Chapter 11

Eve's POV

My heart slammed once, hard, against my ribs.

He smelled it.

I'd used half a bar of soap in the Obsidian Estate bathroom before I left.

Scrubbed my hands twice, then my wrists, then the inside of my forearms, working up a lather until my skin felt raw.

I thought I'd been thorough.

I thought I'd been careful.

But he smelled Victor on me anyway.

"I went back to Silverleaf today," I said. My voice came out level. "To deal with the move. I told you I needed to collect the rest of my things."

I leaned into him just slightly as I said it, letting my shoulder press warm against his arm, the way I did when I wanted him to feel that I wasn't hiding anything.

"Victor's been away for a year," I said, keeping my voice soft, easy, the kind of tone that didn't push back. "He's my foster brother. Nobody knew he was coming home today. Mom wanted everyone at the table, and then we sat around talking for a while after. I must have picked up his scent without realizing it."

I paused, just briefly.

"I know you don't like it, so I scrubbed down before I left. That's actually why I missed your call. I was in the shower too long." I searched his face. "Is it still there?"

Renault looked at me.

He didn't speak for a long moment.

His eyes moved across my face with that particular quality he had, unhurried, measuring, like he was weighing something and hadn't decided yet whether the number was acceptable.

The streetlights outside dragged slow orange bars across his jaw, his shoulder, the line of his collar.

Then he exhaled through his nose.

"Fine," he said.

Fine didn't mean he believed me completely.

It meant he'd decided to accept the explanation and file whatever remained of his dissatisfaction somewhere else.

I let myself breathe.

The car moved through the dark, the city thinning out as we crossed into the estate roads, the lights more spread out here, the trees pressing in close on either side.

Then his hand moved.

His fingers came up slowly, unhurried, and hooked over the folded edge of my turtleneck.

Except his eyes weren't on the sweater.

They were still on my face.

"You shouldn't be carrying anyone else's scent," he said. Low. Deliberate. The kind of voice he used when he wasn't asking.

My fingers pressed flat against my thigh.

I should say something. I should make this smaller. I should—

His palm settled against the side of my neck.

The heat of it hit me before I'd finished the thought.

His thumb found my pulse point without searching, like it already knew the address, and pressed there, light and steady, not restricting, just present.

Just reminding me that he could feel exactly how fast my heart was going.

Which was too fast.

Which he knew.

"Renault." My voice came out quieter than I meant it to.

"I want your scent to be mine."

He leaned in, and his mouth was close to my ear now, close enough that I could feel the warmth of him before he spoke.

"Only mine."

The words landed in my chest and stayed there.

His thumb moved in a slow arc over my pulse, and I felt his lips brush the curve of my ear, barely contact, barely anything, but my breath snagged on it anyway.

His free hand came to rest on my hip, fingers spreading wide, thumb pressing into the soft notch where my hip bone met the seat, and I understood then that he wasn't in a rush.

He was doing this the slow way.

The thorough way.

He wants to replace it, I realized. All of it. Every trace of everything that isn't him.

I turned my head, just slightly, and his jaw was right there, the line of it sharp and close, and I could feel him exhale against my temple.

My fingers curled against my thigh. "We're still in the car."

"I'm aware."

His mouth moved to the hinge of my jaw, and the press of it was soft, almost careful, which was somehow worse than if it had been rough.

My lungs forgot what they were supposed to be doing.

I caught a breath and it came out uneven, and when I made the mistake of glancing at him, the look in his eyes hit me somewhere low in my stomach, dark and unhurried and completely certain, the kind of want that didn't ask permission.

A year of this had taught me what that look meant.

He was like that, had always been like that, hands that couldn't seem to stop once they started, a need for contact that ran deeper than mood or occasion, like his skin was always slightly starved for something and I was the only thing that ever came close to satisfying it.

I'd noticed that the first time it happened.

I'd never said anything about it.

The car was slowing.

The gates were opening.

His lips found the juncture where my neck met my shoulder, and he stayed there, not biting, not yet, just breathing against my skin.

The car stopped.

He lifted his head.

"Come on," he said quietly.

He pushed the door open and stepped out, and his hand came back for mine, palm up, waiting, the way he never usually waited for anything.

I looked at his hand. Then I looked at his face.

He wasn't going to let this go tonight.