But just because Jacks had helped her out of another sticky spot last night didn’t make them allies. Her dream about his arms being safe was clearly a delusion.
She crossed her arms over her chest. “You need to stop ordering me around.”
Jacks ignored her comment. “Once you get dressed, we can start our search for the missing arch stones.” He hopped off the nightstand, crossed over to the gown, and tossed the dress at her face.
“Jacks!” She caught the gown with her hands. It was wonderfully soft against her fingers and far cleaner than she felt. But she wasn’t about to let him bully her. She dropped it on the bed. “I still haven’t agreed to help you open the arch.”
He gave her a look that said he didn’t think her joke was funny.
But she wasn’t kidding. “I want to know why you want to open it so badly.”
Jacks flashed a dazzling smile, curving and perfect and utterly cruel. “I’m flattered you’ve taken such an interest in my wants. But you really should start thinking about your husband more than me.” His eyes turned dagger-sharp. “In case you’ve forgotten, Little Fox, Apollo is under the Archer’s curse. If you don’t agree to open the Valory Arch to break it, he will kill you. Just like the Archer murdered his fox.”
Jacks pulled the apple from his knife and gave it a perversely cheery toss.
Evangeline gritted her teeth; she knew it was pointless to argue with him. But he’d ruined so many other things, she wasn’t going to let him destroy her favorite fairytale as well.
“You don’t know that,” Evangeline said. “No one knows for sure if the Archer killed the Fox.”
“Oh—” Jacks laughed, hard and nasty as his smile. “The Archer definitely killed the Fox.”
“That’s not what I believe. He could have fought the curse! Or the Fox could have found a way to break the curse. No one knows how the story ends, so anything could have happened.”
“But it didn’t,” Jacks snapped back. “Ballads never end happily, everyone knows that. No one has to actually read the whole story to know the Archer has blood on his hands. Open the arch, Evangeline, or die just like the Fox.”
Jacks stopped tossing the apple and stabbed it with the dagger.
Evangeline frowned as the dark juice from the fruit dripped onto the floor.
She really didn’t want to give in to him. But her refusal to open the arch was starting to feel like stubbornness instead of wisdom. After what LaLa had said, Evangeline wasn’t quite as fearful that the Valory contained something horrible, but she still didn’t want to give whatever it contained to Jacks. She didn’t want to partner with him or have anything to do with him. But she did want to break the Archer’s curse—she needed to break it, or she would spend the rest of her life running from Apollo, and he would spend the rest of his life hunting her.
She supposed in a way it was a sort of ever after. The curses linked the two of them inextricably, promising their lives would forever be intertwined, but this wasn’t the way she wanted them to be together.
“Fine,” Evangeline said.
“Does this mean you’re going to open the arch?” Jacks quirked a brow. A tiny thing, and yet she could tell he was genuinely pleased.
She was briefly tempted to keep fighting him. But now that she had made up her mind, she was ready to get on with it. The sooner they found the stones to open the arch, the sooner she’d be rid of him.
“Yes, I’ll help you open the arch,” she said. “But I’m not getting dressed while you’re in here.”
“That’s too bad,” Jacks murmured.
Then he was gone.
And Evangeline was grateful he could not see her sudden blush.
15
Jacks whistled merrily as he and Evangeline walked down the low-lit hall together on their way to meet with Chaos. She had never heard Jacks whistle before. She supposed he did it now because she’d finally agreed to open the Valory Arch. But for some reason, she hadn’t expected it to make him this kind of unabashedly happy.
Jacks was all dimples and whistles, and it was unsettling how curious this happiness made Evangeline. What could Jacks possibly want inside the arch?
He’d found another apple as she’d gotten dressed—it was unbitten and blue, and he tossed it in time with his merry song.
“You’re staring.”
“I was just wondering why you always carry apples.”
Jacks chuckled under his breath. “Trust me, Little Fox, you’re better off not knowing.”