Page 28 of Godsbane
Murphy’s head cocks to the side, strands of black hair falling across his brow. He drops my arm and takes a step backwards, letting his gray eyes survey me from head to toe. Pearly white teeth snag on his bottom lip as his gaze wanders back to my face.
“You really can pull off every shade of green, can’t you?”
“Fuck you!” I call out, turning towards my room with every intention of putting distance between us.
“You want to.”
His words stop me in my tracks, my mouth hanging agape. I know my audacity is fueled by whiskey tonight, but I’m not sure where he’s getting his.
I turn back to find Captain Murphy walking towards me at full speed. I backpedal, my back smacking the wall seconds before his forearms move to bracket my head, holding me in place.
“Let me go,” I protest half-heartedly.
Wow, real convincing, Ivy.
“I will,” he promises. A soothing bolt of magic washes over me urging me to trust him. His lips brush against the shell of my ear as he speaks. “As soon as you admit that it wasn’t the blacksmith you really wanted to fuck tonight.”
The feel of his body pressed against mine overwhelms all of my senses, his words stoking the embers of my magic and my lust back to life. I fight the urge to expose my neck to the heat of his breath, futility demanding the molten heat in my core to steel.
I cannot melt into him.
“You think awfully highly of yourself, Captain.” I force the words past my lips. Words that neither confirm nor deny his damning accusation.
He stiffens and my magic shudders as a ripple of emotions cascade through me. Waves of frustration mingled with a deep longing and capped with an indescribable desperation. Emotions that I know don’t fully belong to me. He shifts slightly, angling my head upward until our eyes meet.
“Why do you refuse to say my name?”
“Why does it matter?” My whispered words are barely audible over the hammering of my heart in the empty hallway.
The tattoo, the inexplicable way my power dances around him, his name. They’re all omens. Dark signs of our intertwined fate. Saying his name aloud doesn’t change that; I know that in my bones. But it feels like accepting it. Like I’m giving up my last chance at fighting whatever waits for me.
Murphy’s hands move to cup my cheeks. “The only people who use my name are the people who are important to me. Whether you like it or not,youare important to me.”
“I’m not …”
“Don’t do that.” His demeanor shifts, something akin to pain flashing across his expression. “Don’t diminish yourself.”
His right thumb traces my cheekbone, leaving a trail of sparks in its wake. Instinctively, I lean into his hand, sealing my fate without a thought in my head besides the otherworldly call of his touch.
“Look me in the eyes and tell me that you don’t feel that. Tell me that you’re not … thatwe’renot important … that we’re not connected. And don’t fucking lie to me, Ivy.”
My stomach clenches at the sound of my name on his lips. The very world feels as if it’s spinning on an unnatural axis. I swallow the thick knot in my throat, fighting back the warring feelings within me.
“The only thingweare is death.”
My whispered confession burns as it claws its way past my lips. Giving voice to my premonitions feels oddly like carving them into a headstone. Proof of our demise that will last for hundreds of years after the Dark God has claimed our damned souls.
“Death and I are well acquainted.” The captain’s voice is just as pained. Unspeakable memories must be playing on an infinite loop behind the silver storm that churns in his irises. His hand slides to grasp the nape of my neck, hauling me closer to him until his nose rests atop mine. “I’m not afraid of shadows.”
“What about poison?”
A low chuckle shakes his chest as a sly smile forms across his too close lips. “I’ve waited a long time to be poisoned by you, Ivy.”
What little hold I had on my stability is completely lost at his words, his grasp the only thing keeping me upright. I struggle to breathe, to form a single thought other than his name. I clench my fists hard, nails digging into my palms in a futile attempt to restrain myself from falling completely into whatever spell he’s cast over me.
I don’t want to think—not about who he is, who I am, or the doom that fate has in store. I just want to fall senselessly, passionately into the neverending chasm that awaits us.
“Cal.”
