The Gilded Wolves (The Gilded Wolves, #1)(16)

“Is that so?”

He meant it teasingly. But Laila’s posture changed almost immediately. More languid, somehow.

She moved closer, sliding her hand down the front of his jacket. “I will tell you what you want.”

Séverin held still. This close, he could count her eyelashes, the starlight gilding her face. He remembered the soft flutter of her eyelashes against his cheek when she’d brought him down to her long ago. The heat of her skin seeped through the linen of his shirt. What game was she playing? Laila’s fingers slipped into the inner breast pocket of his jacket. She pulled out his silver tin, popped the latch, and withdrew a clove. Eyes still locked on his, she dragged her thumb across his lower lip. The motion felt like the afterburn of sunshine on his retina. Two images lazily superimposed: Laila touching his mouth then, Laila touching his mouth now. It jarred him so much, he didn’t remember parting his lips. But he must have because a moment later, a sharp clove hit his tongue. Laila drew back. Cold rushed in to fill the space. All in all, it took no more than a few seconds. The whole time her composure had stayed the same. Detached and sensual, like the performer she was. The performer she had always been. He could see her staging an identical routine at the Palais des Rêves—reaching into a patron’s jacket for his cigarette case, placing it on the man’s lips, and lighting it before she took it for herself.

“That’s what you want,” she said darkly. “You want an excuse to go hunting. But you have mistaken the predator for prey.”

With that, her skirts swirled around her heels as she left. Séverin bit down on the clove and watched her leave. She was right. He was hunting. And so was she. Neither of them could afford to lose sight of their prize, so one night in each other’s arms stayed as one mistake, and the memory of it was shoved into the dark. He waited a moment before turning back to Tristan.

He knew what argument he’d have with his brother. He had prepared for it, and yet it still wrenched something from him to see the shine in Tristan’s eyes.

“Just tell me,” he said wearily.

Tristan looked away from him. “I wish this were enough for you.”

Séverin closed his eyes. It wasn’t about enough. Tristan would never understand. He had never felt the pulse of an entirely different future, only to see it ripped from his grasp and smothered in front of him. He didn’t understand that sometimes the only way to take down what had destroyed you was to disguise yourself as part of it.

“It’s not about enough,” said Séverin. “It’s about balancing the scales. Fairness.”

Tristan didn’t look at him. “You promised you would protect us.”

Séverin hadn’t forgotten. The day he said that was the day he realized some memories have a taste. That day, his mouth was full of blood, and so his promise tasted like salt and iron.

“Let’s say this whole venture doesn’t kill us. What if you get what you want? If you get back your House, you’ll be a patriarch…” His voice pitched higher. “Sometimes I wished you didn’t even want to be a patriarch. What if you become like—”

“Don’t.” He hadn’t meant for his voice to sound so cold, but it did, and Tristan flinched. “I will never be like our fathers.”

Tristan and Séverin had seven fathers. An assembly line of foster fathers and guardians, all of whom had been fringe members of the Order of Babel. All of whom had made Séverin who he was, for better or worse.

“Being part of the Order won’t make me one of them,” said Séverin, his voice icy. “I don’t want to be their equal. I don’t want them to look us in the eye. I want them to look away, to blink harshly, as if they’ve stared at the sun itself. I don’t want them standing across from us. I want them kneeling.”

Tristan said nothing.

“I protect you,” said Séverin softly. “Remember that promise? I said I’d protect you. I said I’d make us a paradise of our own.”

“L’Eden,” said Tristan miserably.

Séverin had named his hotel not just for the Garden of Paradise, but for the promise that had been struck long ago when the two of them were nothing but wary eyes and skinned knees, while the houses and fathers and lessons moved about them as relentless as seasons.

“I protect you,” said Séverin again, this time quieter. “Always.”

Finally, Tristan’s shoulders fell. He leaned against Séverin, the top of his blond head tickling the inside of Séverin’s nose until he sneezed.

“Fine,” grumbled Tristan.

Séverin tried to think of something else to say. Something that would take Tristan’s mind off what the five of them were planning to do next.

“I hear Goliath molted?”

“Don’t pretend like you care about Goliath. I know you tried to set a cat on him last month.”

“To be fair, Goliath is the stuff of nightmares.”

Tristan didn’t laugh.



* * *



OVER THE NEXT week and a half, Laila spied on the Order members who frequented the Palais des Rêves, keeping an ear out for any rumors of theft following the auction. But all was quiet. Even the notorious Sphinx guards who could follow the trail of any House-marked artifact had not been glimpsed outside the city residences of House Kore and House Nyx.