“Sort of. Yeah.”
“Well fuck all that, Broderick. We’re in this together.”
“Serena, I—”
“If you think I’m leaving Damien in that place… or letting you go there alone? You’re out of your fucking mind.” She looked angry now. Even more angry than me. “To think I’d hang back and sit on my hands, especially after all that we’ve—”
“Okay.”
She stopped. Blinked. Opened her mouth again to say something else.
“I said okay,” I repeated. “But on one condition.”
Serena put her hand on her hip.
“We do it my way.”
31
DAMIEN
I woke to a familiar feel… and smell.
It wasn’t just the sheets, or the pillows, or the beautifully vaulted ceiling. It was the unmistakable smell… of her.
Damn.
I bolted upright, and Karessa was there. She was standing on the other side of the chamber, wearing nothing but the sheerest red silken robe. She moved delicately, lighting burgundy candles from the end of a long flaming taper.
“About time.”
Her voice was soft, sultry, seductive. Her ‘favor’ voice. The one she used whenever she wanted or needed something. It was the voice she also used to placate us whenever we’d get angry, or challenge her, or—
I winced hard as a white hot pain flared through my head. Everything ached. Everything was still foggy too. I reached up tentatively and found a huge lump, just behind my right temple.
“How’d I get here?” I asked.
“By force,” Karessa said simply. She spoke as if it were nothing.
I glanced to the left and right. We were alone. All alone in the citadel’s main bedchamber. Or at least, it sure seemed that way.
“So I’m your prisoner? Is that it?”
She lit another candle without turning around. “Do you feel like one?”
“Yes,” I said, a little hesitantly. “Maybe.”
“You’re not bound.”
She was right. My hands, my wrists, my legs… they would’ve all been so easy to tie to the 17th century, four-poster bed. I flushed with embarrassment as I thought about all the things we’d done here before. To her… with her…
Back then it was usually Broderick and I tying her down. Right now however, I was totally and completely free.
“Damien,” she breathed softly. “Oh my Damien…”
She sang my name like a song. Spoke it with a beautiful lyrical, quality.
“How did we let it get like this?”