She hugs me, and I find myself clinging to her, her weight slight on top of me, but her presence solid and warm and so fucking necessary. And I know without a doubt that what I feel for her I have never felt for anyone before. Ever.

“It’s not your fault. You know that, right? Please tell me you know that.”

I cup her face, feeling myself harden even now, even with what I just exposed. “I do, my sweet little monster. But I also know my temper. It matches his. Surpasses it.”

“What are you talking about?”

“Carlisle. His rage skipped a generation and landed heavy in the next.”

“That’s what you think?”

“That’s what I know.”

“And the reason you won’t marry. Because you think you’ll repeat history. You think you’ll hurt me like he did her.”

I try to push her off and get up because this isn’t where I wanted to end up when I started this story. But she doesn’t let me go. She sets her thighs firmly on either side of me, presses her soft breasts into my chest, and kisses me.

“You’re an idiot, Lawson Montgomery,” she says, kissing me again as she sheathes herself on me.

“And you are going to be the death of me,” I tell her, wrapping my arms around her and pushing deep into her. I shift my hands to her hips to move her over me all the while kissing and biting her lips as she kisses and bites mine, her moans growing louder as my thrusts become more urgent. And when I try to pull out, she grips me tight, the muscles of her legs pressing into me, and even though I could flip her off, do the less wrong thing and not come inside her again, I don’t. I hold on tight and listen to her pant my name as I come inside her.

22

Judge

The next few weeks pass in a lasting cease-fire. We are tender toward one another. We make love. We lie together in bed, Mercedes curling into my side. I hold her and wonder how I will ever sleep in this bed when she is no longer in it.

But I try not to think about that. I want to hold on to this tenderness a while longer. Already the end is near. I received a call from Hildebrand. Well, a summons. Not me, but Mercedes, although I haven’t told her about it yet. I have put him off, but not for very much longer. I have a feeling I know what he’ll require of her because she won’t walk away from her role in Santiago’s poisoning scot-free. No one does, not from The Tribunal.

But I’m not ready to burst this bubble we’re squatting in just yet. Two interlopers. Almost happy. Almost because we both know the end is coming. These are stolen moments.