any idea what that monster put me through, what he did to my life, you wouldn’t do this to me. I hate him!”

He didn’t say anything, but his jaw hardened as he took in the sight of her tears.

“Ashe, please believe me,” she cried. “I swear I’m not lying to you. I just…I wanted to keep anything bad from happening to you. Every person who has learned the truth about the Delacourts has suffered. I knew that if you learned what they really are, you wouldn’t stop until you’d found some way to destroy them. Even if it killed you. I just wanted you to be safe!”

He made a hard, thick sound of frustration. “Goddamn it, Jules. Did it never occur to you that I could take care of myself? I didn’t need your protection. I needed your honesty!”

“I know. And I’m sorry. But I wouldn’t change what I did, even if I could. I wasn’t trying to hurt you. I’m not like Gretchen, and I’ll do whatever it takes to make you believe that. I only lied to protect you, not use you. And you’ve lied to me, too.”

“We’re not going there,” he growled, turning his face to the side. His profile looked as if it’d been carved out of stone, his chest rising and falling with his ragged breaths.

Wetting her lips, Juliana accepted that the only way she might reach him was by tearing open her soul and baring the last of her secrets. It might backfire and blow up in her face, but she was willing to take the risk if it meant having a chance with him. “You can trust me, Ashe. I swear that you can. And I’ll…I’ll tell you the truth about everything to prove it to you.”

He turned his head, his heavy-lidded gaze sliding slowly back to hers. “You mean there’s more?” he drawled, his husky tone sending nervous chills down her spine. “What now, Jules? You have proof of Big Foot? The Loch Ness Monster?” He lifted his hand and snapped his fingers. “No, wait. I know. Alien abductions, right? Are we going to share secrets about little green men?”

Juliana could feel the color leach from her face as she wrapped her arms around herself. “You can be an ass if you want—it isn’t going to make me run. I just…I want you to understand why I was so protective. I want you to know what they’re capable of.” She swallowed, forcing the words from her tight throat. “You see…the banishment to the Wasteland wasn’t—”

“It’s too late,” he growled, cutting her off. “I don’t want to hear any more.”

Standing near the foot of the bed, she said, “Ashe, please.”

“I’m serious,” he ground out, shoving his hands in his front pockets. He started to pace before the dark window, his powerful muscles coiling and flexing beneath the soft cashmere of his sweater. “Let’s just leave it and try to get some rest.”

“Are we at least going to talk about the Burning?” she asked, wiping her damp cheek with her sleeve.

He cut her a sharp, warning look from the corner of his eye. “No, we’re not.”

“Just tell me one thing,” she whispered, her heart pounding to a deep, painful beat. “Is the Burning the only reason you made that deal with me? Was it only because you needed to…ease yourself?”

He rubbed his hand over his mouth, then exhaled a rough breath. “This isn’t a conversation we need to be having right now.”

She licked her lips again, and could taste the salt of her tears on them. “It was quite a risk you took, sleeping with me when you had no intention of claiming me.”

His breaths were coming a little faster, a muscle pulsing in the hard line of his jaw. “I wanted you and I took you,” he scraped out. “Nothing could have stopped it from happening.”

Even though Juliana knew she should stop talking, she couldn’t hold the husky words inside. “I’ve heard the need for a Burning male to release the serum in his fangs is excruciating. Your control is impressive, Ashe.” A bitter smile touched her lips. “But then, it probably helped that you don’t even like me.”

He slanted her another narrow look. “Don’t do this.”

Her own temper started to fray. “This isn’t fair,” she snapped, irritated that the blasted tears wouldn’t stop even when she was angry. “I’m opening myself up to you completely, and you’re still blocking me out. Still blaming me, as if my reasons mean nothing to you.” Her voice was getting louder. “Do you always bury things you aren’t willing to deal with behind a wall of rage? Do you always have to control every bloody situation?”

He was on her before the last word had even left her mouth, taking her down to the bed and crushing her beneath his body. “You never know when to stop pushing, do you?” he growled, pinning her wrists over her head and taking her mouth in a kiss that was hard and hungry and raw, before tearing his mouth away. “Do you see any control now, Jules? Do you?”

She stared up into the glittering depths of his eyes, his gorgeous face right over hers. “The Burning—”

“Fuck the Burning. I wanted you before it even started. From the first goddamn moment I ever saw you!” Pulling in a deep breath, Ashe tried to claw onto his control, but it was shattered, violent hunger and an eviscerating tangle of emotions ripping through him, breaking him down. “The heat in my veins came later,” he choked out, trying to make her understand. “It might have made things more painful for me, but it didn’t make me want you more. I already wanted you so much I bloody ached with it!”

“Then why didn’t you tell me?”

“Because I didn’t trust you! I still don’t!” he shouted, his fangs dropping from his gums with a searing burst of heat. He tried to fight it, but couldn’t. Before he even knew what he was doing, he’d lowered his head and was running his lips up the tender side of her throat. The scent of her skin made him crazed, the beat of her pulse roaring inside his head as if it was his own. “After what you’ve done, I doubt I could ever trust you,” he added. “But strangely enough, none of that seems to matter worth a damn, because I still want to mark you as mine so badly I can taste it.”

She turned her head to the side, moaning his name as her body shivered with need, and Ashe knew that she was his for the taking. That she wouldn’t fight him. He could drive his fangs into that pale, fragile skin and release the serum right into her vein, while her hot blood poured like liquid pleasure over his tongue, sweet and warm and rich. He was so damn tempted to do just that, if only he could find a way to get past his anger. But he…couldn’t. It’d braided itself into his friggin’ system, seeping into his blood and bones and cells. He was angry with her for not trusting him and for thinking he couldn’t handle an arrogant prick like Delacourt. For having ever let that miserable bastard put his hands on her in the first place.

But more than anything, he was furious that she’d made him start thinking this thing between them might actually have a chance. For making him believe in her, when she’d been lying to him all along.

The only answer was to do something to make her push him away, because he didn’t have the strength to do it himself.

And it had to be done now, because he was only seconds away from losing it.

Forcing himself to release her wrists, Ashe pulled away from her body and moved to his feet at the foot of the bed. Scrubbing one hand over his jaw, he said, “Tell me something, Jules. Were you as easy for Raphe as you are for me?”

She blinked up at him, looking confused. “What did you say?”

He raked his gaze over her body, then locked it with hers. “I asked if you were as easy for Raphe as you are for me? Is that why you wanted him so badly? Because he could flip your switch without even touching you?”

“You son of a bitch,” she whispered, her expression stricken as she quickly scrambled off the side of the bed.

“Just answer the damn question.”

Folding her arms around her body, she shook her head and stared back at him with glistening eyes, looking as if he’d just stabbed a knife between her ribs. “No,” she said in a low, whispery voice. “I wasn’t…easy for him, Ashe. But if you want all the gritty details of our night together, then I’ll tell you.”

“Can’t wait,” he said, though he was starting to feel a little sick inside.