Page 112 of The Fire Went Wild
“It’s not the dress.” He walks toward me with slow, heavy steps, his gaze burning blue. “Well, not just the dress.”
His grazes the back of my hand with his knuckle, his touch soft, and that hot gaze settles on my lips. I suck in my breath, still not sure what to say. What to do.
“Are you nervous?” he asks.
“I don’t know.” I smile at him. “I feel like I should be, but I’m not.”
He returns the smile, and for a moment, things feel easy between us, like they have the last few days as we got everything ready. “It’s because you know what you are.” He brushes my cheek. “I wasn’t nervous, either. I was excited.”
“Yeah, I wouldn’t say I’m excited. I just feel—” I don’t think there’s a word for what I feel. “Inevitable.”
I don’t think it makes sense, but Jaxon nods like he understands.
Then he kisses me, and it’s like he’s kissing me for the first time, like we’re on a date and he wants to impress me. His mouth is warm and slow and hesitant, and he waits until I slide my tongue between his lips before he does the same. He letsme deepen the kiss even more, tilting my head, sliding my hand along the side of his neck, kissing him with the ferocity of all the darkness storming inside my heart.
When he breaks it, I gasp at the loss of contact.
“I’m going to do that again when you revive,” he murmurs into my ear.
It’s a surprisingly effective reassurance.
“Come on,” he whispers. “It’s time.”
His hand snakes down to grab mine, and I accept it. Then he leads me out of the living room, out of the house entirely. When we step onto the porch, I immediately shiver. A cold front came through last night, and the air’s sharp and snapping against my skin. Jaxon wraps his arm around my shoulders, pulling me into his heat.
“You won’t be out here long,” he says softly.
“That’s one way of putting it.”
He grins, then grabs my hand again and leads me out into the yard. The wind blusters out from the swamp, damp and cool, pushing my dress back up so I feel like a ghost already drifting through the marsh. Jaxon takes me behind his shed, and for the first time, I see the thing he’s been working on for the last few days. The little project he told me was a surprise.
It’s a tomb.
Not a permanent one, not one made of carved marble like the tombs in New Orleans. But it’s clear what it is: a little silent house built of bones and antlers and dried human skin—a thought that gives me a peculiar twist in my belly and nothing more. Swamp fronds on the roof. Thick, woody vines twining everything together.
And, painted above the entrance in blood, is the sigil that brought me to Jaxon in the first place.
“Once it’s warmer,” Jaxon says, his breath in my ear, “I’ll plant honeysuckle and jasmine, and they’ll grow around you and keep you safe.”
It’s beautiful, this place where I’m to die and be reborn.
“Will it stand up to the weather?” I ask.
“It should.” Jaxon looks at me. “The Unnamed is protecting it.”
“Okay,” I say. “But if a hurricane hits, you’re going to bring me inside, right?”
Jaxon’s eyes glitter. “Don’t worry, cher. Nothing’s going to happen to you while you’re dead.”
That’s notexactlytrue, and we both know it. But I don’t say anything.
Jaxon helps me inside the tomb, and it’s warmer in there, out of the wind, and there are soft, downy blankets for me to lie on instead of the cold grass. Jaxon helps me down, sliding himself between my parted legs, and runs his thumb over my lips. I can feel his heat against mine. I can hear his heart pounding and I can smell his excitement, his lust, his affection.
His love.
I reach down and lift my skirt. I’m not wearing anything underneath. A gift for him.
Jaxon doesn’t break eye contact. Not when he slides his hand along my wet slit, not when he unbuckles his suit pants and pulls out his cock and presses it against my clit, making me moan.