“No. This conversation is over and done with. You’re not going to make any crazy deals that backfire in your face.” He waved his hand as if he was signaling the end of this conversation, and that was a big oh-hell-no. “I made my bed and I’m going to roll around in it.”

I waited a second. “Are you done yet?”

His eyes flared a bright ocher.

“Just wanted to make sure, since you think you can tell me what I can and cannot do. Guess what? You can’t. And you know what else? I understand that because of what you did in your past, you think you’re not worth me—”

“In the past?” Seth laughed again, the sound cold and hard. “You think I’m talking about that shit with Ares? How about a couple of weeks ago?”

“What . . . what do you mean?”

Seth stared at me a moment and then he spoke a shattering four words. “I fed off you.”

“What?” I whispered after what was probably an entire minute of trying to process what he’d said. There was no way he said what I thought he said, because it didn’t make sense.

He turned sharply, stalking away from the bed, giving me his back. “Fuck. I should’ve told you before . . . before you gave yourself to me, but I’m a fucking selfish bastard. You heard me right, Josie. I fed off you—off your aether.”

My lips moved, but my tongue forgot how to form words. Shocked, I sat there as an icy shiver danced down my spine. Goosebumps raced over my skin. Seth had fed off me?

“That’s the kind of . . . of thing I am.”

Lifting my gaze, I saw him drag his hand through his hair. His fingers spasmed around the strands, tugging them briefly before his hand dropped to the nape of his neck.

“I have a . . . a problem. I’ve had one for a while now, and I tried . . . I’m trying not to be that person, but it’s in me, and it comes out. I know it’s going to again, and when it does, I don’t care who I hurt—what trust I break. In that moment, I don’t care who I’m hurting. Even you.” The raw edge to his words cut deep. He turned slowly, his chest rising sharply. “I don’t want to be that person. Gods, not with you, but I am.”