Iniquitous (The Marked #3)(49)

His jaw muscle pumped furiously, but he didn’t deny it. “You’re bonded to Dominic. You drank from him. I don’t think you get how bad this is.” He shook his head at his own words and then took another sip. “The bloodbond isn’t just going to go away, Jemma.”

“Yeah, but it’ll fade, right? You said so yourself the last time.”

I remembered it vividly. It was right after we began testing my unicorn-blood with Dominic. I’d begun feeling confused about my feelings for him and Trace was right there to reassure me that it wasn’t real; that the manufactured pull towards him would fade with time.

“This isn’t like the last time,” he said icily.

“Why not?”

“Because, Jemma. You didn’t seal the bond last time,” he said, his voice as heavy as his eyes.

“Seal the bond?” My head ticked back five notches. “I didn’t seal the bond this time either!” I had no idea what he was talking about or where he got his intel from, but he was hugely misinformed.

“Yeah, Jemma. You did.” Sadness filtered in through his expression as he ran a hand down his majestic face. “You sealed it when you drank from him.”

“What the hell are you talking about!” Terror exploded in my stomach like a buckshot. “What does that mean? I don’t understand what you’re saying!” And why the hell was I only hearing about this ‘sealing’ bullshit now?

“I’m saying you made the bloodbond permanent.” He picked up his glass and tipped his head all the way back, pouring the rest of his drink down his throat without even touching the glass to his lips. “I’m saying I’m going to feel it every time I touch you.”

Oh. My. God. No!

“And the longer you stay away from him, the worse it’s going to get.” He pushed his hands through his inky-black hair and dropped his head, his gaze turning away from me as though he couldn’t face me anymore.

I shook my head violently. This wasn’t happening. It just wasn’t. “This has to be a mistake.”

“It isn’t.” His tone was so cold, so detached, it sent a shiver down my arms.

“But, I didn’t…and he never…”

“I’m sure he didn’t,” he said, sounding bored. His eyes, however, were anything but. His eyes were raw with the kind of emotion that slams you in the chest and steals your breath. “I’m sure he conveniently left that part out.”

My mind was racing in dizzying circles, moving almost as fast as the room was. Was he seriously telling me that he was going to be forced to feel my connection to Dominic every time he touched me? That the longer I stayed away from Dominic, the more frenzied my feelings would get? And that it was never going to stop for the rest of our lives? My ears rang like alarm bells as the implications sank further into my soul.

Touching me would become constant torture for him. No one in their right mind would want to live with that. And I would never ask him to. The future that we could have had—that we were supposed to have—just detonated right in front of my face. I was ruined…ruined for Trace. Dominic had made sure of it. And I couldn’t even hate him for it. I couldn’t even wish him dead because I wouldn’t mean it. The bloodbond wouldn’t let me mean it.

Oh, my God.

I bent forward, gasping for air again. Grasping for pieces of my ruined life as they fluttered away from me like debris caught in a storm. I needed air. I needed Dominic—I needed him to put me back together again.

“You need to calm down. You’re hyperventilating.”

I felt Trace’s hand on my back, the electricity between us instantly took flight through my body as he tried to soothe me. But it was only another painful reminder of what could have been. Of what will never again be. My legs trembled until they gave out and I collapsed onto the ground. Trace was right there with me.

For now anyway.

I knew that it was only a simple matter of time before he wouldn’t be. Tears brimmed and dropped freely to the ground like rain. I didn’t bother hiding them or covering up this time. There was no point, and I didn’t have the energy to keep fighting these losing battles. I didn’t have the strength to keep losing the people I loved most.

“Jemma. Please. Look at me.” His voice was so soft it tickled my ears when he spoke.

I shook my head, pushing the softness away. I didn’t want to listen to him. I didn’t want to look at him. It was only going to make it that much harder when he was gone for good.

“Come on, don’t do that.” He picked up my chin and turned my face to his. “I’m not going anywhere.”

I looked back up at him through blurry tears, and I saw it. I saw it right there on his face—the determination—the doomed countenance of a man who was determined to keep his hand on the fire despite his own burning flesh.

My heart splintered, split right down the middle like cheap plastic because I knew I couldn’t let him do that. I couldn’t allow him to suffer through that. I loved him too much to ever consciously allow him to feel that kind of twisted pain.

No matter how willing he thought he was.

I opened my mouth to say just that, to tell him the words I never thought I’d say, but they never made it out. He shut me up the only way he knew how.

He kissed me.