Page 27 of Midwinter Night's Prince

She held her hands up in surrender. “It’s me, I promise.”

Seth laughed. “Right. Effortlessly reading my mind is a great way to prove that.”

She rolled her eyes—the gesture so very Blair he almost let it convince him. “I’m not reading your mind—just your posture. You’ve never looked at me like I’m something to fear before.” She considered it for a second. “I admit I like it.”

Seth wasn’t sold. “How did you get here? Who took you?”

“A beautiful goddess. Golden eyes and skin. Partial to riddles.”

How thoroughly mortal. Seth’s shoulders relaxed a little. “You’re describing a thousand goddesses, at the very least. Are you hurt?”

Blair shook her head, and again, he narrowed his eyes.

Most of the things on Olympus would have hurt her, just for sport.

When he’d been pulled here, he’d faced nothing but torment.

Blair wasn’t of any interest to Olympus, but they should have shattered her simply out of boredom. Unless there was a bigger plan at work.

“Convince me you’re my witch, and I might let you live.”

“Yours?” She sneered. “Presumptuous, much?”

His lifted a palm and gathered a streak of lightning.

“Fine.” Blair shrugged. “Read me. I’ll put my shields down.”

His suspicion peaked. Blair’s shields were faultless—he could only enter her mind when she allowed it. And she’d rarely allowed it. Not any time he’d wanted to pull her into a dream until the previous night. Now she was just fine with it?

Unable to resist the temptation, he did nudge her mind with his, and found the doors wide open.

He walked in, taking a good look at everything that made her who she was. The walls confining her soul. Her memory, her trauma, her fears and her hopes…

“You’re not even capable of calling a drop of water?” a striking blonde with wavy hair and piercing green eyes snarled. “If I hadn’t pushed you out myself, I would think you weren’t mine, daughter.”

“Your core magic is strong, but forbidden. Trust the gods to bless you with a useless gift. Learn your place in the world, child.”

“You call yourself a witch?”

Terra White was cool precision, and in her quest to perfect her fiery, impulsive daughter, she’d broken her. Then when Blair failed to meet her expectations, she’d discarded her, training her cousin to take her place.

Away from toxicity, Blair thrived. Each time she heard her mother’s voice calling her useless, she beat it back behind doors, and got up, determined to prove she was someone. Something. Blair Lawson.

Professor Lawson. He could almost taste her goal, her dream. She’d been hurt at every turn during her training and she strived to become the opposite of her mother. Always smiling and bubbly, soft and sweet.

Except with him.

Blair saw Seth as an immovable mountain. No one, nothing could touch his self-confidence, so she didn’t need to play nice with him. She found it quite relaxing to simply not police what she said or how she acted around him.

Seth knew he was dealing with her now. He could close the door, let her retain some of her privacy.

He pushed through to the next room inside her mind—a dark place filled with filthiness, sensual dreams he would never have thought his proper, bubbly little witch capable of. And beyond, there were other secrets locked up tight. The impulse to hurt herself, which she’d long stopped giving in to. Her mother had made her hate herself, and younger Blair used to cut at her flesh, desperate to crawl out of it. Now, she did push-up, punched a bag or a sparring partner.

“I’ll kill your mother one day,” he informed her casually.

Blair finally shut the doors. “She did what she thought was right.”

“She saw your strength, and put you down before you could rise to take her place,” he snapped. “The Whites can live hundreds of years. She knew you’d climb the ranks of the clan within a couple of decades. Her treatment of you ensured you left before you could challenge her.”

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