Page 94 of Coal Hearts

Tingles sparked in my fingers the longer I rested my palm on his shirt. His chest rose and fell, his heart thundering beneath my touch.

I shoved again.

Nothing.

I dropped my hand and balled it against the stinging current left behind. I hated that he still held me prone. That his fingers flexed around my wrist wedged against my spine—a threat and a caress all in one.

Neither of us spoke for far too long.

Tension and awareness thickened.

Fight and fear, hate and hellfire.

I didn’t like it.

“Let me go,” I breathed. “Just...please. If you’re truly sorry for bringing me here. For gifting me to a dangerous creep who entertains rapists, then please...help me get out of here.”

Henri’s grey gaze bounced around the shelves—eyes narrowed as he searched the corners of the room, the bronze figurines of hunting dogs and stags, the quaint framed embroidery of hedgehogs and badgers. All the knickknacks were from another era, falsified and replicated in this mockery of a citadel.

Finally, he looked down at me and lowered his voice. “I see four cameras clearly. Who the hell knows how many are hidden elsewhere. I don’t know if they have audio, but I can guarantee we’re being watched right now, and we’ve already spent far too long whispering against the bookcase.”

“Then let me go.” I went to push him again but hesitated.

I didn’t like touching him.

I didn’t like the strange sensations that sparked between us.

I didn’t like that even now—even after everything he’d done and would do—my body was still aware of his. Still tempted by the forbidden. Still deluded by danger.

He exhaled hard as his gaze locked on my mouth. “I know you have no reason to trust me, but...you have no choice. I will tell you one last time...I’m the only chance you have in here. Thanks to me, you’ve been trafficked into a society that will never let you go. You were the key to me getting inside, and I’m...” He swallowed, his throat working. “I’m sorry.”

“You’re sorry?”

“More than you’ll ever know.”

The way he said it. The aching truth behind it.

It made me pause.

Made me study him.

Slowly, things began to shift into nonsensical sense.

The key to getting inside?

The apparent reluctance to play?

The sincerity of his apology?

Who is this man?

And why did he seem different, all while awfully the same?

“Just who the hell are you?” My eyes narrowed. “Why do I keep getting conflicting emotions from you?”

He let my wrist go but he didn’t stop crowding me against the bookshelves. “You don’t need to know who I am, only that you need to obey me.”

Even that sounded forced. No, not forced...laced with something other than dominance.