“I don’t want your care, either,” he said. “I want more than that.” Still holding my arm, Val put his other hand on my chest over my heart. “I want what’s in here, too.”
Val sounded so sincere that his unexpected admission unnerved me. “I-I,” I stuttered, but he broke in. “Don’t say anything trite, Solina. I can’t stomach it. I’ve had time to think about what you said—about my being a distraction. Maybe you’re right.” Val’s restatement of my objections made me sound coldhearted, but I wouldn’t take it back. It was something I should have said sooner. Then maybe all this turmoil between us could have been avoided.
“It goes against my better judgment to leave you here,” Val said. “I hate to do it. The Valkyries have their own agenda, and I don’t trust them to put your safety first, but it’s not about what I want all the time. I get that.” I opened my mouth to say something consoling, but Val put his fingers over my lips to stop me. “I have a favor to ask of you, though.”
“What is it?” I asked, pulling away from his finger.
“Take some time to think about what you really want for yourself, for your life. See if there’s room in it for me. Be honest with yourself. I’ve waited hundreds of years for you. I can wait a little longer.”
“You haven’t been waiting for me.” He might have had me convinced, but Val’s claim to hundreds of years was overselling, and I didn’t buy it. His words no longer felt like sincerity but like manipulation. “You’re no monk, Val Wotan.”
Val’s cheeks flushed. If asked ten seconds ago, I would have sworn such a thing was impossible for him. “Maybe I’ve made love to a few, but I assure you I’ve never been in love with any of them.”
“A few?”
Val shrugged. “Who’s counting?”
“And if you think for a minute that I believe you’ve fallen in love with me, then I have an oceanfront home I’d like to sell you in Arizona.”
Val smiled sadly. “You’ll never know what it could be if you don’t give it a chance. That’s all I’m asking, Solina, that you’ll think about giving us a chance.”
“Val… I…” Find a backbone, Solina. You’re only waffling because you don’t want to hurt him, especially if he is being sincere. But you already know the answer to his proposal. There’s no point in stringing him along, and doing so would only cause more pain in the long run.
As if he sensed my reticence, Val made the move that he must have thought would convince me to agree. But it was the wrong move. He swooped me into his arms and kissed me, hard and possessive. For a heartbeat I saw an image of the earth sinking into a sea of fire, but reality returned in the next moment. Val’s kiss was brutish, like he was trying to claim me. I didn’t care for it at all, and I shoved at him. “Val, stop it,” I said, turning away to gasp for breath. I reached for my fire, but I never got the chance to use it.
This time when Thorin appeared, it wasn’t in his usual silent and sudden way. His arrival was loud, like a steam train roaring into the station, crashing against Val and slamming him into the wall. I gasped and jumped out of the way.
“What the hell do you think you’re doing, Val?” Thorin raged like an angry giant. Fee-fi-fo-fum, indeed. “She made it clear that she wants you to leave her alone.”
Val shoved against Thorin, his biceps bulging from the effort, but Thorin held him in place.
“She came to me,” Val said. “Apologizing, hoping to make up. Why don’t you ask her what she wants?” Val’s eyes darted to mine. “C’mon, Solina, tell us. You want me to keep my hands off?”
Thorin shoved him again. “It was a lot more than your hands.”
“Who do you think you are, Thorin? Her father? Her jealous lover? I know for a fact she’s never laid a hand on you.”
“You don’t know anything,” Thorin said.
Val’s certainty wavered for a second, his eyes flickering between me and Thorin. “Bullshit,” Val said, finally working up the force to push Thorin away. Val stormed over to his bed, grabbed the messenger bag containing his things, and slid the strap across his chest. “This is all bullshit.”
Fire simmered just under the surface of my skin, pushing like shaken champagne strains against a loose cork. The little devil on my shoulder urged me to let it out, convert all my feelings into a messy conflagration and burn down both Val and Thorin. Fortunately my voice of reason spoke louder. By the time I recovered my composure, Val was already out the door and making his way down the hall, so I turned my indignation on Thorin.
“What the hell?” I said. Thorin glared back at me, his eyes black and bottomless. “Who asked you to interfere?”
“Last night you announced to the whole house you were finished with Val. Then I come around the corner to find him plastered all over you, and you didn’t look like you were enjoying it.”
“Irrelevant!” I screeched. Thorin was intent on making me the damsel in distress, and I was sick of being underrated.
Thorin folded his arms over his chest and glared at me. “Who knew you were such a fickle creature, Miss Mundy?”
“It’s irrelevant because I was perfectly capable of handling Val on my own, but you always underestimate me. I’m not helpless. And stop calling me Miss Mundy. We both know you only do it to get under my skin.” I raged at him over the inconsequential because I didn’t want Thorin to know the depth of my confusion and hurt. Val’s insistence on treating me as some trophy to claim felt like a metaphorical fist squeezing my heart.
Thorin stepped closer and leaned down so that we were nose to nose. “And you continued to humor Val just to get under my skin.”
“Why won’t you understand that what happens between Val and me has nothing to do with you?”
Thorin leaned in even closer and dropped his voice. His warm breath brushed my cheek when he said, “Why won’t you understand just how wrong you are about that?”
“What are you saying?” My voice went dry and raspy as Thorin’s closeness filled my senses. My heartbeat changed from a frantic gallop to an anticipatory lope. My body was so quick to betray my convictions.
Thorin brought his lips mere millimeters from mine and then stopped. His scent was thunderstorms and burnt sky. He cupped my face in his hands and rubbed a thumb over my lower lip. His touch was lightning, and it brought forth images of boiling clouds the color of bruises and winds like artillery, tearing into an army of shadows bearing claws and teeth. Thorin growled, cursing in a language I did not recognize. If I’d had to guess, it probably translated to something along the lines of “damn it to hell.” Then he shook his head, and in a rough and broken voice he said, “I’m not like him. I won’t make his mistakes.”
Thorin dropped his hands and pulled away. He exhaled a heavy breath, and then he was gone, leaving me cold and bereft. Damn his black heart to hell—or whatever place of eternal suffering existed in his theology. I sank to the floor and covered my face.
That was how Skyla found me. She lowered herself to the floor and put her arm around my shoulders. “I couldn’t help overhearing the loud parts, but toward the end it got real quiet. You want to tell me what happened?”
I repeated the story, including the look in Thorin’s eyes and the sensation of his touch.
“Ah, so that’s why you’re glowing.”
“What?” I pulled my hands away, and, yes, Skyla was right. A soft, candlelit glow radiated from my skin. “Well, that’s just great.”
Skyla sighed. “I am so glad not to be in your shoes right now.” She patted my head when I sobbed again. “Was it really so bad as all that?”
“No,” I said. “It was incredible.”
Skyla blew a breath out between her teeth so that it whistled quietly. “That makes it a lot more complicated.”
