Page 89 of Savage Blood
“Preston,” Nora warned, shaking her head.
“What?” He tossed his hand in the air. “Fane’s going to lose her if he keeps pushing her toward Saint. And I don’t want to see that happen. I like Tate. She’s family.”
Knots fisted in my chest. “I don’t want that, either, but Fane’s not really giving me much of a choice. And after what happened with Hawk…”
Preston set his glass on the counter. “He only did that to save you. You are his first priority. Everyone else is second. Everyone, even us. And that’s how it should be.”
“Faneiskind of losing it,” Dylan muttered and removed his arm from my shoulders. “He destroyed a bunch of paintings in his art studio the other day.”
“What paintings?”
Dylan shrugged. “I’m not brave enough to find out. He’s barred anyone from entering that room.”
I set the spoon in the bowl and wiped my hands on a towel. “Fane can be mad all he wants if he finds out I snooped in there.”
The moment I stepped into Fane’s art studio upstairs, his scent overwhelmed my senses, and I inhaled it like a drug. Warmth enveloped me, sinking through my bloodstream. The urge to curl up on the buttery leather couch and drown in his presence tugged at my muscles.
I’d done it plenty of times before, when Kaspin’s spell still had a grip on him and he wanted to kill me. We finally broke that old witch’s spell, and Fane and I should have been happy.
But something always kept us apart.
A blank canvas sat on the easel in front of the window, and no fresh splatters of paint stained the drop cloth on the floor beneath it. I walked the perimeter of the room, peering at the familiar scenic paintings on the walls.
A sheet-covered stack in the corner caught my attention, and I knelt before it, pulling the fabric off.
My pulse spiked as the first torn painting emerged, and I fingered the rips in the canvas like claws had shredded it. Once I fitted the scraps together, the scene finally took shape. A pair of familiar tattooed hands—Fane’s—gripped the metal railing of a balcony. Bright lights shone above, and the crowd below, painted in shapeless blurs, surrounded the only clear figure.
Me.
The air catapulted out of my lungs as I recognized Wrath & Ruin, or more specifically, the moment Fane and I first laid eyes on each other.
Was he remembering?
The witches said he might never recover his memories.
My hands shook as I moved the canvas aside and discovered another shredded painting that depicted a worn, exhausted Fane lying in a bed, watching over me while I slept next to him. Cuts and bruises littered my face, my neck, and the arm sticking out of the covers.
His worry pulsated from the sorrowful brushstrokes and swirled in the cool, somber colors.
I pressed my fingers to my mouth. This was the night I nearly died fighting those agrigons and a royal demon in Mohan Wilds. They said Fane had never left my side.
When I unveiled the next painting, I fell back on my ass, and my lungs threatened to cave in. Logan’s lab in Vlehull erupted over the canvas in muted grays and whites while Fane and I, in the center, were a splash of intense, vibrant colors colliding together.
His thick, powerful arms embraced me as his mouth latched onto my throat, my expression showing dichotomies of emotions.
Bliss and pain.
Fear and safety.
Tears burned in my eyes as I ran my fingers over the destroyed canvas and traced the lines of our tangled bodies.
This was one of the worst moments of my life.
At least I used to think it was.
When Fane sank his teeth into my neck to give me the shifter bite, I’d hated him and cursed the day we met. But that fury faded as we melded together and connected in a way I still didn’t understand. I saw him, the real Fane, for those few moments, and I didn’t want to let go.
We were the same—broken and full of pain. And lonely.
