Page 91 of Creatures that Breathe

Brows furrows, a ketchup painting on her plate, Leni doesn’t look at me, when she says, voice fragile, “Promise you’ll be gentle with me, Cross.”

I’ll be anything she wants me to be.

Gentle and calm and serene, patient. A man who doesn’t pressure, doesn’t rush.

I’d make sure to give her that. No matter how desperately I crave to devour her, how potent my lust.

I could do it right now. Not like I haven’t been hard since she ordered me tea. Pekoe tea. Because she remembered. Because she cared.

I could cover the entire pub in shadows this very second, splay her across the table and force her forget to everyone but me. Free her from Draven, and more than that, better than that, make her mine.

I won’t.

The curse is supposed to give me a week, but Leni has changed the time limits. Shortened it, by consuming my focus entirely. It doesn’t matter how many times I direct the conversation back to the king, how often I nip dirty thoughts, the influx of information fades too quickly. Drains as my focus centers on the pulse in her throat, the wet gloss of her lips.

Her every breath brings me to the brink. Her mind, her movements, the curl of her voice around my name, the flick of her lashes—white without the makeup, beautiful.

She gives me only agony.

I love it.

Saving her, giving her gentle, will be the best and worst thing I’ll ever do.

“I haven’t been gentle in a long time,” I admit after a slow, steady breath. My voice sounds low and murderous, vile even to my own jaded ears. “But for you, I would become it. As gentle as you ask. But please, don’t ask it.”

“You like it rough.” Resigned, dreading.

“I’d like for you to not be coerced into fucking me, Leni. We can come up with another solution, we can …” I trail off, having generated zero alternatives. Lying is the best option, but most creatures can scent relations.

Atlas blames the skill on rampant adultery among the Olympians, assumes they trained the ability into their ichor. Whatever the reason, a lie would only keep Leni safe if Draven never found her.

I could hide her.

Yeah, right, try it, the curse taunts. You’d last days.

If that. She distracts me too greatly.

She glances away, a blush fanning out across her cheeks like wildfire. “There is no other way,” she says. “I have to do this. I can’t go back there. The torture, the isolation. Yaya chose death over seeing what would happen to me in Draven’s hands.”

“Then pick someone else. Pick a better man. Don’t pick me.” I won’t survive it, knowing she’ll leave, knowing I’ll never have her again.

“It has to be—“ She stops herself. Tips her chin up. “Do you hear that?”

“No.” I cup her cheek in my palm, lower my gaze to hers. “Why does it have to be me, Leni?”

She shakes her head out of my hold. “It’s coming from you. It’s … buzzing?”

I hear it then. Too late.

Static. Crinkling hissing static. An old TV, a phone on hold. So quiet, one could only hear it in an empty bar with an avid eavesdropper.

Fuck.

I lurch to my feet. Throw money on the table.

Too distracted.

“We need to go.” I snatch the phone from the pocket of Atlas’s coat, clench my teeth, and drop it into Leni’s beer. “We need to go now.”

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