Cass was promised to another.
He had come here fearing she had a man, and she did, one who was waiting for her, expecting her to bear him a child for her coven.
“Ready.” Cass’s voice had him jerking upright and spinning away from the desk, his heart rushing in his ears as his gaze settled on her.
She sauntered towards him, her hips swaying enticingly, a slight smile curling her rosy lips.
Flirting with him again.
All his feelings, his frustration and anger, must have been painted across his face because she drew up short and her ice-blue eyes warmed with what looked a hell of a lot like concern.
“What’s wrong?” She lowered the black bag she had packed to her side and canted her head, leaning towards him.
“Nothing,” he snapped. “I’m bored of waiting for you. I’m leaving now… with or without you.”
She frowned at him. Stared into his eyes for so long that he feared she would be able to read why he was upset with her, even when he wasn’t really sure himself. He had told her that he didn’t have a heart to give her, and she had told him that she didn’t want it anyway. Everything that had happened between them had been nothing more than harmless flirting.
So why the hell did he feel as if she had just ripped out his heart and squeezed it until it shattered?
“I’m leaving.” He turned away from her and came face-to-face with the cat.
The ginger and white tom glared at him and then sauntered past him with his head and tail held high, heading for Cass.
“Oh, Milos. I’ll have to come back to feed him now the nearby summer residents have gone home to the mainland.” She began to bend to pet the cat.
“Not going to happen.” Daimon bit those words out from between clenched teeth, wrestling with his feelings, fighting to find some balance again. “You’ll have to ask a neighbour.”
She straightened and scowled at him. “I just said they’ve all gone away. This cat is my responsibility and he’s been with me a long time. I won’t leave him behind like that. I won’t abandon him.”
Abandon.
That word stuck in his mind.
He could see in her eyes that she meant what she had said. If she wouldn’t abandon an animal, she definitely wouldn’t abandon the man who was waiting for her.
She had only been flirting with him.
He hammered that into his head, over and over again when it refused to stick. None of it had been real. She had been teasing him, tempting him, probably finding it amusing. She knew about his problem. Had it given her pleasure when she had found a way to circumvent his ice and she had touched him, making him believe something impossible?
That he didn’t have to be alone anymore.
“I’m leaving.” He closed his eyes and turned away from her.
“Daimon.” She grabbed his arm, sending a hot shiver rolling up it. “What’s wrong? Don’t tell me nothing. Something is wrong.”
He opened his eyes and looked across at her, thought of a thousand things he wanted to say.
He had foolishly thought she had really liked him.
He had foolishly allowed himself to feel something for the first time in centuries.
He had foolishly admitted the truth to himself—that while he had loved Penelope, it hadn’t been true love, the sort that would have lasted forever.
He had grown to love her and then he had lost her, and he had mourned her but part of him knew he had mourned what had been taken from him more than he had grieved her.
He had foolishly admitted that the loyalty he felt towards Penelope had been forged as a shield to protect him from the loneliness he had endured for centuries, giving him a reason to not look at other females, a reason not to feel cold and forsaken whenever he was around his brothers and their women.
In the end, only one word rose to the tip of his tongue, the rest of them held back by fear, by pain that had grown since meeting Cassandra, agony that ripped at him every moment he was near her.
“Nothing.”
She bit out a curse in Russian, picked up her cat and cuddled the wretched thing. All the while, Milos glared at him. Daimon glared right back. He knew he was being a dick. He didn’t need the small god pointing it out to him. He was sure Milos had been a dick himself more than once in his life, had probably been a bastard to Cass countless times since she had found him.
“He’s coming with us then.” She tipped her chin up, her sparkling blue eyes daring him to say a word against it.
“Fine. Whatever.” Daimon took hold of her bare arm and stilled as that heat rolled through him again, marvelling over the fact he could touch her and she wasn’t in pain, wasn’t in any danger.
He brushed his thumb over her skin, wanting to feel it without his gloves, flesh-to-flesh, as he had in the bath.
He shut down that need. She couldn’t be his. She already had someone waiting for her.
“Daimon,” she whispered, pressing closer to him, until the heat of her body soaked into his clothes and ignited a need to tug her closer still, so they were pressed together, not a molecule of air between them.
He stepped instead, embracing the cold darkness, letting it wash over him to give him strength.
Milos hissed and growled throughout the teleport, and continued as they landed in the middle of the main room of the mansion.
Cass struggled with the cat, gently chastising it.
Increasing that feeling Daimon had, the one that said she didn’t know the truth about cats.
“Neko!” Aiko leaped onto her feet from the couches in front of him and hurried over to Cass, her dark eyes bright for the first time since Esher had disappeared. “Kawaii!”
She drew that word out as she melted over the raggedy cat who was in
