Evelyn squeezes my arm. “Perfect. My friend has had a hard day, but we’re grateful for the service.”
“O-of course.” They slide a key across the counter and snatch their hand back as if they’re worried I’ll throttle them.
The worst part is that I’m not sure if it’s because of my display of anger or the crimson coat I’m wearing. I wasn’t displaying any power at all when we walked through the crowd earlier. Evelyn might not think I noticed how people skittered out of our path, but it was impossible to ignore. Their fear rankled. It always rankles.
Evelyn leads me back to a surprisingly large room, complete with a decent-sized bed and the promised pool of steaming water. It’s a nice space, but I’m not in the mood to appreciate it. She moves around the room, touching things and humming a little to herself. Even the sight of her isn’t enough to chase away the horrible feeling rotting away inside me. My entire life, everything I’ve worked and fought for and believed in … It feels like it’s teetering on the edge of a massive wave. One wrong move will suck me under and I might never surface again. “Don’t steal anything.”
She gives me a sharp look. “I don’t steal from normal people just trying to keep their business afloat. That’s evil.”
“You steal from me.”
“Yeah, I do.” She comes to stand before me. “You’re not a normal person, Bowen. You’re the villain in so many people’s stories. Us villains have to stick together.”
“I don’t want to be the villain,” I say quietly. I don’t know what to feel or think. All I can see is my ship sailing off to the horizon without me, taking the people who were as close to family as I’ll ever get. Not Dia, but I’m not foolish enough to think Dia will stick around. She’s always moved to her own beat, and that may take her away from me. Even if it doesn’t, she’s not immortal.
Eventually she’ll sail on seas I can’t reach.
Evelyn reaches up and tentatively cups my face. “Most people don’t want to be the villain. That doesn’t mean they don’t stumble into it by accident. I know you try to do good, and this hurts right now, but maybe you should use it as an opportunity to look around and see how things truly are.”
It’s too much. I understand what she’s saying, what the evidence of the last few days is starting to point to, but it’s too big to grasp. And under it all is the horrible suspicion that Ezra knew exactly what everyone believed the C?n Annwn to be and intentionally carved off those bits in his teachings as he raised me. I can’t think about it. I’m tumbling beneath the surface, and if I start swimming one direction, I’m just as likely to be moving away from the air I desperately need as toward it.
So I don’t think about it.
Maybe that’s the coward’s way out, but I don’t give a fuck. All my problems will still be there in the morning.
I glance at the bed. I’ve been so wrapped up in my misery that the implications are only now settling in. A single room at the inn. One bed. With Evelyn, who I haven’t stopped thinking about since I tasted her.
I take an abrupt step back. Honor didn’t keep me from touching her before, but she’s essentially trapped here with me. I clear my throat. “You can take the bed. I’ll sleep on the floor.”
“Bowen.” The reproach in her tone is nearly enough to make me smile. “You can’t be serious.”
“Actually—”
“If you’re making that offer because you regret the kiss in the forest and want to establish some boundaries, that’s one thing.” She moves with me as I turn, not allowing me to hide my gaze from her. “But if you’re trying to sleep on the floor out of some misguided paladin guilt, then I won’t have it.”
“I do not have paladin guilt.”
“You’ve been lashing yourself so intensely since your crew sailed off that I’m surprised you’re not bleeding out on the floor.” She crosses her arms over her chest. Well, under her chest. Her breasts aren’t particularly large, but they’re very present, and they press becomingly against the thin fabric of her shirt and …
Gods, I’m staring at her chest again.
I almost take another step back, but that would be running from her, and I’m not capable of doing that. I don’t want to do that. “You don’t have another choice but to room with me.”
“For all the—” She rolls her eyes. “You might drive me batty, but that doesn’t mean I don’t want to strip you down and have my filthy way with you. For fuck’s sake, Bowen, you made me come without taking off any of my clothes. If I didn’t want you, I wouldn’t be here.”
“I’ve wanted you from the moment you stole that flask off my hip. That kiss in the forest was barely an appetizer. I couldn’t justify doing more while I was still your captain, but my ship is gone and we’re just two souls lost at sea.” I shrug out of my cloak and toss it over the chair situated next to the desk. “Never think I don’t want you, Evelyn.”
Her lips curve and her gaze heats. “You sea captains love your water metaphors.”
“Evelyn.” Over the course of a single day, everything has changed. I’d be a fool to throw caution to the wind and fall into bed with her. I don’t care. Everything is spinning out of control, and she might be a force of chaos adding to it, but she’s also the person I find myself turning to again and again.
I’m turning to her right now. “Kiss me.”
“It’s not a good idea.” Despite her words, she takes a step toward me. “The closer we get, the more it will hurt when it goes poorly. If you sleep with me, you’re not going to be able to hunt me.”
She’s not wrong and yet she’s missing one very specific point. I hold out my hand. “I was never going to be able to hunt you.” Even if denying that order makes me a traitor.
She takes my hand and allows me to tug her close, to wrap my arms around her. I’ll never get over how perfectly she fits against me, her body soft and giving and, fuck, I want her so desperately, I can barely hold myself still as she considers me.
“I know you weren’t.” She kisses me.
It’s even better than last time. Now I know the shape of her. I know the way she melts against me at the first stroke of her tongue. I know the feel of her body pressing into mine. I know …
It’s not enough.
I wrap my arms more tightly around her, and it’s as if I’m holding the world itself. That’s a wild thought, one completely unearned. It doesn’t change the fact that it feels true. Ever since Evelyn came into my life, she’s had me questioning things that I never thought I would question. And now that the truth has smashed my world to bits, she is the only thing that feels sturdy.
That thought is enough to make me break the kiss. “I’m sinking fast. I don’t want to drown you alongside me simply because I’m grasping for something that makes sense.”
“Bowen.” She tugs on my hair just short of sharply. “All of us are drowning. Every single one of us. Anyone who says otherwise is a goddamn liar.” She steps back. As much as I mourn the loss of her touch, watching her pull her shirt over her head and then shimmy out of her boots and pants is more than worth it. I’ve thought Evelyn was beautiful from the moment I saw her, but nothing could’ve prepared me for the sight of her naked, and her blond hair tangled around her face.