Page 223 of Flirting with Darkness

He swallowed and lifted one shoulder. “I thought you just meant to fuck. I… I didn’t think anyone would want me for me, beast and all. Notreally.” His face crumpled, just for the briefest instant, but I saw it and I ached for him. “When I realised I’d attacked you, it felt like those people were right all along… like my worst fears had come true. I was just a vicious beast no one wanted. And I felt stupid for wanting anything more, for hoping that maybe…”

The tears I’d held in earlier came. Weeping in silence, I stared up at him and tried to gather my breath. “Iwasfrightened. Not of you, but what she’d made you—mindless and out of control. When that faded, though, I realised I already knew exactly who and what you were.”

He took my hand, his claws tickling my palm. “If I’d told you before we got here and became subject to her geas, it wouldn’t have happened.” He shook his head like he was still battling those mistakes. “I should have—”

“Oh hush.” I placed my hand on his chest, revelling in the warmth of him, and used that to steady myself as I rose on tiptoes. “Has anyone ever told you you talk too much?”

He only had time to raise his eyebrows in what must’ve been surprise before I kissed him. A kiss to seal all we’d said. A kiss to prove he had nothing more to apologise for. A kiss to remind him we’d survived and that was what mattered most.

When I pulled away, he wore a grin that was part foolish, part dazed. “No one’s ever told me that.” He even gave a slight chuckle as he brought his arms around me.

I squeezed and shut my eyes and inhaled, taking in greedy breaths of bay and mint, musk and fur—ofhim.

I even grumbled when he pulled back, but he kept his arms around me and only pulled away enough to look me in the eye. “I love you, Rose. And in case it wasn’t clear, I want you, too. I want you to be my wife, in reality, not just in a bargain.”

His eyebrows clashed together and even as a thrill fluttered through me at his words, I tensed for the “but” I could feel coming.

“But I know us being together means leaving your home, your family, everything you know and want, all you—”

“Yes.”

He blinked, twice. Quickly.

“Were any of those things on my list of wants?” I cocked my head at him. “Once IthoughtI wanted them, but I think I just told myself that, because they were the only options I thought I had. My family doesn’t need me; they haven’t for a long time.” I gave a little shrug because that knowledge didn’t hurt as much as it would’ve a month ago. “Ari said how well they’ve managed.

“And, yes, I love them, but it’s a different kind of love.” My heart thudded against my ribcage—he had to feel it where we were pressed together. “Different from what you give me or I feel for you. Visiting them—that will be enough. So. Yes, I will be your wife. I will have you as my husband—myrealhusband.”

His lips parted but he said nothing, just stared back.

“There were some wants I didn’t say the other night in the courtyard.” My face grew warm. “Iwas the coward. But here they are now.”

I held on to his shoulders, using their solid mass to anchor myself to him. “I want you, Faolán. In every way. I want to see your hard-earned smiles and hear that infernalhmmsound. I want you to be grumpy at me and pretend you don’t find my jokes funny. I want to wake up with you even though we’re no longer locked in that house. I want to be a shield, like you are.”

If we hadn’t been so close, I might’ve missed the slight widening of his eyes, the tiny flare of his nostrils. But I was close enough to catch every little detail as he absorbed my words.

Slowly, the corners of his mouth rose and he nodded like he was looking at a job well done. “Yes.” He lifted me from the ground, still nodding. “That’s my love. That’s my little flower—my greedy little flower. Want, want, want.” He clicked his tongue as though telling me off, but his canines flashed and gave away that he was fighting a grin. “We’ll make sure you have it all.”

He kissed me, gently, sweetly, deeply, which was exactly what I needed after all we’d been through in the past twenty-four hours.

We stayed there a long while, me wrapped around him, his attention tender but thorough.

Just as we crossed a line into heated rather than warm, he groaned, pulled me off him, and placed me on the floor at arm’s length. He closed his eyes and exhaled. “Much as I could do this all day, we still need to get out of here. Now it isn’t bound to the house, the residual magic is stopping me from contacting Bastian. I canfeelit choking the air.” He shuddered like a sabrecat shaking off flies, and when I looked closer, I spotted the hairs on his arms were on end.

I frowned and held still, but it was only once I closed my eyes and held my breath that I became aware of the faint hum in the air, too fast and too high pitched to be pleasant. I shuddered, too. “What if he doesn’t come right away?”

“I’m tapping this thing until he does.” He lifted his wrist. “I will irritate him into appearing and taking us home.”

I laughed, and hand-in-hand, we walked through the forest. At last we found a strip of collapsed rubble that stretched away left and right into the distance—all that was left of the wall around the estate. Faolán stepped right over it, then lifted me across like I weighed less than a bag of flour. I couldn’t help but smile at it. Back in Briarbridge I always felt too tall, too strong compared to women like Ari, but sometimes around him, I felt almost dainty. Almost.

When he placed my feet on the floor, he didn’t let go, though, just held me close and smiled. “So, I get to keep you,” he murmured and closed his eyes, touching his forehead to mine. “Even after everything you’ve seen of me, you’re still here.”

I threaded my fingers into his hair and basked in this closeness—not just the physicality, but the intimacy. “Especiallyafter everything I’ve seen of you.”

“Hmm.” This one was a sound of pure contentment before he released me and tapped on the bracelet.

While we waited for a reply, him still tapping, I tore a wide strip of fabric off the hem of my nightgown. To his questioning look, I raised an eyebrow. “I know you aren’t bothered about nudity, but I figure you probably don’t want to return to your court in this state.”

He looked down at his still very naked body as though only just realising. “Fair point.”

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