Page 115 of Slaying the Shifter Prince
It would mean giving Eric the chance to escape.
I gritted my teeth. “He’s the one, Sepher. He killed her.”
“I heard.”
“I thought you wanted to see him bleed, too.”
“I do.” His eyebrows squeezed together. “But I don’t want to see you bleed for it.”
Traitor. It seized my throat. How could he?
His fingers flexed. “Please take my hand, little bird. I’m afraid you cannot fly.”
“‘Little bird,’” Eric scoffed. “You let thisthingspeak to you like that?”
With a snarl, I pressed the blade to his skin, silencing him. A bead of blood pooled against the iron’s edge. The blood I’d wanted all these years, and it had been right before me the whole time.
I shook, muscles screaming, the worst part of me lusting for the thing it had pursued for so long.
“Zita, ignore him. Look at me.”
It wasn’t even malicious compliance when I obeyed. It was just that I couldn’t deny him. I wanted to look at him, even in this shape.
My beautiful, beastly Prince of Monsters watched me with eyebrows knotted together, like he could will me to take his hand with a look.
“I want you to live. I wantyou. As simple as that. As selfish as that.” He scoffed. “I am not a good man. I want to possess you and be possessed by you. I want all the best and worst of what that means. I’ve killed for you before with no remorse, and I will do it again.” His golden eyes drilled into the very depths of me, like he could see that I wasn’t as horrified by that thought as I should’ve been.
“But…” There was too much in me, too much clamouring in my chest to say anything more than that. Between my legs, Eric shifted, and I squeezed my thighs tighter. He wasn’t going to wriggle free.
“I know you can’t lift my curse.”
That snapped my attention from Eric. He knew?
But he didn’t look angry about the fact I’d lied. The corner of his mouth hinted at a smile. “I’ve been reading about cursewitches, and every record says their curses are permanent.” He shrugged. “But I don’t care. I’ve accepted what I am. I’ve accepted what happened. I’ve let go of revenge, not because it was the right thing, but because the cost was too great.”
That phrase again. What was the cost of his revenge? What was the price he’d refused to pay?
The question must’ve shown in the tight lines of my face, because he raised his eyebrows. “Because if I’d taken the revenge I’d promised and killed you, I’d have lost the woman I loved.”
It curled through my veins and muscles, chiselled through my bones.
He loved me, and he’d let that trump vengeance.
“Don’t die for this, Zita. You’ve already lost the past ten years to it. I don’t want you to lose everything else, too.”
There it was, the horrible, choking truth. I hadn’t just spent the past decade in a deadened state, I’d spent it as a ghost.
I’d played the part of Zinnia. I’d grown my hair to look like hers. I’d modelled my shows on hers. I’d smiled sweetly at patrons like she had, fucked them like she had, taken their money like she had. Everything—everythingI’d done for her, like her, so consumed by her death that I’d completely forgotten to live.
That was what he’d meant on the beach.
You’re someone who should have a big life, Zita. Huge. Not the stunted thing you’ve been nursing.
That was why it had shaken me.
He’d been right.
I could see that now I had a life that was bigger than before. One with him, yes, but also with friends like Celestine, Anya, and Essa. Maybe Cadan could become a friend in time—we had Zinnia in common.
