Cruel Enchantment (10 page)

WHEN
she woke the next morning, a bowl of oatmeal rested on the floor near her head. Wow. First a pillow and blanket. Now oatmeal. She sat up slowly, working the kinks out of her muscles. Two nights sleeping on a concrete floor hadn’t done her body any favors.

Her throat hurt even more now than it had before she’d fallen, mentally and physically exhausted, into a fitful sleep. She was certain she had a bunch of bruises shaped like Aeric’s fingers ringing her throat, but they’d disappear soon enough. Her heightened healing ability knocked most injuries out in half the time it took other people to heal.

She picked up the oatmeal and began spooning the cooling sludge into her mouth. Movement caught her eye and she realized she wasn’t alone. Aeric sat against the opposite wall, looking unrested. Apparently he’d been watching her sleep. Her stomach clenched and she immediately lost her appetite.

“Morning?” It came out as a question because she wasn’t sure which Aeric she was getting. Was she getting the enraged Aeric who might lunge across the floor and strangle her at any moment? Or was this the grief-stricken Aeric who was giving up his dreams of vengeance to take the moral high road?

Boy, she hoped it was the latter Aeric. She liked that high road a lot, especially when it kept her alive.

“You said that killing Aileen was an accident.”

Her bite of oatmeal went down with an audible gulp. “Did I say that?” Because, hoo boy, she’d never meant to. She set her bowl down.

He nodded. “Last night.”

Oh, yes, he meant,
last night after I tried to strangle you and you were begging for your life
. She touched her throat. It was possible she’d let slip a little info. She’d been pretty terrified and hadn’t been thinking straight.

Well, she’d see how much she could explain without explaining everything. “It
was
an accident. I knew no one would believe me, since I had that . . . um . . . that—”

“Infatuation with me?”

“Yes, that.” Anger suddenly rushed through her veins, making her lash out. “A schoolgirl crush. Something I haven’t felt for you in hundreds and hundreds of years.”

Aeric only studied her in the half-light, not rising to the rage in her voice.

“I knew no one would believe me because of the crush and because of my . . . occupation. It made it seem like I had killed Aileen out of jealousy. That’s why I left Ireland after it happened. I knew that no matter what I said, my reputation would precede any explanation I made. I knew you’d kill me.”

“You were right. No
assassin
of the Summer Queen has
schoolgirl
crushes. You were never that innocent.”

She crossed her arms over her chest. “Maybe you perceive me that way. I was just trying to survive, Aeric. I was young, impressionable.”

“You were a stone-cold killer.”

“Yes, I was,” she snapped. “I was what the Summer Queen made me. She took me in when I had no one and molded me from the time I was twelve years old.”

“Don’t blame her. Don’t try and play off my sympathy. You made your own choices.” His volume ratcheted up a notch and made the hair at the back of her neck stand on end. “I don’t have any sympathy for you.”

“You’re right.” He was right; she wasn’t just agreeing with him to help him keep his temper in check. “I did make my own choices and they were the wrong ones. I was, however, highly influenced by others. Manipulated. Threatened. Tricked. Even tortured.”

And the Summer Queen, via Lars, had taught her how to effectively do all those things to others. Her “education” hadn’t stuck with her for long, however. It just wasn’t in Emmaline’s basic makeup to be that way. She guessed she’d make a sucky Summer Queen.

“Are you trying to make me feel sorry for you? It won’t work.”

She gave him a slow blink. “I think I know that.” She took a deep breath and set her palms on the floor on either side of her. “Look, Aeric, if I had wanted to kill Aileen to get her out of my way, do you really think I would have done it like that? I was an
assassin
to the
Seelie Royal
, the best there was. I knew how to kill people and keep it quiet when the need arose. If I had wanted to kill Aileen and make a move on you, don’t you think I would have made her murder look like an accident?” She thumped back against the wall, out of breath and her throat aching.

All expression had left his face. It was like looking at a blank wall.

“It’s just logical,” she finished, needing some kind of sound to fill up the sudden unnerving silence.

“It’s
logical
that you came upon her in the woods and were so filled with murderous rage that you shot her without really thinking about it. Then you panicked and ran.”

So that was the scenario he’d been imagining. A crime of passion. Her jealousy had so overwhelmed her that she’d shot Aileen down in a fit of uncontrollable emotion. “You just said I was a stone-cold killer. How much do you think passion or panic entered into my decision making back then?”

He looked away from her, his jaw locking. He still hadn’t asked her for the details of Aileen’s accidental death and that was a good thing. “You just called yourself a manipulated young woman with a schoolgirl crush. Pick an illusion and stick with it.”

“I was both, Aeric. Two sides of the same coin. I learned to kill for the Summer Queen at an early age, and I showed great proclivity for it. Believe me when I say that passion or panic never weighed in my decision making where doling out death was concerned.”

He shook his head and gave a laugh that sounded anything but joyful. “You are incredible. You have an answer for everything and I can’t believe any of it.”

“I can’t help you with that, Aeric. The truth is all I have, and that’s all I’m telling you. You either believe it or you don’t.”

“I don’t.”

She lifted her hands and shrugged her shoulders. “Okay.”

They sat together in silence for several long moments, her uneaten oatmeal growing cold and congealing on top. The couple of bites she’d taken sat like little paperweights in her gut.

“You need a shower and a change of clothes,” he said finally.

Hope surged through her. There was a toilet here in the forge, but not a shower. That meant the shower was behind that door, in his apartment. If she could get into his place, maybe she could escape him. Granted, she had no idea where she’d go after that, since the Blacksmith had been her destination in the first place, but she’d figure it out after she gained her freedom.

“I would enjoy both.”

His answer came as a snarl. “I don’t really care—”

“—what I would enjoy. Yes, I get that. Probably you just don’t want me stinking up your forge, right?”

He stood. “Come with me. Try anything and I’ll nail you to the wall.”

Wall
.
Nailed.
Got it.

She struggled to stand on sore legs and hips, then hobbled after him. The bright light of his apartment made her blink and squint. She’d spent the last week in murky darkness.

Once she could see, she assessed her surroundings instantly as a bachelor’s apartment. It was a nice place, though there were no windows. Apparently they were underground. The door behind the tapestry was interesting. The forge was a secret. She could guess why. Most charmed iron weapons had been outlawed since the end of the fae wars. She wondered if now she knew too much. Maybe he’d have to kill her after all.

The furniture was the type she would’ve selected, neutral colors, overstuffed, comfortable. No fussy pieces. No kitsch. Lots of pillows and throw blankets. The floor was wood and covered with colorful area rugs.

It was amazing she noticed the furniture at all under the clutter. Clothes were piled on the couch and chairs. Shoes had been discarded by the end table and the front door and kicked off haphazardly on the floor near a short hallway. The kitchen was a mess of dishes, discarded towels, and abandoned food containers.

Apparently Aeric had never married and likely didn’t have a girlfriend. Unless said wife or girlfriend was the messy type.
But of course
. He was married to Aileen in his heart and no other woman would ever measure up.

“The bathroom is over here.” He led her past the discarded shoes and down the small hallway. An open doorway led to a large bathroom. A whirlpool tub sat in one corner, clothes draped over the side. It looked like he didn’t use it much. A shower stall stood next to it.

Staring at the draped clothes, she wanted to crack wise about things called closets, but her sense of self-preservation kicked in before she opened her mouth.

Turning, she glimpsed herself in the mirror over the bathroom counter. She stopped and stared—arrested. It had been so long since she’d seen herself,
really
seen herself. Centuries had passed. She was no longer the twelve-year-old girl she’d been when she’d taken on glamour permanently. Now she looked to be in her late twenties; age had been kind to her. Long dark hair curled past her shoulders. She had the same whiskey-colored eyes, the same full mouth and slightly crooked nose. The same long face and pointy chin. Yellow and green bruises marked her throat and dark circles stained the flesh under her eyes.
Lovely
.

“Are you all right?” Aeric asked.

She jerked, realizing how she’d been staring, so transfixed. “I’m fine.”

He pointed at a towel, washcloth, and toiletries like soap and a toothbrush, all still in their packages on the bathroom counter. “Those are for you to use. I also found you some clothes I think might fit.” He leaned up against the counter and crossed his arms over his brawny chest.

“Okay, thanks.”

They stared at each other for several moments until dread bloomed in her stomach.

Her jaw worked for a moment as she narrowed her eyes. “You
are
leaving the room, right?”

“Hell, no.” She followed his line of sight to a grate in the wall. She never would have even seen it, if he hadn’t made her notice it. “You could escape.”

She tamped down a flare of total aggravation. Instead she went over to the grate and pointed at it, then herself. “There’s no way,
for the love of Danu
, that I could ever fit through there.”

“I disagree. You could glamour yourself into a mouse and slip through.”

She fisted her hands at her sides, counting to ten. “I can’t do that. Glamour is illusion. I can’t actually shift into something else. I can’t change my actual body mass.”

“I’m staying. If you want a bath, you have to do it with me in the room.”

“I’m not taking my clothes off in front of you.”

“Then I guess you’re not getting a bath.”

She rolled her eyes. “Even if I got through that incredibly small space, I wouldn’t know where I would be going. I’m in the bowels of the Black Tower, as far as I can tell. I would be utterly and hopelessly lost. Remaining here with you, I’m sorry to say, is preferable to getting lost in the heating system and either dying in there or ending up somewhere worse than your forge.” Though there weren’t many places worse than here, truthfully.

“The deal is that in order for you to get a bath, I stay in here. If you’re worried about me being overcome by your nude body and jumping you, don’t concern yourself.”

Ouch. Though she’d expected nothing less.

“Fine,” she replied in a measured voice. “Stay in the room, then, if you’re so worried about me escaping, but I think it’s stupid and unnecessary.”

“Your concern is noted and disposed of.”

Great. Just great.
Had Aeric been this pigheaded when she’d known him in Ireland?

Dumb question. Considering the candle he’d been holding for Aileen—and his thirst for revenge—pigheaded didn’t even begin to describe this man. More like relentlessly driven to get what he wanted.

Glaring at him, she snatched the towel, washcloth, and soap and went into the frosted glass shower stall with it all. No way was she stripping in front of him. She already felt naked without her glamour; she wasn’t going to make it official.

She tossed her clothing over the top of the shower stall door and turned on the water, yelping as she regulated it, since she had to pretty much stand in the stream while she did it. Once she had the water the right temperature, she settled into it with a sigh of pleasure, closed her eyes, and tried her best to ignore the fact that an unpredictable man who hated her stood right outside.

 

 

HE
was having a hard time hating her. That was the problem.

He wished he could. He was trying to hate her as hard as he could, but that sliver of doubt about how Aileen had died had lodged itself in his mind and it didn’t appear to be planning to dislodge anytime soon. No matter how hard he tried to remember, or all the years he’d spent waiting for revenge, he couldn’t shake it free.

There was something about Emmaline that called to him. He wished he could heat that intangible element up and use his hammer on it, transform it into something he could use to fuel his anger—a weapon. Instead all it did was get in his way, make him change his plans, and,
Goibhniu
, show her mercy.

He hated that he saw innocence in her brown eyes no matter how hard he tried to see guilt. He hated that he couldn’t dredge up the strength to kill her for what she’d done, accident or not. He hated that by doing and thinking all of this, he was dishonoring Aileen’s memory. Most of all, he hated that he seemed unable to think or do anything else.

No, scratch that; most of all he hated that she looked really good behind that frosted glass.

He turned his face away and cleared his throat, regretting his bright idea to stay in the room. He only noticed her because he was a man, with the normal urges and desires of a man. Emmaline—no matter who she was or what she’d done—was a beautiful woman and his dick noticed it. That was all.