Igniting Darkness (Courting Darkness Duology #2) - Robin LaFevers Page 0,82

was everything. She was trusting him with her name.

He shouldn’t touch her. It would be wrong to answer that trust by touching her, but his body didn’t care about such rules of engagement. He placed one finger on her full lower lip, felt the faint trembling. When she did not pull away, he brought his other hand up and gently brushed a stray hair from her cheek. Smooth and flawless, just as he’d remembered. She drew in a ragged breath. Or maybe it was his own ragged breath. “Genevieve.”

Her gaze grew dark, and she drew another trembling breath before leaning—ever so lightly—into his touch.

Inside him, need tried to claw its way out, but he ignored it. Instead, he cupped her face, relishing the shape of her jaw against his palm, the feather-light touch of her cheeks against his fingertips.

“It is not too late,” he whispered. “If something is wrong, I can still help.”

Her eyes flew open, wide with wonder and disbelief, and for a moment, he feared she would unravel before him.

 Chapter 46

Genevieve

With the force of an ax coming down on a rope, I am undone. My remorse is like a boulder barreling downhill, flattening everything in its path. Every twig gives way in resistance, every blade of grass is crushed beneath the onslaught. He is, once again that voice in the dark, wholly understanding, withholding all judgment. It is too much. It is far more than I have earned, and yet I am helpless before it. I want to lean into the comfort he is offering. To accept the grace he is extending. And even though a small part of my heart knows he could be setting some ghastly trap for revenge, I decide I do not care. Not if—for these few moments—I am able to believe that he is so large-hearted.

And so I let myself believe his words. Believe him. And if they or him are false, it is no more than the debt he is owed.

“I’m sorry I did not trust you before,” I tell him.

“I’m sorry I didn’t do a better job of earning your trust.”

I shake my head. “You did, though. All the times you could have overpowered me and didn’t.”

“But the time I did overpower you overshadowed that. You didn’t know me. I had given you only the barest scraps of the truth you had asked for. Saints! You had only my word that I was not imprisoned for the wanton murder of innocent people.

“You were alone, venturing into a dungeon cell, with few weapons at hand. Which”—he gives my shoulders a little shake—“you should never do again. Why should you have trusted me?”

I close my eyes. “There are many things I would never do again.”

He rubs my cheek with his thumb, the faint roughness of it as sensual as any embrace. “For all that my intentions were good, they were mine and not something I shared with you. In doing so, I all but told you that my own justice, my own revenge, was more important than yours. The same when I did not trust you enough to tell you that I was sending the others on ahead to meet us in case of an ambush.”

I am awash in the unexpectedness of his words. That he recognizes my concerns, sees them as valid, feels as if some invisible weight has been removed from my side of the scale.

No. From my heart.

“I took advantage of someone who I knew was grieving, and seized an opportunity for my own freedom. It was wrong, but if I am truthful, and I will be with you, I cannot say I wouldn’t do it again. I could not die in that place.”

His face shifts so that it is as stark and gaunt as when I first came upon him. And of course he is right—for who can turn away the only chance they are likely to come upon to secure their freedom? To continue to live. This feels like the most honest thing he’s said.

“The truth is,” he continues, “we both did the only thing we could under such circumstances.”

“We did,” I whisper, pressing my cheek into his hand. My heart pounds with want. I want him to move closer, to press his lips to mine. When another moment passes, I realize that he is waiting for me. To decide if I can trust him again. To give him permission. To say yes.

In answer, I bring my lips to his. He pauses for the briefest of seconds, then