Endless Knight (The Arcana Chronicles #2)(23)

“For some reason, you quiet the buzz of all of them. But if one came close enough I’d still hear it, just as I did Selena’s call.”

“Does it scare you, knowing these people want to kill you?”

I nodded. “I’ve known for months that Death has some kind of sick interest in me. I don’t know why, but he does.” I thought of my dream. Apparently, he always had. “Matthew’s shown me visions of his skill, his lack of mercy.” And Death had said I wouldn’t last this week. “But I try not to dwell on it, try to think about other things.”

“Like what?”

Like wishing I were normal and we were back together. “I think about you a lot.”

“Why’s that? You doan need a protector anymore.”

Debatable. And maybe we needed to protect each other. Besides . . . “That’s not the reason I liked you.”

“Oh, this I gotta hear.” His tone was snide.

“Just forget it. It doesn’t matter. Why should I explain anything to you? You’re going to leave as soon as we get to the next town. That’s clear.”

“Is it?”

“It’s for the best anyway. You’ll be safer once we separate.” Separate. A life without Jackson Deveaux. The mere idea sent my emotions spiraling.

My skin began to glow anew, and even through my T-shirt, the glyphs shone as they wound along my arms, across my chest. I knew my face was casting off light as well.

He stared at the changes in me.

“Look at you, Jack! You’re disgusted.”

“Not used to you.” He got up on his knees before me, wary, like a mongoose sidling around a serpent. “Just let me do this, okay?”

As he reached for me, he yanked off his fingerless gloves, as Death had done in my dream. Block that out.

Jackson lifted the hem of my shirt, baring my torso to little bites of rain—and his avid gaze. With his muscles tensed as if he might have to leap away at any moment, he tentatively touched me.

I gasped at the contact.

Growing bolder, he skimmed the backs of his fingers along a glyph as it floated across my damp skin. His hooded eyes followed the path of his fingers. “Hypnotique.” His breaths were short puffs of smoke in the cold night, his expression fascinated.

With infinite slowness, he stroked until I was panting, until I ached. I bit my bottom lip to keep from moaning out loud. I needed him to kiss me. I needed those strong arms, squeezing me to him.

“Your skin is so soft. Satinée,” he murmured. “You goan to drive me crazy before it’s all done, ain’t you?”

“Jack, please.”

“Please what?” He looked up, met my eyes.

Accept me, kiss me. I moistened my lips.

He noticed. Though his brows drew together as if he were pained, he didn’t give me the kiss I craved from him. Yet his fingers still traced my skin, higher, higher.

When he bared my bra and grazed his knuckles over me, I couldn’t stand it anymore—I scrambled to my knees, grasped his broad shoulders, and kissed him.

His muscles stiffened beneath my palms. Against his lips, I murmured, “Kiss me back?”

Heartbeats passed.

Then, with a groan, he did. Slow slants of his lips over mine grew more heated, more urgent. He leaned me down over his arm, laying his rough palm on my cheek to hold me steady for his kiss.

Groans broke from his lungs, moans from my lips. As ever, the fire between us stoked into an inferno. That combustible chemistry. He kissed me like he wanted to brand me—

Someone cleared his throat.

When Jackson released me and drew back, I saw Matthew standing awkwardly at the entrance to the hut.

As I pulled my shirt down, Jackson grated to me, “You taste like my Evie, feel like her. But you’re not her.” He swiped the back of his hand over his lips.

Ah, and here was the rage.

“We’re out here with no protection from Baggers, no lookout, and I’m still a heartbeat from taking you! You mesmerizing me too? That’s the only goddamned reason I’d still be thinking about you after all this shit. All my life, I never went looking for trouble, but it always found me! You’re just the latest helping of grief.”

My eyes pricked with tears. “I didn’t want it to be like this.”

“Then let me go! End this hold you got over me.”

“I didn’t mesmerize you. I wouldn’t.” Surely I wouldn’t?

“?‘Come, touch, pay a price?’ That’s your call? Well, I did. I’m paying it still.”

He snatched up his bow and bag and strode away into the dark, leaving me trembling, cold, adrift. I stared after him for long moments. When I pulled my knees to my chest, Matthew crossed to sit beside me. “Not Arcana.”

“Can you see Jackson’s future?”

“I see far.” He frowned. “Not with him. Unknown. Variable. Strike from equation!”

“Would he be safer away from us?”

Matthew gave me a raised-brow really? look. Stupid question. Then he tilted his head. “More dreams of Death?”

I forced myself to stop staring in Jackson’s direction and pay attention to Matthew, who sounded relatively coherent. “Yes. The same encounter with Death, after he’s stabbed me.” Again, I’d noted that he looked younger then. “If he’s immortal, how does Death age?”