Chapter Nine

 

Look at me. Bastian’s voice echoed in her head. Ophelia finished rinsing her hair. If only the water could take the conflicting feelings inside of her down the drain with it.

Who did he think he was?

When she had connected with him in more than one way, that deceitful feeling of being wanted, of being a part of a couple, started creeping in. She couldn’t be vulnerable again. Surviving Nadair’s mental manipulations had been a challenge, but Nadair hadn’t wanted to know anything about her past. He hadn’t cared about what made her tick or why.

Bastian not only acted like he cared, but he knew more about her than her team did. He didn’t know details, but it scared her how easily she could give them up to him.

Then what? He’d know her deepest, darkest secret—and the humiliation that had faded under the heart-wrenching pain.

None of us has kids yet.

Such a casual observation Demetrius had made. Yet not completely accurate.

No, it was. She didn’t have a child. That fleeting moment of her life when she’d felt life grow inside of her had been stolen from her as completely as her youth had been.

With the shower raining tepid water over her, she could tell herself she wasn’t crying.

Damn Bastian for coming into her life. She’d been just fine deluding herself about her misery.

Wanting more was the true danger. A seedy, underhanded male like Nadair using her and failing at monogamy was what she was used to. She’d been with him and still done her job.

If an honorable and caring male like Bastian walked away from her, her malfunctions would affect her—in her normal life and in her work. Getting over him would take more than she cared to give.

She stood under the spray for a few minutes longer. What were the chances Bastian got upset and left?

Her heart sagged at the thought. The reaction wasn’t the hopefulness she’d told herself she’d feel.

She did another round of body wash.

What if Bastian hadn’t left and was only interested in more sex?

Yeah, she’d be up for that. His brand of vanilla sex had been the best she’d ever had. Of course, it hadn’t felt bland and tame at the time.

It was just sex. A natural function. She’d suffered through bad sex, decent sex, and…unwanted sex.

This morning’s round had been both desired and far beyond decent. And all it’d been was girl on top. It’d been mind blowing. Then she’d gotten up and left.

She bared her fangs at the faucet and flicked the water off. Stepping out of the shower, she grabbed an eggplant-colored towel. Slowly, she’d been incorporating her tastes into this small apartment.

With it being winter, she couldn’t do many upgrades on her cabin.

Bastian’s cabin. She didn’t want to ponder the meaning behind her purchasing his old home before they’d ever met.

She’d looked for a place to call her own. After the mess with their government and having to live under a false identity for so long, living in the compound with everyone just hadn’t felt like home.

The guy selling it had been willing to do everything over email. She’d had the money; he’d wanted it off his hands. The cabin had been so peaceful, and being there filled an empty part of herself she couldn’t identify.

She didn’t think that was the part that wanted to bond.

Then she’d gotten busy with demons and ferreting out those among her own people helping them. And Nadair.

She’d turned his manor into her home, knowing he could kick her out any second. But also knowing he wouldn’t.

Perhaps that was what had made Ophelia feel safe.

No, it was that for all his faults, Nadair had never turned his attentions toward young and vulnerable females. He manipulated those who could take it or deserved it. That was why Ophelia had felt safe. He could go to Sharpe’s Point and come home smelling like expensive sex, but it wasn’t underage sex. He didn’t target the kids of his colleagues. He had an odd sense of ethics, but it met the important points for Ophelia.

He also hadn’t filled her with the simple peace that being at the cabin did. She’d thought it was the space, not the ghost of the male who’d lived there.

She finished drying off and wrapped her hair in a towel. Using the white robe on the back of the door, she swirled it around herself.

She opened the door and stopped.

Bastian waited outside the door with his arms folded and his dark gaze brooding. “Are you done hiding?”

She fought the urge to step back inside and slam the door shut. “Excuse me?”

His voice softened. “I can smell your tears.”

“I wasn’t crying.”

He stared at her.

“Fine. It’s none of your business.” She returned his stare. It might very well be. True mates were supposed to sense emotions in each other. But they weren’t bonded yet, and she had no plans to be in the near future. Besides, true mates were supposed to know they were meant to be together, even if they fought the attraction. She should sense Bastian was her perfect match. Shouldn’t she?

Or maybe she was too fucked-up to tell. Her attraction to Bastian was undeniable, but it didn’t mean she was going to bind her life to his.

“You’re right. But I wasn’t asking to be nosy. I asked because I’m worried about you.”

He really needed to get dressed. His flaccid cock was still impressive, and she wouldn’t have to do much to make him sport another massive erection. And if he did that, she wouldn’t have the good sense to send him on his way. She’d shove him down and climb on again.

“Why are you worried about me?” She went out to the kitchen. He’d fed and while she’d love to tap his vein, it’d lead to more sex. And sex with him seemed to lead to an emotional mine field she didn’t care to traverse.

“Because that’s what people do. We care about each other.”

“Humans, maybe. Shifters, yes. Not vampires.” What could she make that was quick and would keep her eyes off him?

Chicken and mushroom cacciatore.

She pulled out the ingredients.

“Even us,” he said. He scanned her pile on the counter. “Chicken and mushrooms. Marsala, cacciatore, or carbonara?”

“Cacciatore.”

She was still talking to him at least. “Do you make your own sauce?”

“Absolutely.”

He nodded and stooped to pick up his pants. He stepped into them but didn’t button them.

His chiseled chest flowed down to his hard abs and that delicious curve of muscle that disappeared into the material of his pants.

Without a word, he started wiping off mushrooms.

She prepared the chicken. “Are you telling me that you were also the house chef?”

He shrugged as he worked. “It wasn’t hard. The Gastons weren’t picky about their food as long as it looked expensive. One day a week, I prepared meals and froze several. It was easier when Antonia got older.” A faint smile touched his lips. “She’d hang out in the kitchen and help. I doubt her parents even knew where it was. She didn’t worry about getting caught.”

“She’s remarkably well-rounded. You must be the reason.” She snuck a look at him. Was he blushing?

Hellfire. That was adorable. A big male cooking and blushing. How had she thought he was like all the rest?

“I texted her while you were showering. I don’t know if Fyra realizes the impression she’s leaving on that young girl.”

“It’ll be mostly good. Anything that’s not will only increase Antonia’s survival skills.”

He chuckled and started on the onion and garlic. She heated her pan and forced herself to quit sneaking looks at him. Them, together in the kitchen, felt right. It was dangerously close to her childhood fantasies coming true.

“You won’t tell anyone…” She bit her lip. Why was she bringing this up? “My team doesn’t know what happened to me. The only people who do are all dead.”

“By your hand?”

“Yes. After I recovered, I…” The story was pushing to get out, to finally get told, and the easy comfort they had working around each other made it hard to keep silent. “My parents were like the Gastons. They wanted to get ahead and stay ahead and that meant if one of their friends took an interest in me, I was theirs to give.”

“How young did it start?”

Ophelia’s appetite had left, but the act of cooking was still soothing. “Look at me. Before puberty.”

“They took your blood, too.” Fury boiled in his voice, but his slices were even.

When she failed to hit any growth spurts during her teenage years, her parents kept her closeted even more. Her diminutive size reflected on their parenting after all. Too bad they hadn’t realized that earlier and given Ophelia a few more years of peace before they bartered her away.

“Oh, Mother and Father tried to feed me to make up for the deficiency, but it was the—” She chomped on her lip so hard she cut through her skin. Licking her lips, she sealed the wound. But Bastian had probably caught it all.

“Something else happened?”

She dumped ingredients in the pan out of habit. No real thought was going into her meal prep anymore.

Should she lie? Instead of getting the nutrients she needed, she’d had them siphoned off her, unable to withstand the demands of a growing life inside of her and the sick desire of the leech her parents had given her to.

“I got pregnant.”

Bastian carefully laid his knife down, but his hard gaze stayed on the cutting board. Rage clogged the air. Since she’d dealt with it all decades ago, the emotion must be his.

“You heard correctly,” she said even though he hadn’t asked. “It’s hard to get with child outside of a bond, but it happens. And lucky me…” She grabbed the items he’d chopped and dumped them in to sauté. “Actually, while I wouldn’t call it luck, it was a turning point. She was stillborn at seven months along. They weren’t going to let me hold her, but I insisted on being the one to lay her in the sun.”

She shuffled the food around with a spatula harder than she’d intended to. But as her first verbal recounting of her past, she wasn’t flinging hot grease and meat all over the kitchen. So there was that.

“When she was…you know, gone, I’d already gone through the mental shift. My parents were going to die. The male using me was going to die. And they went to their final resting place the same way my little girl did.” Ashes. All of them.

Bastian gently pried the spatula from her hand and set the lid on the pan. “What was her name.”

His voice was a caress, but not sexual. Again, just what she needed.

“I never named her.” One of the many failings Ophelia chalked up to her past. Who didn’t name their child?

“Just because she didn’t have a name doesn’t mean she wasn’t real. I think you can name her whenever you’re ready.”

Ophelia took comfort from his words even though she didn’t deserve them. “It’s been ninety-four years. I think I passed ready.”

“How many of those years did you shove the memories into your mental stronghold and ignore them? Antonia showing up on your doorstep, nearly experiencing the same thing. Searching for Quentin, who might be in a similar situation. It’s all forced you to confront your past. And she’s not just in your past. She was your daughter.”

“She didn’t have a chance to be anything. If she had survived, her life might have been just as dismal.”

“Not with you as a mother.”

Ophelia spun. Didn’t he get it? “It was because I was her mother that she was conceived and died. I would’ve failed her if she’d lived.”

Compassion filled his gaze and it should make her angry, but she clung to it. “Would you tell that to Antonia? It was her fault she almost bonded a demon? What about Quentin? Is it his fault Lora seduced him?”

“Of course not.”

“Give your young self the same latitude.”

Her lips thinned. He was right, dammit. Why couldn’t she just agree with him?

“It won’t come instantly,” he said and pulled the pan off the stove. “You’ve been blaming yourself for a long time. Each time you want to pile the blame at your feet, think about what you’d say to Antonia or Quentin. Over time, you may change how you talk to yourself.”

She rested her hands on her hips. Her hair was drying and if she didn’t comb and contain it, it’d have to wrestled into submission. The savory aroma from their meal filled the kitchen. Her stomach came alive.

The talk with Bastian brought her appetite back to life. A quiet meal with him sounded…nice. She could use some nice in her life.

“You do that a lot,” she said. “You say what people need to hear.”

He lifted a shoulder. “My parents loved to talk to the campers. Since we were night owls, we usually caught them after a few drinks and a long day. They let their guards down, revealed things about their personal joys and struggles. My mother grew attached to humans.”

“Like they were puppies?”

He laughed. “No. She liked puppies just fine. But she thought with their short life span that they should revel in what they have, not waste precious time trapped in conflict of their own making.”

That certainly described Bastian. “And your father?”

His grin was unrepentant. “He wanted to make Mom happy.”

She giggled. Her hand flew to her mouth. Had that carefree sound come from her?

Bastian’s smile grew wider. “Where are your plates?”

She should be embarrassed. She should admonish herself for letting her walls down so far around him. Later. She’d build her defenses back up, but she was too raw right now, and Bastian was the perfect balm.

 

***

 

Bastian was on the bottom again. His pants had been shed and lay by the couch, along with Ophelia’s robe. She’d untied it and let it flutter to the ground after they’d eaten.

He didn’t remember what they’d consumed. He’d spent the entire meal wanting to keep that light look on her face. She’d smiled easier, and her eyes weren’t closed off, or worse, haunted.

She’d asked for stories about the campers his parents would talk to. He had the feeling she was connecting the desolate cabin she owned with the lively campground that had been located closer to the lake.

Flyaway hair surrounded her delicate face and she closed her eyes. He was content to watch her. The sinuous way her body moved was a work of art. The stroke of her sex against his shaft was as real as it got.

As good as this felt, there was still something…distant…about it.

She swiveled her hips and his worries were whisked away. It was just them. She stretched around him, her movements uninhibited and free. He’d have to be content with that for now, but he would get to the real her, the part of her that she’d shared while she cooked chicken over a stove.

She went taut as her climax hit, and he couldn’t hold back anymore. As she relaxed into her orgasm, he pulled her to him. Their mouths smashed together. He swallowed her cries, and she took his as they crested together.

Their kiss lingered. He massaged her back as she rocked gently against him.

“We need to get some rest if we’re to hunt for Quentin tomorrow.” His breath tickled her ear. “Want me to tuck you in?”

She didn’t shiver. A sign her defenses had gone back up. “I’ve never been tucked in.” She pushed herself off him. He mourned the loss of her heat. “I don’t think tonight’s the night to start.”

She grabbed his clothing and her robe from the floor. Tossing his pants at him with one hand, she swung her robe over her shoulder with the other.

He always knew the right thing to say. Wasn’t that what Ophelia had claimed?

What did he say now? “We’re not done, are we?”

“We don’t have to be.” She sauntered to her room.

Was that an invitation? She might welcome him into her bed, but it’d be for more emotionless sex.

He put his pants on and located his shirt. Once that and his boots were on, he filled a glass of water and carried it back to her room.

She declined getting tucked in, but he could see her to bed like a gentleman.

The view that greeted him made him stumble. Water sloshed in the cup. Ophelia had put on a tight dark purple tee and shorts that hugged her body like he wanted to. The three-inch gap between her waistband and the hem of her tee played a sexy peek-a-boo with her hard stomach.

She was power and femininity in one small bundle.

He held up the glass before setting it on her end table. The covers were rumpled from their earlier tryst. The memory threatened to send blood rushing to his cock again, but he clamped off the vision.

He left her room and gathered his tactical gear with a swoop of his arm. Leaving her apartment, he smiled to himself. It was the best way to leave her. Respectfully, with his wishes for more made known, but not outstaying his welcome until she thought the only reason he was there was to use her.

Laughter carried down the hall. He turned one of the many corners inside the maze of the compound and slowed. A group had gathered outside the door of an apartment. Antonia sat on the floor outside of another door that had a burly guard standing post.

The male’s name was Scurn. Bastian had met him the first night when Calli had loaned him Demetrius’s clothing. She’d said he was the personal guard for Demetrius’s sister Isabelle, but she hadn’t said why Isabelle would need one.

Calli stood by the entrance to her own place, her arms folded but her stance relaxed. Her smile stayed when she saw Bastian. Surprise lit her gaze.

Damn, he must smell like sex and Ophelia. What would Antonia think?

Antonia was too busy laughing with someone behind a crack in the door. Even stern Scurn looked amused.

A pale face peeked out. An ethereal beauty with light emerald eyes assessed him. Those ancient eyes didn’t belong on such a youthful face. “She thinks she can choose, but she cannot. I get to choose.”

“What’s that mean?” Antonia asked.

The girl glanced away from him to Scurn. “I get to choose.”

“Sure you do,” Scurn said. Isabelle scowled and jerked back. The door slammed shut.

Antonia bit her lip and glanced from Scurn to Calli.

Calli held out a hand to help her up. “That’s the way Isabelle usually says goodbye. Especially if Scurn talks to her.”

“What’d she mean?” Antonia brushed herself off. The look she shot Bastian was full of question.

“Only Isabelle knows what she means, but it’s never nonsense.” Calli smiled but didn’t elaborate. “Have a good sleep, everyone. I’m up way too late.” She disappeared into her room.

Bastian nodded at Scurn, then turned to Antonia. “You’re up a bit late.”

“I couldn’t sleep and it’s not fair to Fyra to babysit me day and night. Calli offered to entertain me for a while but Isabelle distracted us.”

Leading Antonia back to their apartments, he asked, “What did she say?”

She frowned. “Nothing that made sense at first. She said the beneath comes up and the up goes down and that’s not going to change. Calli got her talking in more than riddles. She’s… different. Nice. I like her.”

“Good.” They wandered in silence. Isabelle’s words could very well mean the underworld. Before they reached their destination, he turned to her. “How are you really doing?”

Tears welled in her eyes. “All the same thoughts are going through my head. They circle around. Fyra can stall them for a while, but they’re always there. Waiting.” She stopped in front of her door. “Has Father tried to get ahold of me?”

“I don’t know,” he said quietly. In a way, Bastian hoped Master Gaston had. Then Antonia would think he gave a shit. But if he had, it’d be for his own gains and not out of concern for his daughter.

“I know it’s best I don’t know if Father’s trying to get to me, but…”

“I know.”

Tears threatened to spill, but she nodded and dragged in a shuddering breath.

He couldn’t leave her like this. “When’s the last time you had a decent cup of tea?”

She laughed. “Not in like, forever. Fyra insists on heating the water with her touch, but I don’t have the heart to tell her it makes it taste like sulfur.”

“Go on in. Get ready for bed and I’ll make some tea.”

“Sweet, thanks.” She darted inside. “Oh, and don’t think I don’t want to hear all about you and Ophelia.”

He’d give her the PG version. She hadn’t asked about Quentin yet and if she couldn’t sleep earlier…