He wasn’t amused when Ecco wiped his brow with exaggerated relief.
Liam stalked out, leaving Jilly to follow. He’d trust the same self-preservation instincts that had made her duck away from the worst of the exploding glass would make sure she followed immediately and silently.
He should have known better.
In the stairwell, the drag of her steps behind him made him grit his teeth. “I can finish chewing you out in front of the others, or you can pick up your feet and take your licks in private.”
She gave a short, low laugh. “Why start now?” When he whirled to glare at her, she just glared back. “Lay a hand on me, and you will regret it for the rest of your suddenly very short life.”
A protest sprang to the tip of his tongue that he would never lay a hand on her, but that’s exactly what he wanted to do. He was so tired of the dance. It was worse than fighting, this circling around what was between them.
If he just indulged it . . .
No, that was sin itself talking. And he didn’t even have the excuse of the raw, exposed solvo nearby.
He tightened his fists against the urge to reach for her. “I want just one peaceful night of destroying tenebrae. Is that too much to ask?”
“No one’s stopping you,” she snapped. “Oh, wait. Except Corvus.”
He glowered at her. “And you.”
The stairwell was as uncomfortable a place for seduction as he could imagine—other than the middle of a tenebrae attack—and still his body yearned toward her. And here he’d always thought he had the inevitable talya death wish firmly under control.
He had nothing under control when he was with Jilly.
He took a long breath and let it out even more slowly. “I don’t want to fight with you again.”
“And yet we do it so well, remember?”
He couldn’t help but smile at the wry note that crept into her voice. “Yeah.”
“You told me not to go out, and I didn’t.” When he opened his mouth to point out that she’d found plenty of trouble anyway, she pinned him with a glare. “I get at least a few points for that.”
“You get minus points for destroying company property.” He held up one hand. “But I’ll count you back at zero if you aren’t around any more explosions for the rest of the night.”
She huffed as if his request was a huge imposition. “If we had enough raw solvo, we could launch it into a room of salambes—maybe even use it against malice and ferales—from a distance, and no one would get hurt.”
He gave her a reproving glance. “Except for anyone caught in the resulting cataclysmic blast. You said Sera used just the smallest bit of leftover solvo, and look what it did.”
Jilly chewed at her lip and looked away. “But we wouldn’t have to risk anyone in the hand-to-hand again. If it works, the talyan could overcome the tenebrae without having to get close enough to match their demons against each other.”
Knowing he shouldn’t, he reached out to touch her cheek, to bring her gaze up to his. “Losing Perrin was bad,” he said softly. “But we can’t fix it, can’t bring him back, by avoiding our mission.”
He expected her to pull away, assuming she didn’t just snap off his head—and maybe his hand. Instead, she rested a moment against his touch. The blue streaks of her hair hung down without their customary gel, straight and soft against the backs of his fingers.
“I just can’t seem to make anything better,” she murmured. “My family. The kids at the halfway house. I manage to make things worse even when I’m fighting evil incarnate and it seems like there’s no way things could get worse.”
“We all have our special skills,” he said. She rewarded him with a fleeting smile, compelling him to remind her, “I wanted more for the boys under my watch too, so I know how you feel.”
He wished he could make it better. For her. Never mind the world’s battle against evil. If he could ease her hurt, even for a moment, maybe that would be the first step to making up for all his failures over the many long years.
After all, he did know how she felt. He just wanted to feel more of her.
He leaned down, very slowly, giving her time to protest. She only stared up, her eyes half closed and her lips parted.
Softly, he closed his mouth over hers. Spicy and sweet. The sigh of her breath warmed the damp joining of their lips and spread with a curling rush through the rest of him. He stroked his tongue against hers, felt her melt as the heat rose between them.
He pulled her up against his chest, the clean cotton of the black T-shirt he’d laid out for her—the whole time imagining her bare, wet, hot skin in the shower—rumpling under his clenched fingers. He’d like to see that skin, taste it, mark it with his presence, a warning more clear than even a flashing reven to any who would hurt her again.
A clang from somewhere down in the basement made him lift his head.
But she didn’t draw away. “I thought we weren’t going to do this again.”
He brushed a twined strand of blue and black hair behind her ear. “If it’s this or fight . . .”
Her hand rested in the middle of his chest, rising and falling with his slightly harried breath. “We can’t do anything by halves, can we? But that’s all we are anymore. Half of a soul, half demon.”
His grip on her tightened involuntarily. Because he didn’t feel divided at the moment.
Oh no, definitely all of him wanted all of her.
She might think of herself as somehow lessened, but he knew better.
“You said it was my fault we lost Perrin, and I agreed. But I didn’t say why.” The confession ripped out of him. “If I’d been with you, we could have staved off the salambes’ attack, at least long enough to confine the one and make our escape.”
Under his hand, he felt the imperceptible stiffening of her spine. “What do you mean?”
He pulled her closer again. “This. This power that binds us. I’ve denied it, thinking it would do more harm than good. But as you pointed out, how can we sink any deeper?”
She’d gone utterly still in his grasp, and he realized he could’ve offered a more impassioned appeal to her senses before pointing out the cold practicality of their joining. He tilted his head, gaze fixed on her mouth, ready to make up for the error.
But she pulled back, exerting no little amount of her teshuva’s strength. “So you think one kiss seals the deal?”
“No,” he murmured. “I figure two or three should do it.”
This time she was not amused, he saw. Under the black weave of her T-shirt, her muscles rippled as she amped the demon higher. “So we’re going to hook up to save the league.”
He had to let her go or risk an undignified wrestling match on the cold metal stairs. “I thought you understood. You noticed it yourself, before I did; we’re two halves of a whole, mirror images.”
“Matter and antimatter,” she countered.
“And if we handle the explosion right, we’ll only take the evil in the world with us.”
She took a long step back from him, until her heels hovered near the edge of the stairs, as if she’d rather tumble back down than be near him. “You’re the one who said no more explosions.”
“I was hasty.” He grimaced. “You bring that out in me. Just another way we’re different.”
“Just another way we’ll kill each other before we could drain a single malice.”
Frustration rose up in him. “You want to fight. You’ve been pushing to take this to the next level.”
She stared at him, her golden eyes opaque with some secretive veil that hid more dangers than the barrier guarding the human realm from the demon. “I don’t want to be just another weapon in your hands.”