Zodiac Academy Fated Throne - Caroline Peckham Page 0,209

to try and get by, to get some air, but he didn’t step back, refusing to let me go. And I was one second from forcing him to.

He gripped my chin, his chest crushing me back against the wall and suddenly the air was thick and hot and another pulse was pounding in time with mine again somewhere in the tomb. But I couldn’t focus on it through the fog of my mind, my hands sliding up to grip his biceps and squeeze as anger gripped me in an iron fist.

“I don’t care,” he said, his breath warm and enticing against my mouth. “I knew I could never keep you, Blue. I knew it from the first time we kissed, I just fooled myself into believing it for a while. So when it came to us or you, I chose you. Because I woke up to reality. And real life isn’t nice or easy, it’s fucking quicksand that tries to drag you down the more you fight it. Love doesn’t conquer all this time, because we’re on two different paths. You’re heading to the stars, beautiful, and I’m staying down here in the dirt. That’s just the way it is.”

“It didn’t have to be,” I hissed, hating him, loving him.

“Well it’s too late for regrets,” he said darkly. “And I’m sure you’ll enjoy the view of the sky up there with Seth Capella beside you.”

“What?” I balked, my thoughts totally derailed by that comment. “What’s Seth got to do with it?”

“Oh, come on,” he scoffed, his fangs on show as he leaned down into my face and my hands grew scoldingly hot against his arms in a threat. “Are you going to deny it right to my face?”

“Deny what, asshole?” I snapped, my hands blazing hot now, but he still didn’t move, taking the burns rather than letting me go.

“That you’re together. He likes to send me the updates to rub my face in it,” he spat and the heat slid away from my hands as I saw the hurt in his eyes. “To be honest, you being with anyone else would have broken me, but did you really have to choose the one guy who tried to rip us apart?”

I reached up to brush my fingers across his cheek, hating the raw pain I saw in his eyes. It cut into me like a knife. “I’m not with Seth, Lance. Never have been, never will be. He’s a friend. That’s all.”

He tsked like he didn’t believe me and I scowled, my anger rising again. So my word just meant nothing now?

“You think I’d screw him after what he did to me? We might have resolved our differences, but I wouldn’t just forget that he cut off my hair or that he tried to ruin me at every chance he got. That he messed with us and made it so much harder for us to be together. Do you really think that little of me, Lance Orion?”

His brow creased, his eyes scouring my face, pausing on my mouth. “No…I think the world of you, Darcy Vega.”

He grabbed a fistful of my shirt, yanking me forward and suddenly pressed a demanding kiss to my lips. He surrounded me, consumed me. My heart was fit to burst as I tasted the man I’d pined for for so long and I was frozen in shock, torn between wanting him and needing to pull away. But I gave in, falling into temptation as I took a bite of the juiciest apple ever presented to me. I clawed at him as he pinned me back against the wall, a low groan of desperation in his throat making an earthquake roll through to the centre of my being. He tasted like broken promises, but of purest sunlight too. The shattered pieces of my heart sat like broken glass against my tongue, and the longer I kissed him, the more those pieces seemed to draw back together. But it was too late for that. We’d had our shot. He’d hurt me. And he hadn’t once even apologised for it.

I broke the kiss, furious at myself for giving in and his face was cast in shadow as I looked up at him, my lips bruised and tingling.

“We can’t,” I breathed.

“Fuck,” he rasped, stumbling back a step. “No.”

I didn’t know what to say, but I knew this was the last thing on earth we should even be doing right now. The drumming pulse of magic sounded in my head