Page 178 of Problematic

Tempting.

Disgustingly tempting.

“Should I send someone to tail her?” he asked.

“No.” The word came out flat enough to chill the hallway.

Vale turned toward me.

I walked back into the room before I made a liar out of myself. “She said no.”

Chapter 26

Liv

Fuck, he was beautiful.

That was the first thought my stupid, horny brain offered me after the elevator doors slid shut between us.

Lux Draven had been standing there with blood drying on his skin, white hair wrecked from my hands, red eyes bare for the first time, and a thin scar tucked beneath one corner of his lip, exactly where those black fanglike edges had always hidden it. He had no right. None. The fucking audacity. He should have been ugly. Not regular ugly either. Troll-ugly, unfortunate-swamp-witch-victim ugly. Instead, he had a face I wanted to kiss. Had kissed.

My fingers curled around the strap of my bag until the cheap fake leather bit into my palm.

“No, nope. We aren’t going to think about his stupid, gorgeous, really talented lips,” I whispered to myself. “Uggghhh.”

My reflection wavered in the dark metal doors. His shirt hung off one shoulder beneath my jacket because I had left too fast to fully hate myself into changing better. My hair was a mess, my lips were swollen, my eyes were glassy, and on the side of my neck, beneath my jaw, the mark pulsed like it had opinions.

I slapped my hand over it.

The mark answered with another throb. I gasped and pressed harder like I could shove the sensation back under my skin.

The elevator reached the lobby with a soft chime. The doors opened. Lux Tower’s lobby stretched in front of me, black glass, silver veins in the floor, wardlight crawling along the walls in silent lines. Security stood near the front desk. Two demons in dark suits turned as I stepped out. Their gazes dropped to my neck.

My hand flew back over the mark.

One of them lowered his eyes fast.

“Ms. Heart,” the woman at the desk said, her voice careful enough to piss me off.

I kept walking.

“Do you need transportation arranged?”

That almost did it. I stopped near the middle of the lobby and turned my head enough to see her. “No,” I said.

Her mouth pressed flat. “Mr. Draven asked that you be given anything you need.”

I laughed, and it came out mean and ugly. “Did he?” My voice shook, which made me angrier. My whole body had betrayed me tonight. My voice was simply late to the party. “Tell Mr. Draven I need him to develop personality traits that don’t come with deceit.”

The desk woman blinked.

I turned before she recovered and walked out through the huge glass doors into the morning.

The city had that pink, bruised color it got just at sunrise when the streetlights still buzzed and the night workers dragged themselves home while morning people started pretending they had their lives together. My sneakers hit the sidewalk.

Every step away from the tower tugged at the bond. Not a sweet ache. More like a hook caught under my skin. My body wanted to turn around. My blood wanted him. My magic, whatever unholy disaster had woken up inside me, kept reaching backward.

I clenched my jaw. “No,” I told myself. “You are mad. Stay mad.”