Page 105 of Mistress of Lies

For a second, she thought she had reached him, but then Samuel’s expression turned dark, a harsh frown on his face as he studied her. “No. Please tell me this isn’t what I think it is.”

“Samuel?”

He wrested himself away from her, wiping his hands on his vest, as if he could remove the stain of her from his skin. “Is this what I’ve been to you this whole time? A way to the throne?”

“No, of course not!” Shan pursued him. “I would never—”

“You would. Don’t lie to me, Shan.” Samuel held out his hand, and in that moment she swore she could feel his power—just a hint of it, a taste that slipped out past his lips. But not enough to truly affect her. He held himself much too tightly for that.

It still sent a shiver down her spine.

“I meant it,” she said. Taking his hand, she pressed it against her face. “I am a liar, Samuel, and a cheat, and I will do whatever it takes to reach my goals. But I will not—I cannot—do that to you.”

Samuel sneered—and at that moment he looked so much like the Eternal King that Shan almost staggered back. “And why not?”

Shan searched for an answer, for one that she could bring herself to say. There were so many parts to it.

She didn’t want to hurt him.

He didn’t deserve it.

She wanted things with him she never dreamed she could have.

He was a good man, better than any she had ever known.

She could have said any of these things—all of these things—and it would have been the truth.

What she did say was “Because I can’t.”

When Samuel laughed it was the coldest thing she had ever heard from him. “I suppose that is an answer.”

But it wasn’t the one he wanted, or needed, and she had known it the moment she put voice to the words, could feel it in the way he closed off. “Please,” she whispered, barely knowing what she was asking for. “Please believe me.”

He hesitated. “I want to. But I don’t know if I can. If I can trust anything in this damned city anymore.”

Shan felt her heart crack. He was turning away from her—not because of the deepest, darkest parts of her soul, but because she couldn’t say the words he needed to hear. Not to herself, not out loud. So she did the only thing she could do. She hoisted herself up on her tiptoes and pressed a kiss to his lips. It was different from the last one they had shared—that had been violent, harsh and full of promise.

This was soft, desperate and full of all the things she never learned how to say.

Samuel melted into her touch, his hands cupping her face. He returned her kiss with a hunger, a fervor, that had her trembling against him. She twisted her hands in his jacket, pulling him close as the kiss turned heated—teeth and tongue and so much passion that Shan felt as if she were about to burst into flames, a phoenix reborn from the ashes.

Blood and steel, she wanted.

“Shan,” he gasped, against her lips, pushing her hair back from her face so that he could touch as much skin as possible. “I—”

“I know,” she said, interrupting him, not wanting to hear it. Not able to hear it. She already felt as if she was teetering at the edge of an abyss from which she would never claw her way out of, and she was afraid of even the tiniest of pushes. Instead, she pressed her face into his neck, whispering words against him. “I found you with the intention of making you king, yes, but I never wanted to be your queen. I never meant for this to happen.”

He drew in a deep breath, and she could feel the erratic beat of his heart against her. “I believe you, Shan. But we’re here now.” He wrapped his arms around her, not pulling her in for another kiss, not pushing her away, just holding her.

It was this—these little things—that he seemed to understand, that he so easily offered her. He wasn’t demanding, he wasn’t pushing. Though she could never bring herself to ask for this—she was raised to take, not to beg—he understood her perfectly.

He was a perfect partner in every conceivable way, except that if she were to have her way, she could never be with him. She was not meant to be a queen—she was far more powerful in the shadows.

Raising her hand to his lips, he pressed a gentle kiss to the back of it, and it felt like forgiveness.

It felt like a beginning.

Her smile was a fragile, brittle thing.

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