The Mad King (The Dark Kings #1)(78)
Be yourself. The echo of her mother’s gentle words flooded her mind.
He stared at her, waiting for something. For some sign. A truth to pass between them, a kindred sharing. Some awareness of who he was.
Alice remembered an elective she’d taken in high school. Who knew the meaningless English lit class would someday come to good use? Since he seemed to love Edgar Allan Poe so much, she’d start there.
“The true genius shudders at incompleteness—”
He closed his eyes and his breathing hiked. She took a timid step forward.
“—and usually prefers silence to saying something...”
He recited the last part with her. “Which is not everything it should be.”
He stepped forward. The air shivered between them, a tremble, a kiss of wind at her temple. Her hand was on his cheek, the whisker-roughened skin tickling her fingers.
Haunted eyes stared back at her.
She pulled his face down until their lips nearly touched. “I’ve known you all my life.”
He gripped her fingers, squeezing hard.
“I discovered you when I was ten.” She looked deep into his eyes, peering into the mad soul, and poured out her truths. “I saw more than pages or a name in a book. I saw a brave man. A kind man. Even then I knew, even then I craved that which I could not name. And when I was thirteen...” She swallowed, wanting to share, wanting to see a flare of recognition in his eyes, a remembered memory.
He looked at her, brows drawn, waiting for her to finish. She couldn’t, not yet. If he didn’t remember, if he hadn’t cherished it as she had, it would be a wound.
She shook her head and smiled. “And when I was thirteen, I knew. I always knew, Hatter.”
“Alice, don’t. Don’t say these things. They aren’t true.” Wine-tinged breath stroked her lips and she sighed. And though his words begged her to stop, his hands wrapped around her waist like a vise, defying her to step out of the circle of his arms.
“I wish I was lying. I wish I didn’t feel this. Do you have any idea how hard it was to be in love with a man in a book?” She closed her eyes, aching as the memories flooded her. “It’s always been you, Hatter.”
For a weird second, she was sure the grass beneath her feet trembled. She looked at him, his gaze riveted to her face, searching her like he was trying to peer into her soul.
He shook. “Three days, Alice. Three days and you’ll be gone, just like your wicked great-grandmother. She also gave an oath of love.”
“I. Am. Not. Her.” She shook her head. “Three days to prove to you that I”—she grabbed one of his hands and forced him to cup her cheek—“am real. Three days to make you see me. Not her. But me, little Alice Hu. Lover of all things Hatter.”
He didn’t yank his hand away. “No, Alice.”
He smelled of sweet smoke and wine. Such a delicious combination, it made her want to purr and curl her toes into the dewy grass.
Alice stopped thinking, stopped wondering right from wrong. She wanted this. Always had. She laid her head against his chest. The muscle flexed beneath her cheek.
How would she ever be able to leave?
Chapter 8
Alice slept. Her silky black hair trailed along the white pillow like cracks in the earth, and he ached to touch her. To kiss her gently awake. To watch her eyes grow soft and liquid with lust, with love.
Hatter gripped the doorframe. Once he was certain she’d fallen asleep, he’d tiptoed back to her room and stood outside, watching. Hoping. Dreaming. Hating.
Hating his existence. Hating her for coming. For looking so much like the other one. Hating her because he needed her so much, knowing she’d leave him like all the rest.
Each Alice had been an adventure. Each wild, unpredictable incarnation had imprinted an indelible mark upon his soul. He remembered one who’d loved to fish out treasures from the sea and another who’d spun dresses from the cotton candy orchards. Some had sat three days locked away in their rooms, never venturing out, never trying to know him. He’d enjoyed some more than others and at the time had mourned their not staying.
In the end they’d all left, ripping out a piece of his soul. For a time, he’d grown excited knowing another Alice would come, dreaming the next one would be different. But after several years, the constant parade had lost its appeal and he’d yearned for the moment they’d leave him to his solitude.
She sighed and rolled over. Her outstretched arm pointed toward him. A wild sleeper, she’d moved from one corner of the bed to the other as if seeking something, even in sleep. Her fingers curled and her mouth tipped down.
So damn beautiful.
Skin the color of wild spring honey with hair like shadow, hanging long and low, with the tiniest widow’s peak on her forehead. A short thing, this Alice, barely reaching the top of his chest. Petite, but full figured in a ripe, luscious way. Her hips flared out, and his heart pumped harder. She was the perfect size to hang on to while she rode him, passion gleaming from the depths of her big doe eyes.
Heat pooled in his groin. It grew stiff, frustratingly so. But he did not touch himself. He’d stopped doing that a long time ago, when the other Alice Hu had left. After her, he’d sworn never again. Never again would he allow himself to care because to do so would weaken him.
It’d been years since she’d left, and with time, he’d realized he’d not loved that Alice at all. He knew because he’d survived, but it was that knowledge that made him fear to love. Because though he’d not loved her, the weeks that had followed had been some of the worst in his life. Only Danika’s stubborn willfulness had brought him back from the fog of his mind.