I don’t walk to the head of the table. Instead, I take the seat directly across from her. We stare at each other as the minutes tick by. I know that to speak first is to lose, but at some point, this is just ridiculous. “Congratulations, you’ve proven your point.”
“Have I?” She leans back and spreads her arms. “Where are your people, Bram? Do they respect you so little that they don’t worry about their absence here? Don’t bother to answer. I already know.”
My earlier frustration and anger bubbles right out of my mouth before I can think better of it. “That’s rich coming from you. You act like you know so much about responsibility and taking care of your own. Yet the first chance you got, you abandoned your entire realm and came into this one to find answers about a dead woman. What the fuck does it matter how she died, Grace? It doesn’t change anything. It certainly doesn’t take away from the fact that you’re running from your problems, same as me. I think that’s what pisses you off the most about me. We. Are. The. Same.”
“The fuck we are.”
Now it’s my turn to lean back, to smirk at her as she unravels the same way I did earlier in my office. This is childish. But I want to be under her skin and just as aggravating as she is to me. That satisfaction is empty, but I don’t care. I press forward well beyond any good sense. “You’re so angry, Grace. Do you think I’m not? But then, the most aggravating thing in the world is to look at another person and see your perfect mirror. Changing me won’t change how you feel. It won’t change you.”
She plants her hands on the table and rises abruptly. “Shut the fuck up.”
“Or what?” I see the answer in her energy—little pops of the threat of violence. Now is the time to turn us back to safety. I won’t. This is the moment I tuck my wings close to my body and let gravity take hold. The moment I embrace it, throw myself against the most basic law of existing: what goes up must come down. And when it does, it hurts like nothing else.
This moment with Grace is ugly and awful, but at least it’s real. If I make her angry enough to kill me? That’s something she’ll have to live with. Not me.
“Or maybe we’ll find out if you really do burn after all.” She’s practically shaking with fury. It’s a beautiful sight, though I don’t know what it says about me that I think so.
I don’t burn. I don’t feel much temperature fluctuation at all, courtesy of my skin. I won’t say that Grace is no danger to me, but I recognize that she’s taking an avenue that will cause no permanent damage and might make us both feel better. I doubt she’s doing it intentionally . . . but I am. It’s toxic, but I don’t give a fuck.
“Silas.” I barely have to raise my voice. I know he’s standing just out of sight around the doorway to the kitchen. I can sense him there, his curiosity and worry lingering at the edge of my line of sight.
He emerges a few seconds later, and I can appreciate that he doesn’t appear like he was eavesdropping. “Are you ready to eat?”
“I think we’ll skip straight to dessert. Please bring me matches, oil, and those lovely little marshmallow things you made earlier today.” They’re soft and gooey and should burn rather nicely.
To his credit, Silas doesn’t hesitate, though I catch more worry in his energy before he slips away. There’s no worry in Grace as I turn back to her. She has her eyes narrowed in suspicion. “What are you up to?”
“One of the first times you ever spoke to me was to ask if I burn. Let’s find out together.” I lean forward, bracing my elbows on the table, daring her with my eyes to back down. “You might like the way I fuck, but don’t pretend you like me. Don’t pretend you don’t crave freedom from my presence to pursue your poor, dead mother. So burn me, Grace. Unless you don’t really want answers at all. Maybe you’re just as much a coward as I am. I’m your mirror, after all.”
18
GRACE
This godsdamned fool of a gargoyle. After the shit show in his office this afternoon, I realized he didn’t understand. I don’t have the words to make him. I don’t have the time. I sure as fuck don’t have the patience.
But then he comes here and throws my vulnerability back in my face? I didn’t have to let him in, even the smallest amount, yesterday. I might not have given him the full truth, but I didn’t have to confess even that much. Now I’m glad he doesn’t know everything about me and my family. If this is how he returns vulnerability, best not to show it at all.
And now he wants to use me to hurt himself.
Neither of us speaks as Silas comes back into the room with a small tray. He hesitates for a moment and then sets it on the center of the table between us. It contains an artful display of matches in a round container, a little gravy boat thing that appears to have oil in it, and a pyramid of fluffy square marshmallows. He walks out of the room without another word.
I’d like to believe this is a bluff, but I know Bram well enough now to recognize his lack of hesitation. The problem is that the man has no self-preservation. Which might mean that he’ll be fine if I follow through on this ridiculously risky path . . . Or it might mean that he’s about to die right in front of me. My fury burns hotter at the acknowledgment. He calls me selfish, but what is this? I don’t expect him to genuinely care for me—at least I don’t think I do—but this is so cruel, I can barely stand it. I should walk away. In fact, I will walk away. Right fucking now.
Except I don’t.
I sit my ass back down in the chair and reach over to take the container of matches. I hold Bram’s eyes as I sit back and place a single match, head down, between my middle finger and the table. It’s a stone table, so it’ll work just as well as a matchbox. I strike the match and flick it toward him. It lights and sails through the air toward Bram. It lands on his plate and sizzles for a moment before burning itself out.
“Cute bluff. But I don’t think you have the courage to do it for real.” He grabs the container of oil and pours it over his chest. Even knowing I should look away, I can’t help tracing the path the oil takes down his chest to his waist. I know how those muscles feel beneath my hands, my tongue, pressed against my breasts and back.
I know better than to let my rage take the wheel. Nothing good comes from losing control. Only pain.
I reach for another match. We’re playing a game of chicken that might have deadly consequences. This is toxic and a huge indicator that we are a terrible pair. Neither one of us has the brakes to divert this runaway train. I can’t stand the thought of him calling me a coward again. More, a dark part of me wants to punish him, to prove that he doesn’t actually want to die.
I flick another match toward him. This one lands on a napkin next to the plate, and we both watch in silence as it goes up in flames. Bram looks at me, and all the tension leaches out of his body. He gives me a cocky smile. “Surely you can do better than that. If not, we’re going to be here all night.”
I am a broken creature. I’ve known that about myself for as long as I’ve been aware enough to understand that my family is not like other families. If I had any kindness, any self-preservation, it was trained out of me before I knew the meaning of the word. Normal people don’t fall back on violence as the first solution to any problem. Normal people lose sleep at night when they end a life, justified or not. Normal people . . . But then, I’m not normal. I never have been.