Page 58 of Petals for Deadly Power

“You’re wickedly and deliciously exasperating.” The way his voice was low as he pinned his stare on her lips made Lenna want to devour him, to get lost in him—withhim. “When you say partner, what exactly do you mean?”

She stroked his bottom lip with her thumb. “That you better not let anyone else in your ruthless heart and you better not put your precious cock anywhere else, Jake, because I’m so deeply in love with you, I would burn the world down if that happened. I want you all for myself.”

He inhaled deeply, his hands trailing down until he held the small of her back. “A burning, raging fire.” His hands went lower and lower until they cupped her ass. “Myburning, raging fire.” The way his strong fingers pressed against her cheeks made her core ache in need of more. “My heart is yours, and my cock—worry not, for I will ruin that lush pussy of yours until the very last of our days together. There is no one else I’d rather spend my days—my life—with. I can be your partnerandyour lover. For you, I can be it all.”

38

Hope

Nina’sfootstepsgrewlouderas she followed the dark green gathering sparks Ciaran had sent. When she entered the room that had become their common area, her white, wavy hair was all over the place, her ocean-blue eyes widened.

“Are you both okay?” she said, holding onto the wall.

Ayla arrived shortly after, her green eyes assessing Ciaran and Hope from tip to toe. Indianna followed.

Ciaran looked at Hope, swallowing. “We are now. We have—”

Raoul entered last, and Ciaran didn’t finish his sentence. Hope frowned deeply. The constant, never-ending change was scary.

Anyone could have recognized Nina and Raoul as siblings months ago, but now other than their smooth, pale skin, they looked barely alike anymore. There were dark bags under Raoul’s eyes, no longer light blue but a dusky sky tone, and the immaculate white hair Hope had first seen in the cave of Verdania—there were barely any remaining white strands left on his head. The majority of his hair was black.Black.

“What do you have?” Ayla asked Ciaran, walking next to Nina.

“The West feather,” he muttered. “Raoul, what the Fifth hell is happening?”

Nina’s brother shrugged, a failed attempt at being nonchalant, even when it was obvious his state was way past that. “I wish I could tell you. I go to sleep, and when I wake up, I look like crap.”

“Real, shit-looking crap, not standard, just-woke-up crap,” Ayla added.

“What happens when you sleep?” Hope asked. She had a feeling she knew the answer, and she didn’t want her answer to be true.

“I dream.”

“About?” Hope insisted.

He looked exhausted when he sighed. “You already know.”

The Core Cardinal had warned her after her Fifth Ceremony and then again during her ordeal, and still, this made it so much more real.

“Does she talk to you?” Her voice was a whisper. Ciaran’s shoulders tensed when he crossed his arms.

Ayla frowned deeply. “What are you two talking about?Whospeakswhere?”

“Black magic,” Raoul said.

Ayla snorted, lifting her eyebrows. “Oh, thanks. That explains everything.”

When Raoul stopped staring at the floor and met Hope’s gaze, she saw it. In his blue eyes there were black speckles that hadn’t been there before, either. Speckles that looked like ink. One moment, they were there, the next, they were gone.

“I wish I could tell you,” Raoul finally answered. “She talks to me, but I can barely remember when I wake up.”

The blood in her veins froze.Barely—notnever, butbarely.

Nina put a reassuring hand on her brother’s arm, pressing gently against his pale skin. “How was your ordeal, Ciaran?”

Ciaran shook his head slowly, the intensity of his stare pinning Hope down. A thin trail of shadows left his fingers, going towards her. In another world, another life, or with another man, she would have been alert, ready to attack. But it was Ciaran.

There wasn’t a single person in the world she trusted more than him.

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