Page 101 of Gravehouse

He pins me with a glare. “Try again.”

I clear my throat. “Once.”

The corner of his mouth tips upward, clearly pleased with my answer, before he stands from the bed. “The problem is that love and trust don’t go hand in hand.”

What is he talking about?

“Asher...”

“Shut up,” he chuckles, shaking his head. “I never trusted you, Ivy. But where I don’t trust your intentions, you don’t trust my motives. For whatever reason, we’re both stuck in a fuckingplace we can’t move out from, yet any time you walk in a room, I want you. Every single fucking time, and that’s never gonna change.”

He traces the contour of my cheek.

“How’d you get out?” I repeat, trying again since he’s being so open.

“Fuck, I just...”

“...how’d you get out?” I challenge, voice hardening.

His eyes snap to mine. “I crawled. And then I spent a year locked up in a facility talking myself into killing you.”

I shiver, goosebumps spreading over my skin. Out of all the possibilities, that wasn’t the one I thought he would say.

“Dovecrest,” I say, thinking back to that night. “Probably should have just done it. Would have been over quicker.”

He gives me that crooked grin. “But this way is so much more fun?”

“And Aléia?” I need to stay focused. “She was there?”

His fingers knead my neck, forcing my forehead to his. “You’re asking the wrong questions, Venom.”

This is him again. The battle between dark and light forever at war behind his eyes.

What happened to you.

My pulse spikes.

Could he know…

“What’s wrong?” His head tilts, thumb tapping the vein on my neck.

“Nothing.” I relax my shoulders.

His jaw tightens. “Ivy.”

“I said nothing.” I step back, needing the distance, needing room to think because my brain is firing in seventeen directions and none of them lead somewhere safe.

I know he’s watching me. Since he dropped Le Boucher’s name, Asher will be watching every micro-expression, every breath that comes half a second too late.

He knows. He has to know.Why else would he tell me?

This is a test. Has to be. He’s been watching me since the wedding, since Désamour, since fuck knows when. Every soft moment, every cracked-open conversation, every time he pulls me close and I let him. All of it fed into some larger calculation I haven’t cracked yet.

I need to fucking ground myself.

His face changes, all warmth draining from him until those pale eyes go flat and distant. I know it because I wear the same look every time I choose the job over everything else.

I turn before the guilt can finish climbing up my throat.