Page 63 of Necromancers Don't Raise

He frowned down at me, at his hands in my impassioned grip, then back up to my eyes that were doubtless particularly bright from the layer of tears that hadn’t yet fallen. He pulled me into a hug, holding me so tight that for a second I thought that he was trying to strangle me, but it would be the world’s least efficient strangulation, and one thing Mercury was, was efficient.

Finally, he let me go and shifted so that he could kiss my hair and brush away the tears I hadn’t noticed falling. “Your hair is so soft.”

I sighed heavily, closed my eyes, and pressed my head into his neck. “And wet. I give you permission to eat it if you like, but it will probably give you all kinds of indigestion. I’m so tired, Monsieur Mercury. I’m so tired of today.”

“Today was exhausting,” he rumbled in agreement. “I turn my back on you for a moment to heal a broken arm and a few scratches, and the next thing I know, you’re off to interrogate the world’s worst monster. Do you know why he told you such a ridiculous thing as that he’s your father?”

I took a shaky breath. Hearing him say that it was ridiculous was very nice. Good was fabricating things for some reason I was too sane to understand. “I don’t understand what he’d get out of it. He said he was giving me his empire.”

“He’s going to publicly claim you as his daughter?” His voice was even, but he squeezed me a little too tight before he loosened his hold again. “Do you have any idea how many people will try to kill Mr. Good’s heir?”

I rubbed my cheek against his neck and breathed in his scent. “I imagine the whole world wants him dead, but I’m not worried about it. First of all, the whole thing is ridiculous. The secondthing is that while it’s not your favorite thing to bring me back from the dead, you still would, wouldn’t you?”

He rumbled in his chest. “Let’s save that as a last resort, but yes, I’d bring you back. You shouldn’t want me to, not such an upright, noble citizen as yourself.”

I sniffed. “That’s right. I’m the stupidly good, bland beauty that wouldn’t ever tempt you. But I’m your pathetic dead, so you have to keep me, anyway. What a madman. Mr. Good. If I had his empire, I’d turn it into an organization for rehoming strays or something equally civil. I’m not going to kill people and run drugs and weapons, or whatever his thing is. He’s not an idiot, is he?”

“You have his immortality. That will help, but you’ll need a bodyguard with you at all times,” he murmured, running his hand over my wet head.

“What?” I tried to get up, to look at him, but he didn’t release me.

“Retta will be an asset.”

“What are you talking about? I thought we agreed that Mr. Good couldn’t possibly be my father.” I struggled and struggled until he finally released me enough that I could sit up and look down at him.

He smiled politely, but his eyes were visibly flickering behind those dark glasses. “Of course. We can agree to anything you like, as long as we are also taking precautions against all threats to your safety.”

“But there’s no threat, because he’s not…”

Mercury raised a hand to show me a small vial of what looked like blood. “I happen to have in my possession a sample of Mr. Good’s blood. I’m not going to tell you that he’s your father, because it doesn’t matter whose blood you have. You are my Nova, and nothing and no one is going to change that.”

He pulled me closer against him, so his hard muscles sank into me along with his heat.

Wait. He couldn’t insinuate that I was Mr. Good’s daughter, but that it didn’t matter. Of course that mattered. I mean, at the very least, I had the immortality he’d bargained a demon for. At the most… My whole life was a lie. Not that it was my life anymore. But where did that leave me?

I shook my head against his chest. “You really think I’m Mr. Good’s daughter? I think I’m going to be sick.” I pushed against him, but he didn’t budge. “Oswald Mercury, let me go. I’ve got to change out of this miserable wet stuff before I get a pneumonia. I might be immortal and regenerate, but that doesn’t mean I can’t get the most miserable cold known to man.”

He finally released me, staring at me through those impossible-to-read sunglasses. “Colds are miserable. There should be clothing in the belly of the boat.”

I swallowed hard and tried to smile, but the foundation I’d built my whole identity on was cracking and crumbling beneath me. “Your clothes or more goblin gear?”

“Mine. You will wear my clothing and climb into my bed until you’re warm and comfortable.”

“I will?” I sniffed and then tugged on his hand. “And you’re going to stay up here sunbathing while I’m in your bed?”

“Unless you’d like to make use of my body heat.”

I stared at him and felt absolutely weird. “Seriously? You’d snuggle the daughter of someone you banned from your auction house?” Was that real? Was it possible?

“I’d snuggle you if you’d been transfigured into an octopus, and I despise octopi.” His slight smile didn’t tell me enough, and his eyes were still covered by the dark glasses.

“Don’t teach Bones how to make calamari. Got it.” I left him, hurrying down the hatch, barely registering the elaboratecarvings around the entrance because everything was spinning out of orbit.

The hall was lit with flickering aqua flames on dark iron sconces that reminded me of his cankered sword. To the left was a bathroom that was larger than I expected, with a large iron bathtub filled with steaming water. It was a weird shade of blue that matched the flickering sconces, but I didn’t let it bother me.

I wasn’t as cold as I’d been before Mercury’d held me in his arms, but I was quickly chilling again. I stripped with trembling hands, then climbed into the blue water until only my nose was sticking out. It was so deliciously warm and comforting. The water bubbling with little bursts that smelled like Mercury’s extremely delicate French cologne. It was delicious, so very delicious. I floated there until the memory of dead fingers had me standing up with a racing heart in a spray of water. Corpses in water were not my favorite, but an octopus would probably be worse.

I grabbed a towel to wrap around myself and then stepped back out into the hall, soft blue carpet beneath my bare toes. I was shivering again by the time I opened the elaborately carved door that opened into a bedroom as beautiful as a jewelry box. The bed was lit by two sconces on either side of the carved headboard, but what I really stared at was the turned-back dark teal coverlet that revealed silk sheets the color of my eyes.

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