Jonas (Darkness #7)(21)

“Okay, just here.” They walked into a little alcove, followed a circular corridor away to the left, and found a shadowed door. If she hadn’t led Jonas directly to it, he wouldn’t have seen it. Not with the way it seemed to crouch in the shadows within the wall. A squeal of metal saw the heavy door swinging into a dark space. Standing at the doorway, there was no way to see how big the room was, its shape, or how deep it went. Given the nature of the corridor, though, chances were the room was round.

Emmy took two steps in, stopped, and sidestepped to the right. “Close the door behind you, then do as I just did. We’ll be blind, so you’ll need to walk around my traps.”

“What kind of traps?” Jonas asked as he pulled the door shut behind them. The click of the latch sounded unnaturally loud. Like he’d just shut them into a tomb.

“Just furniture positioned in the way. Enough to slow someone down so I could go at them with my whips.”

“But… you’d be trapped in here. What would be the point? Magic could take you out.”

“There’s a tiny door in the back. If we get a chance to run, we won’t be going the way we came. Nathanial will follow me with whatever tracking thing he has. That’ll take him in a straight line. He can’t get here in a straight line. This place was designed to keep prisoners in. If they tried to escape they’d be hopelessly running around the inside of this place. It’ll buy us time. Hopefully… it’ll buy us enough time.”

Emmy led them blindly through a series of steps, not unlike an elaborate dance routine, around the room. When she got to a place she deemed their goal, she stopped, about-faced, and sat down slowly. The creak of wood echoed around the stone room. Jonas followed suit, sitting right beside her on what felt like an old bench. This time the creak was more of a squeal. He paused.

“It should hold,” Emmy whispered.

“How do you know?”

“I don’t. But it sounded comforting.”

Jonas huffed and resumed. The bench wobbled, but held. “Okay. Now… we wait. I’m already bored.”

Silence descended on them like a heavy, suffocating blanket. Stagnant air prickled Jonas’ skin with implications. With what he knew was coming. He was sitting here, without a sword, with a woman he’d grown to really like, while warriors wielding buckets of magic wormed their way toward them.

He wasn’t good at this. This waiting for a battle to come to him. He wasn’t built for it.

“Is there room to pace in this place?” he asked in a gravelly whisper.

He felt movement next to him. Emmy took her hand from his grasp. It reappeared on his chest and slid up to his face. Her palm, strangely soft even though she worked with her tools, cupped his chin. “I can distract you.”

The bench groaned as she shifted her weight. Another little palm slid across his thigh and cupped his erection. He closed his eyes, since they weren’t any good here anyway, and let her pull his head toward her. He felt lips touch the side of his mouth lightly before repositioning fully on his. Her mouth opened, inviting him in.

He turned to her and gathered her into his lap. The feel of her, touching her—it was an exquisite sort of heaven. The electricity they’d known before exploded with the increased contact. He deepened their kiss and squeezed her body close. “Do I need to be gentle?”

“If you don’t want to break the bench.”

“No, I mean… are you worried about not being completely in control?”

“I am in control. If I asked you to stop, you’d stop. Immediately. I know that. I trust you.”

Jonas stood with her before setting her down on her feet and repositioning her body. He then pulled her with him to the hard stone floor, cold to the touch, and sat her on his lap. “So we don’t break that bench.”

Emmy laughed. A low, throaty sound that vibrated his bones. He put his arms around her and just held her for a moment, liking the feel of her delicate body against his. Liking that she curled up within his embrace and rested her face against his neck.

“Your problems have lived with you all your life,” Jonas said in a low hum. “Until today. I give you my word that soon they’ll be your past. And we can face that past with a smile and a sword. Or a whip. Soon all this will just be memories.”

“What about your past? What is it that haunts you? That makes you need to feel and own the pain until you come out blazing yet tranquil?”

“You’re way too eloquent for the likes of me—I should point that out. I’ll never hear the end of it from Charles. He’ll say it’s a green card situation.” Jonas gave a low chuckle. The darkness and hush of the room swallowed it up. “I was a runt when I was a kid. A tiny thing. Smaller than everyone. People thought I was deformed. Or that I was human. I didn’t have a firm grasp on my magic, which developed late, like the rest of me, and I couldn’t fight with any sort of strength. I was made fun of ruthlessly. My mom left me—which really is just not done—and my adopted father, who took pity on me, died a few years after the adoption. I was alone for most of my childhood—no friends, no respect, and no peers.”

“How did that change?”

Jonas ran his fingers through her silky hair. “I had a huge growth spurt. I packed on muscle, got a dose of magic, and nearly overnight became a giant. I’d practiced my sword work and offensive magic religiously because of the bullying, but it hadn’t been much good without strength and power. As soon as I got that strength and power…”