He sat next to her, and she glanced at him, trying not to stare at his beautiful features, his strong jawline and glacial eyes. “I think I might remember you. I remember glimpses from when we were kids. I remember someone like you on the beach. A young boy with gray eyes.”

He eyed her cautiously. “I’m older than you. My memories are a bit clearer.”

Curiosity bloomed in her mind. “What do you remember? What were my parents like?”

“Powerful.”

He wasn’t giving details, and she had the unsettling feeling they’d done something terrible to him.

A sigh slid from her. “I remember feeling loved. Even if my parents were witches, I felt safe then. But you weren’t safe. They threw you out.”

He gazed into the candle flames. “Nothing I didn’t deserve,” he said, so softly she barely heard him.

A lump rose in her throat. “You were just a kid.”

“Is that so?” A muscle feathered in his jaw. “You don’t think like a Hunter with all that empathy of yours.”

“Maybe the Brotherhood isn’t as bad as you think.” She thought of Mason, making a mental correction. “Some of them are awful. But most of the Brotherhood made me feel like I had a home again. I felt valued, and important. I had a place among them. They give me a purpose.”

“Is it worth your life?”

“They have to take me back. I don’t have anything else,” she said.

“That’s quite a lot of faith you put in them.”

“It’s not so much faith. It’s more like—”

“—A desire,” he said. It was the same phrasing Ambrose had used, but on an incubus’s lips, the word had an entirely different association. Her mind burned with the memory of his lips on hers, of her body pressed against his, fingers coiled into his hair.

But he’d put a stop to their kiss. It was stupid, but she almost felt the sting of rejection.

“You know when I kissed you earlier?” She flinched at her own question. Shut up, Rosalind.

His lips curled in a faint smile. “The image is fresh in my memory.”

“I was just wondering, since you’re an incubus…” Why in the gods’ names was she bringing this up? She’d lost all her impulse control since she started hanging out with demons. “Why did you stop me? I thought incubi fed off—” She cleared her throat. “You know.”

He arched an eyebrow. “You know. Is that what you call it in the Brotherhood?”

Her chest flushed. She had no idea why she’d gotten sidetracked by this conversation. She should be focusing on the sybil right now, and finding a way to piece her life back together. “You know what I mean.”

He ran a finger over his lower lip, studying her. “Why did I stop it? Because you weren’t in control. I can tell you it took a tremendous amount of restraint on my part.”

Rosalind stared at him, entranced by the flickering candlelight dancing over his skin.