Arcana 03 Dead of Winter by Kresley Cole

Author:Kresley Cole [Cole, Kresley]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Fiction, Fantasy, General
ISBN: 9781471122866
Google: ZqL1AwAAQBAJ
Publisher: Simon & Schuster UK
Published: 2015-01-06T07:00:00+00:00

25

I gazed at the door long after Aric had gone, disbelieving he’d left me alone with Jack, threat or no.

I suspected he was testing me, testing my promise.

“You’re staring after Death,” Jack said, drawing my attention. Anger warred with confusion in his expression. “You worried about him?”

My protectiveness toward Aric hadn’t waned. “Yes.” Worry filled me—for him and Jack. For Selena and Matthew.

“Because you think we need him? Or because you think you care about him?”

“Both.” I did care about Aric, maybe even more than cared.

I’d told Jack and Aric to get their heads in the game. I was one to talk. I couldn’t stop comparing the two.

Jack’s passion and drive versus Death’s intensity and Arcana connection. God help me, I could see myself with either.

Or . . . neither? They’d both hurt me. The red witch in me whispered, That’s what dust is for: to leave them in it.

I wished I could get objective advice. Damn, I missed my best friend Mel. She probably would’ve told me to keep both guys, collecting men like handbags.

Jack set his bow down and began to pace in front of the hearth, his eyes so vivid in the firelight. His black hair had dried, reflecting the flames like a raven’s wing. “Death hurt you in all these ways, but you still give a damn about him.” Out came his flask. “I was dishonest with you over one thing, and you can’t tell me if you’ll stay with me?”

“Put yourself in his shoes, Jack. I tried to murder him after convincing him that I was madly in love with him. I did this to him not once, but twice.”

“You didn’t do anything to him, no! Some long-ago Empress did. You ever heard of Stockholm syndrome? That’s what’s goan on.”

My lips parted. “That’s why you looked at me with pity earlier! That’s why your entire attitude changed? You no longer hate me for getting with him, because you’re putting all the blame on him.”

Jack stopped pacing to face me. “A two-thousand-year-old man stole a vulnerable girl and broke her down.”

He made me sound like Persephone, the daughter of Demeter, forced into the underworld by Hades. But Jack didn’t understand: attitude-wise, I skewed more toward wrathful Demeter than I ever had toward vulnerable Persephone.

“I’m not a girl anymore. I have lived over a hundred years; I feel those previous lives. But even if I didn’t, A.F. years are like dog years. Since the Flash, I cared for my mother as if I were the adult, I’ve killed, I’ve planned and executed coups. I’ve had to grow up fast.”

He swigged his flask. “Why doan you tell me what it was like with Death in the beginning?”

Hell. If I gave Jack the details, he’d stride right out those doors and shoot Aric—who wore impenetrable armor. A bullet would simply bounce off. “I don’t want to talk about it.”

“He messed with your mind,” Jack insisted. “That’s why you think you feel something for him. No other reason could explain this turnaround.

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