Accomplice to the Villain (Assistant and the Villain, #3)(35)

Oh, that was…inconveniently sweet.

She rolled her eyes in a poor attempt to hide the way he had affected her. “I’m your apprentice, sir. You’re meant to be teaching me, not the other way around.”

He lifted a brow, his voice low and rasping when he asked, “And what is it you’d like me to teach you, Sage?”

The most inappropriate and mortifying sentence popped into her head so quickly she desperately grasped for something else. Anything.

“How do you balance villainy with, uh—taking care of your, uh…physical… needs?” NOT THAT.

Looking at her quizzically, he scratched his chin. “I don’t take your meaning, Sage. What is there to balance? Exercise? Personal hygiene?”

Oh well. If she was going to be brash and bold, she was going to do it as aggressively as possible.

She stared at him head-on when she said, “No. Sex.”

He pressed his mouth shut, suddenly much closer than she remembered him being. His head angled down to look at her. His brows drew together in anger as he asked, “Having difficulty with that, are you?”

“No.” She smiled reassuringly, and his eye twitched. “I was just wondering how you went about it.”

She would’ve been more embarrassed if the way he was nearly choking on air wasn’t so entertaining.

“I am certain this is not appropriate conversation between colleagues,” he replied through gritted teeth.

“Do you think we should ask Becky?” She was bluffing. If they asked Becky, they’d probably send the HR woman into heart failure.

“I don’t,” he rasped.

She blinked. “You don’t want to ask Becky?”

“I don’t balance between them.”

She gaped. “Are you saying you do them at the same time?”

He threw his hands up and banged his head into a nearby pillar.

“Sir?” She closed in on him, putting a hand to his shoulder, and there was a near-painful shock at the contact, making them both jolt. He wouldn’t look at her, but he didn’t shake off her hand, either. “Trystan?”

“I haven’t needed to balance them,” he admitted.

She paled, releasing a nervous laugh. “Ever?”

He didn’t say anything else, just gazed at her, pleading in his black eyes, willing her to understand. And then she did, somehow, like lightning to the heart.

I haven’t…since you.

“Well. There’s no choice, then.” Her voice broke, nearly overcome.

“In what?” he muttered hopelessly.

She closed the distance and pressed her lips to his.





Chapter 20


The Villain


Trystan could’ve had the most perfect self-control, but after two weeks keeping away from her, after stolen moments peeking around corners and pressing his ears to doors, walls, and at times windows to hear her voice, there was only one possible response to the gentle press of her lips against his.

And it was, naturally, to lose his ever-loving mind.

Without hesitation, he bent to lift her legs, bringing her as close to him as possible, pressing her against the pillar he’d just been banging his head against while praying to the gods for a piece of sky to fall and clobber him to death. A light press of Sage’s tongue brushed against his lips.

Close enough.

He answered the gesture by slowly seducing her mouth open, gripping the back of her head and losing himself in her the way he’d wanted to from the start. From the moment destiny had pushed them together. For better or worse.

The destiny monster’s words echoed in his head as Sage’s hands held his face tenderly, as she moaned softly into his mouth.

Evie Sage is meant to be your downfall, and you her undoing.

His answer to that reminder should’ve been to pull away. To set her down and offer his regrets, as he had every time their lips had touched before that moment.

But then, in a shy whisper, her light eyes glimmering with unshed tears, she said words he thought he’d never hear from anyone ever again: “I love you.”

He pulled back farther so he could see her remarkable eyes, always brimming with her every emotion, like a message only he could read. “You— I—”

Her fingers fell over his lips. “You don’t need to say anything back. I’m not telling you so I can receive platitudes,” she said fiercely. “I’m telling you because you deserve to hear it. I’m telling you because you deserve to know that someone does, very much, love you.”

Whatever pieces of him that declaration left behind were hers to keep.

The destiny monster’s words echoed in his mind again.

And you her undoing.

And Trystan responded to the monster with two.

Fuck. You.

Staring into her eyes, searching for it, trying to find the lie, desperately. But there was no lie—only the bare, honest truth of her words, her feelings. And then she said it again. “I love you, Trystan, and there is nothing you can do to stop me.”

He grabbed both her cheeks in his hands and crushed his lips back to hers. He shut his eyes tight, the way he did when he was in pain. Trying to show her with everything he had that he loved her, too. The destiny monster may have decided their fate, but it couldn’t have his mind, his thoughts, his kiss. And Trystan used all of them in that moment to show Evie he loved her more than life, more than breath…more than death. Kissing her more deeply, like he was defying the gods, defying destiny, defying everything that had ever told him he didn’t deserve the precious thing he held in his hands.