Total pages in book: 132
Estimated words: 125083 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 625(@200wpm)___ 500(@250wpm)___ 417(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 125083 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 625(@200wpm)___ 500(@250wpm)___ 417(@300wpm)
“I like your soul,” he said. “I’ve never before touched one that has so much to give. It beats with grit, inner strength, guts, and drive. It isn’t stained with foul emotions like so many I own or have rights to. It might be undead, but it’s not a flickering candle that’s close to burning out. It’s a roaring fire. Black fire.”
“You talk about it like it’s a pretty, shiny new toy.”
Hmm, maybe he did. Cain liked to collect rare things—art, books, objects. He’d never had rights to an undead soul before, nor one that held so much promise. “I’m sure it’ll be a fun toy to play with.”
She frowned. “What does that mean?”
Oh, she’d find out soon enough.
“There’s nothing special about my soul,” she said. “I’d bet most of them are ‘roaring fires.’ You have people coming to you all the time to make deals, so you’re used to seeing the souls of those who are greedy or envious or chronically dissatisfied. You’ve forgotten that there’s more to people than that.”
“Not all those who bargain their soul do so for selfish reasons. Some wish to save the life of a loved one, find safety for those they care for, or perhaps locate a person who has gone missing from their lives. Desperation is a powerful feeling. It can make a person do all sorts of things they’d never otherwise do.”
Biting her lip, she conceded his point with an incline of her head.
Seeing her teeth digging into that fleshy lower lip, he was tempted to tug it free with his thumb and then replace her teeth with his own. His body tightened at the thought.
It felt good to really want something. More, it felt good to feel that there’d be some satisfaction in having it. After eons of nothing being out of your reach, you ceased to yearn for things with any true intensity because there was no real gratification to be had from always getting what you desired. But Wynter … he fucking burned for her.
And he would have her.
He’d need to be careful with this one, though. She was sharp. Too sharp. He had more secrets than he knew what to do with.
“Do you ever get people asking to have their soul returned to them?” she asked.
“Yes. Some find that whatever they sold their soul for wasn’t quite as gratifying as they’d expected. That particularly happens with fame. Once they tire of its price, they come crawling back to me looking to wangle out of their contract, fairly oozing regret. A wasteful emotion, really.”
“You don’t have any regrets at all?”
“They tend to eat at a person. If you’re going to live an eternally long life, you can’t afford to have regrets. They’d drive you insane.”
“Some might say you are insane.”
He felt his mouth twitch. “Oh, they might. They do. They may even be right.”
“You don’t sound too concerned about that.”
He chuckled. “On an entirely different note … the sole male in your coven, is he your lover?”
A line formed between her brows, and she shook her head.
Satisfied gripped his gut. “Good.”
“Is it?”
“Yes. I don’t like it when things are in my way.”
Wynter stilled as the implications of that sank in. Her body was totally up for dancing the horizontal tango with him. But nothing about that would be wise.
He moved closer, boldly pushing into her personal space. “Just so there are no misunderstandings, I want you. I want your taste in my mouth. I want my cock in your body. I want my fingers in your mind.”
“My mind?” she echoed.
“When you’ve lived as long as I have, very little can surprise you. Even less can pique your interest. People become too easy for you to read. Too predictable to be entertaining. But you … you’re difficult to get a handle on. Even now, nothing in your expression is telling me what you’re thinking. It’s incredibly frustrating. I want to be up here,” he added, tapping her temple.
Yeah, well, she didn’t want him up there. As for spending a night in his bed … that idea held way too much appeal for her liking. She embraced her sexuality; she wasn’t afraid to explore or admit to her desires—there was a certain power in that, really. But this wasn’t a man who’d quite simply fuck her. He was far too dominant, far too used to control, for it to be that simple. “I’m not interested in warming your bed.”
“You’re interested. Oh, you don’t look it. I don’t see any trace of arousal on your face.” He very gently tapped her cheek with his finger. “But I can read your body much better than I can read your expressions. You let people see only what you want them to see, don’t you? It makes me wonder what else you’re hiding.”
She was hiding that she’d reached the unfortunate conclusion that she was fucked in the head. Wynter wasn’t used to being at a disadvantage. Her magick was a force that was almost as dark and deadly as the monster inside her—both those things made her very good at killing. Plus, she was trained to take down any breed of preternatural, and she was confident in her ability to take care of herself.