Page 9 of The Monsters We Are
The tension slipped from his shoulders as he drank her in. His woman. So beautiful. Deadly. Confident. Powerful. Fierce. It was a devastating combination that delighted both him and his monster. She was their own personal catnip.
Some people around the town were put-off by her magick being dark. For Cain, it was a draw. Darkness was familiar to him. Comforting. Even enthralling.
In any case, he would never be repelled by anything about Wynter, but he understood why the tone of her magick would make some people nervous. Not everyone could handle darkness. They tended to shy away from it.
Luckily for him, Wynter wasn’t one of those people or she’d have attempted to leave him by now. Since he had no intention of allowing that, it was truly a good thing she hadn’t tried. The scene wouldn’t have played out well.
Her thickly lashed quicksilver eyes lifted to Cain, and she studied him carefully. “You’re not feeling any calmer, huh?”
He raised a brow. “Did you think I would?”
She set her book down on the armrest, and then her slender form uncurled from the chair. “A girl can hope.” Wearing only one of his tees—and possibly her panties, he couldn’t quite tell—she strode toward him, so feline and stealthy and fluid. Wynter never took tentative steps. She was always sure of herself, of her movements, of where she needed to be.
Reaching him, she looped her arms around his waist and pressed a kiss to his throat. Cain slid his own arms around her shoulders and nuzzled her neck, breathing her in. That staggeringly feminine scent that wasallWynter rushed into his system, along with the addictive smell of her magick.Jasmine and black pepper.
“I can feel how worked up you are,” she said. “I don’t like it. I don’t want Adam to have any hold over your emotions like this.”
What did she expect? Lifting his head, he met her gaze. “In case you’ve forgotten, he put a bounty on you.”
“And on you.” Fury flared in her eyes. “Are yousureyou don’t want me to kill him for you? Because it’d be my total fucking pleasure.”
Cain’s chest squeezed.For you, she’d said. It wasn’t the price onherhead that most angered her. No, it was the bounty on his. She was as protective of him as he was of her.
And she loved him.
It was something he savored even as the surprise of it left him feeling off-balance. He didn’t know how she could possibly feel that depth of emotional devotion for him; how she couldn’t be repulsed by the reality of what he was, what he could do, and how he came to be born.
But then, Wynter knew what it was to be different, to be unnatural, and to have to hide parts of yourself from everyone around you. She was more accepting than anyone he’d ever met.
He wanted to be able to claim he loved her in return—she deserved to have those words from him. But he didn’t believe he’d felt the emotion since he was a child. He couldn’t recallhowit felt. The ability to experience it as an adult eluded Cain somehow. He resented that, even though Wynter gave no indication that it mattered much to her.
“Obliterating the bastard would be my pleasure as well,” he told her. “But I promised my monster that it could finish Adam. It’s holding me to that promise.”
She let out a petulant grunt, like a child being deprived of its favorite form of downtime—which, for Wynter, was wreaking vengeance. She looked so fucking cute right then, all sullen and dour, that he couldn’t help but nip the juicy swell of her heavy lower lip.
Generally, Cain didn’t find people “cute”. But he supposed it would be fair to say that he didn’t notice others on the same level that he did Wynter. He wasn’t “moved” by them as he was her—only she had that influence on him.
He didn’t know how to describe what he felt for her. It wasn’t soft. Wasn’t sweet. Wasn’t fluffy. It was more like a dark storm that raged inside him.
She was so much more than the addiction she’d once been. She was no longer a simple obsession. She was . . . everything. There would never be any walking away from her. She might not have official rights to his soul the way he did hers, but she owned him just the same. And he point-blank refused to lose her.
“From here on out, you need to be exceedingly careful, Wynter. Some people will be tempted by Adam’s offer. A million dollars is a lot of money.” Cain cuffed her arm with his hand and looked down at the seal on her wrist that branded her his consort. “I’m not sure if even this symbolic reminder that you are not to be touched will be enough to keep you safe from any residents who think to cash in on the bounty.”
She sighed. “I know. Especially since Adam made out like he only wanted me to undo the widespread decay. There’ll be people who tell themselves,hey, it wouldn’t be so bad if we did it because it’s not like the Aeon means her any harm.”
“Which is why I plan to give a speech to the residents tomorrow. I’ll make it clear that Adam means usallharm.”
She gave a sharp nod. “Good idea.”
“You should know that I intend to put guards on you.”
“Yeah, that’s not gonna happen.”
He felt his face tighten. “Wynter—”
“No, hear me out,” she said, raising her hand. “If I was up against an Aeon here in Devil’s Cradle, I’d agree to it, just as I did when Saul wanted to get to me. But this is different. Adam is nowhere near me. And putting guards on me would send the wrong message.”
“It would send the message that you’re under my protection. How is that ‘wrong’?”