The Power
Page 86

“It is not true, Seth.”
He laughed harshly. “You have no idea, Joe. That’s the problem. It isn’t your fault, but you have no idea.”
“Well, that’s not insulting or anything.”
“I don’t mean it to be, but it’s the truth. You’re willing to put yourself in a very precarious position when you don’t know what I’m capable of, but I do, Josie. I know exactly what I’m capable of.”
I forced myself to take a nice slow and even breath. “Seth—”
“No. This conversation is over and done with. You’re not going to make any crazy deals that backfire in your face.” He waved his hand as if he was signaling the end of this conversation, and that was a big oh-hell-no. “I made my bed and I’m going to roll around in it.”
I waited a second. “Are you done yet?”
His eyes flared a bright ocher.
“Just wanted to make sure, since you think you can tell me what I can and cannot do. Guess what? You can’t. And you know what else? I understand that because of what you did in your past, you think you’re not worth me—”
“In the past?” Seth laughed again, the sound cold and hard. “You think I’m talking about that shit with Ares? How about a couple of weeks ago?”
“What . . . what do you mean?”
Seth stared at me a moment and then he spoke a shattering four words. “I fed off you.”
“What?” I whispered after what was probably an entire minute of trying to process what he’d said. There was no way he said what I thought he said, because it didn’t make sense.
He turned sharply, stalking away from the bed, giving me his back. “Fuck. I should’ve told you before . . . before you gave yourself to me, but I’m a fucking selfish bastard. You heard me right, Josie. I fed off you—off your aether.”
My lips moved, but my tongue forgot how to form words. Shocked, I sat there as an icy shiver danced down my spine. Goosebumps raced over my skin. Seth had fed off me?
“That’s the kind of . . . of thing I am.”
Lifting my gaze, I saw him drag his hand through his hair. His fingers spasmed around the strands, tugging them briefly before his hand dropped to the nape of his neck.
“I have a . . . a problem. I’ve had one for a while now, and I tried . . . I’m trying not to be that person, but it’s in me, and it comes out. I know it’s going to again, and when it does, I don’t care who I hurt—what trust I break. In that moment, I don’t care who I’m hurting. Even you.” The raw edge to his words cut deep. He turned slowly, his chest rising sharply. “I don’t want to be that person. Gods, not with you, but I am.”
Suddenly, he was in front of me, clasping my cheeks. My heart jumped in my chest. “Every day I want you, Josie. I want everything about you. I see you and I want to get between those thighs and spend a lifetime there. I want to get so deep in you that you can’t tell where you end and I begin. I want to taste you and fuck you until I don’t know anything else. Constantly. I want more than that. Not going to lie. I want to hold you.”
I couldn’t breathe as his gaze held mine captive.
“I want to be with you. I want to spend every day with you. Every hour, down to the last fucking minute and second,” he said, his voice rough. Cutting. “But that’s not all I want. What’s in you? The aether. Fuck.” His eyes closed briefly and when they reopened, they burned with unholy light, shocking me. “I want that just as badly. Yeah. I want that. I had that when you were coming on my knee.”
My heart pounded fast. His words created a mixture of disgust . . . and God, lust. That was there, too, responding to his words. There was something wrong with me. There was something definitely wrong with him.
“I cannot be trusted,” he said, holding my chin so I couldn’t look away, so that I had to hear and see those words. And I saw his words. I heard them. “And you know what? You’re the only one who doesn’t see it. You think Alex doesn’t? That Aiden doesn’t? They do. That’s the kind of person you’re willing to anger the gods over. That’s the kind of person you’re willing to make a deal for and give up gods know what for.” Dropping my chin, he straightened, letting his hand fall to his side. “I am not worth that.”
Seth walked away again, and the numbness faded. Emotion rose inside me, as violent as a hurricane battering the shoreline. Hurt exploded in my chest just as fury burned red-hot in the pit of my stomach.
“How many times?” I asked.
There was a pause. “Does that even matter?”
“How many times?” I shouted this time, not caring if anyone heard me.
His head fell back. “Just once.”
I let that sink in. I wasn’t sure if that changed anything or not. I wasn’t even sure what I was supposed to do with this information. The back of my throat burned as I stared at his rigid back. I couldn’t even really think. “When?”
Seth didn’t answer for a moment. “I did it the . . . the last day I trained you. When we were arguing and then . . . making out. I lost control and fed off you.”
My mind raced back to that day. “I don’t understand. I didn’t feel anything. The last time I was fed off of, it hurt.”
His spine seemed to stiffen even more. “It doesn’t always hurt. It can be done so that it doesn’t.”