Page 75 of A Subtle Scar
“I don’t need coddling, and I don’t even understand what you are saying. We never shared magic.”
Despite what he was saying, Chandler made no attempt to push either me or Hermes off him.
“It lived between you,” I said. “It wasn’t anything done consciously, or I don’t think that’s how it works because if so, humans would have written books about it. You are a mage in your own right, darling, but the source of your power lies somewhere between yourself and your twin. I don’t know enough about necromancy to say for certain, but it is possible that some of his essence remains with you. What you feel—a presence surrounding you when your mind is most unguarded—that may well be a manifestation of that essence.”
“Essence fades, over time,” Chandler said. This time, he lifted his head away from my chest and looked at me. “You’re wrong. And it doesn’t matter either way. It is what it is. I’m okay. I don’t need your pity or you fixing me.”
“We don’t want to fix you. We want to love you,” Hermes said. Yes, at times he was a genius, if a mad one with inopportune timing.
Chandler snorted, and this time, he really wriggled away from us. “Love me. What the fuck.”
He pointed at my bed. It was the one thing I owned which was new, bigger than king size and quite high off the ground on account of a very thick mattress, whose comfort I had selected to be proportionate to my divinity. The frame was ebony, and after a rare bout of vanity, I had wings carved all over it. Above, set into the ceiling, a curtain flowed from one curtain pole to the other to run down past the end of the bed, creating a sheer, soft sky above it.
“That’s my bed,” I said. I was also very fond of the rest of the cream furniture in the room, especially the nineteenth century vanity, but Chandler showed no interest in that.
“You think you can make me go sad and sappy, and I’d be ready for a fuck?”
“More like, if you wanted to be held and loved, we’d just have to take a few steps to—”
“No fucking,” Chandler said and crossed his arms. Then something passed over his face and he bit his bottom lip. “Actually. Scratch that. Fuck. You know what? You do whatever you want to me. Don’t say anything about love because that I don’t do. Other than that, just—I’d like to feel something else.”
He said that in a tone of voice that made me think what he’d really wanted to say was,I don’t want to feel anything; make me feel nothing.
Going by the look on Hermes’s face, our boyfriend had just surprised the both of us. Both our jaws slackened when he slid off his jacket.
Chapter Nineteen
Ididn’twanttothink about Charon’s wild idea that Victor’s death could have hurt me through magic we shared. Fuck. What kind of brother would I be if I blamed Victor, who was dead and couldn’t defend himself, for me feeling a little blue sometimes?
I decided I didn’t care about even indulging in the thought. I didn’t want to think it, and I wouldn’t, and either way, it was probably just those two immortals who were still trying to get in my pants, best case. Worst case, that thing about wanting to love me wasn’t just empty words. If so, too bad for them. In that case, this would be their damn breakup fuck. I loosened my tie.
“I admit I did an oopsie bringing us straight to the bedroom,” Hermes said, took Charon by the hand, and dashed at me.
I felt the weird teleportation magic surround and swallow me, and when it ebbed, I found myself in Hermes’s arms, blinking against a bright, sunshiny evening, and breathing air that smelled less of the ocean and more of heat than Brunswick did.
“What the fuck?” I asked.
“What a nice way of asking where I took you, baby. But you should recognize this.”
The fuck did I ever. We were at the fountain of the four seasons, the Fontaine des Quatre-Saisons,in the Jardin Anglaise in Geneva. The Lac was visible from here, and the sound of the fountain along with people enjoying the fine spring weather echoed around us, the French I picked up a kind of welcome to my ears.
I said, “No, seriously. Why are we here? I was down to have some fun.”
“You were hurting,” Charon said. I hated how reasonable he sounded. I hated how concerned he looked. He should look this concerned for the murder victims. He should focus all his immortal magic on helping people, not on me. I wasfine. I didn’t need this, and I didn’t want this.
“I was horny,” I said.
Hermes crossed his arms, and while he had the boyish look down, strict also suited him.
“We wouldn’t make you take our cocks in that state, baby. Not that we don’t want you all the time, but Ronny is right. You were hurting. Uhm. So. I can listen.” He took a deep breath, his shirt stretching over his chest. “Do you want to talk about it?”
“Don’t be an ass,” Charon said. “He’s been running around all day. We’ll feed him before anything else. Darling, Hermes won’t force you to talk about anything.” Charon moved in to pet my shoulder again. I was tempted to take his hand and lead him to pet something else, but we were in public.
“You could take me back, force me to cum so hard I’ll forgive you for abducting me, to a different country, I might add,” I said.
Hermes was flustered. I saw his balled fists. “We are taking care of you. We can also buy you lots of stuff. They have all the expensive brands here. But Ronny is right. We’ll spoil you with a good meal first.”
I snorted. “What? First you make me bring up all that stuff about my brother, and then you want to buy me expensive shit to replace him with? Trust me, didn’t work the first time someone tried, and also, fuck you. This was supposed to be your fucking breakup fuck, but I suppose you don’t want that. Have a nice life. Or rest of forever, I guess.”
