One notable perspective had been missing from Hugh’s account of events. “How didyoufeel about being in disguise all that time?”
A deep crease bisected his brow. “I didn’t love it, but…itdidn’t bother me the same way. I just wanted to keep the family peace. If that meant being glamoured around the clock, so be it.”
A diplomat, even as a child.
She eased her calf between his. Hugged him tighter as she asked her next question. “Once your mother confessed, how did your father react to the news?”
“He was thrilled. Proud of how powerful his wife truly was and how she’d flouted the conventions of high demon society to have him. Even more determined to prove she hadn’t made a mistake in marrying him.” His fingers flexed against Gwen’s hip, then relaxed again. “He began glamouring himself as a demon, and he agreed that Eloise and I should keep our empath abilities a secret. If it were up to my parents, all demons currently alive would forget that the Blacke family tree ever included a human branch.”
When Gwen imagined an ambitious human man who’d grown up in utter chaos and probably hated every moment of it, she kind of got why Hugh’s father had been attracted to the law and a high-society demon. Why he’d been desperate to fit into her lofty social and professional circles, both before and after discovering her true identity. But that didn’t give him an excuse to impose his own obsessions on his children.
Gwen couldn’t seem to summon any warm feelings toward either TimothyorMarlee. And despite all the familial context Hugh had just given her, she still found it difficult to understand why he’d confessed his very useful Enhanced ability to her without even the slightest hint of joy or pride. As if he and his twin were embarrassingly good at foosball instead of possessing the talent to read others’ emotions.
“Demonic reputation aside, though, surely being an empath is a benefit to you?” Gwen studied Hugh curiously. “Doesn’t the ability to sense your constituents’ and colleagues’ emotions help guide your decisions?”
To her shock, he shook his head. “I didn’t and don’t use my ability that way.”
Utterly bewildered, she blinked at him. “Why in the world not?”
She’d spent a lifetime encouraging and leveraging every infinitesimal scrap of talent she possessed, all in hopes of creating even a minimally sustainable existence for herself. Against that backdrop, his cavalier dismissal of his own unearned power—however slight—and his unwillingness to employ it for good felt like a careless, disfiguring splash of paint over the canvas. Like anobscenity.
She lowered her hand from his face and leaned away from him, distancing herself as far as she could without toppling off the couch or ending their embrace entirely.
“Both my parents are lawyers, Gwen.” The line carved between Hugh’s brows had deepened as he watched her subtly separate herself from him. “Our family’s official motto might beSemper rectior, but the unofficial one is ‘Feelings don’t change facts.’ As far back as I can remember, my mother and father emphasized rationality over emotion when dealing with others.”
She halted her slow retreat, considering whether her failure to take his parents’ profession into account had been unfair.
For centuries, demon lawyers had brokered high-stakes agreements among Supernaturals and Enhanced humans. While glamoured, they’d done the same for the wealthiest and most powerful common humans too. Even she, in all her unexaltedlack of glory, had heard about those lawyers’ infamously complete adherence to and ruthless enforcement of the letter of the law. Feelings and extenuating circumstances be damned.
Still, Hugh was no longer a child. He didn’t even practice law himself anymore, so—
“It disturbed me.” The words were stark, his eyes faintly pleading. “As a child, when I flexed my talent and read my parents’ emotions or the emotions of anyone in their social and professional circles, I’d have nightmares afterward.”
Shocked by such a private, pained admission from such a reserved man, she froze.
“There was very little warmth, even in my parents. Very little empathy. In the face of others’ pain, they and everyone in their orbit typically feltnothing.” The memory of it left his expression stricken. “The only emotions I sensed from them were deeply unpleasant. Rage. Disdain. Arrogance. Greed. At some point, I stopped reading anyone but my sister, because I didn’t want to know, Gwen. I didn’t want to know how little they cared about everyone else and how single-mindedly devoted they were to their own selfish desires.”
She edged closer to him again. “Didn’t your parents care about you and Eloise?”
Ambivalence knitted his forehead. “My parents love each other. But from what I could sense as a child, they considered my sister and me to be extensions of themselves. Possessions or tools rather than beings whose individuality and happiness they should want to cultivate.”
With the pad of her thumb, she tried to smooth that deep vertical slash between his brows, but it wasn’t going anywhere.
He leaned into her touch, still talking. “Around the age ofeight, I began trying to disrupt my emotional connection to our parents and their friends and colleagues, using distraction or physical pain or whatever seemed to work. Eventually, I managed to sever that connection almost entirely.”
Gwen winced, guilt stricken. “I’m so sorry.”
How could she have judged him for not using a talent that had brought him such pain? How could she have expected him to behave differently under the circumstances?
“No, Gwen.” He huffed out a short, wry laugh. “I’m not asking for pity or apologies. I just want you to understand why I didn’t employ my talent as widely as I’m now realizing I should have or cultivate it as assiduously as my sister did.”
She smoothed a dark eyebrow she’d accidentally rumpled. “Eloise didn’t shut down her connection to others’ emotions the same way you did?”
“Just the opposite. She worked to make it stronger. For better or worse.” His jaw worked. “She was always more social than me, so she found friends outside my parents’ community. According to her, most demons were actually friendly and warm. Just not the ones Mom and Dad knew.”
Reassuring to hear, since Gwen had encountered very few demons in her life before now—and those surrounding Hugh seemed pretty uniformly terrible.
An earlier point had caught her attention, though. “Why do you say ‘or worse’?”
