The Serpent's Curse by Lisa Maxwell (read an ebook week .TXT) 📕

Left with the choice between sitting up by herself or trying to sleep, Esta undressed, stripping down to the nylon slip she was wearing beneath the simple flared skirt, and climbed into her own bunk. She didn’t know what the next few days would hold. If they were lucky, they would have the Book and four of the artifacts. If everything worked out, they would be one step closer to returning to the past and controlling Seshat once and for all. Even that promise didn’t lift her spirits, though, not when her possible end was inching closer, and not when the distance that had sprung up between the two of them made her feel like she’d lost something essential.

Esta had spent her whole life holding people back, pushing them away. Because it was what she’d been taught. Because it was safer. Even now she understood that she’d never really thanked Dakari, never told him what his friendship had meant to her, because she’d been scared. Scared that he would reject her, as she’d once thought her own parents had. Scared to admit that she needed someone to depend on, other than herself.

As the train hurtled eastward, carrying them toward whatever fate or time or luck held in store, Esta realized she was so tired of being alone. She was tired of being solitary and strong. Most of all, she was tired of holding herself away from Harte.

If the Book offered no other answers for controlling Seshat’s power, Esta would have to give her affinity—her very self—to stop Seshat. That was fine. She could accept that end as her destiny. But she could not accept going to her death without Harte knowing what he meant to her. After all, Esta had never been one for regrets.

Easing herself out of the warmth of her own bed, she shivered as the cool air of the cabin made gooseflesh rise along her arms. She didn’t let herself hesitate or second-guess but instead climbed directly up into the bunk above. Harte startled when she slid in beside him, but she ignored the way he tried to pull away from her. Instead, she curled around him, enjoying the warmth of his body and not allowing him to go. She was done hiding, finished with the endless push-pull between them.

You are not negotiable. She still felt her cheeks burn every time she thought about how the words had tumbled from her in the hospital before she could stop them.

That goes both ways, you know, he’d replied.

They hadn’t talked about the exchange since, but Esta had convinced herself that Harte understood. His words proved it, didn’t they? But then he’d pulled back, away from her.

“Esta—” Harte’s voice was strained, a whispered plea between them, but she couldn’t tell what he was asking for.

“You took the Quellant,” she said simply. “We have a little time.…”

“I can’t,” he told her, even as she tucked her face into the place where his shoulder met his neck and pressed a kiss there.

“You could try,” she whispered into the crook of his neck, breathing in the smell of him. Because, god, she just needed to feel something other than grief and pain and hopelessness.

No. Not something. She needed him.

“Esta…”

“Please, Harte,” she whispered, not really knowing what she was asking for. All Esta knew was that she needed this, Harte’s arms around her and the feel of their bodies pressed together.

He seemed to relent, and she felt his body relax little by little as they lay there. The train rocked and swayed beneath them as it carried them onward. Eventually, Harte turned to her, his face so close that she could smell on his breath the sweetness of the wine he’d sipped at dinner. “I have nothing to offer you,” he whispered, his voice a hollow version if itself. “No past, no future.”

I don’t need a future. I might not even have one.

“You have right now,” Esta said, the words coming without planning or any artifice. The moment they were free of her, she felt the truth of them. “I can steal all the time in the world, but right now is all that we’ve ever had.”

“It’s not enough.” Harte’s face turned away from her again, and he stared up at the ceiling. “You deserve more than that.”

“Maybe… but I’m not asking for more.” Esta placed a small, soft kiss on the underside of his jaw, just beneath his ear where his skin was smooth and smelled of whatever tonic he’d put on after shaving earlier that day. It was different from the scent he’d worn in New York, but it still seemed completely perfect for him. Warm with a hint of some spice, it was a scent that felt closer to home than any place she’d ever been.

A long stretch of minutes passed between them with nothing but the shuffling of the rails, the steady rocking of the car, and in the silence, Esta felt a quiet sureness that this was where she belonged, whatever might happen. She knew Harte would turn away from her again. She felt it coming, the shift in his body that would break the connection she needed so desperately, a connection that confirmed that she was still real and whole and alive, when everything else felt like it was crumbling around her.

Harte turned to her instead, surprising her. “I shouldn’t,” he said, his voice as raw as the look in his eyes.

Before Esta could prepare herself, before she could even feel the relief that shuttled through her when she realized what his words meant, his lips were on hers. And she was lost.

THE NIGHT-DARK COUNTRY

1920—A Train Heading East

Harte could no more have stopped himself from kissing Esta in that moment than he could have stopped his heart from beating. Ever since he’d left her on the train, he’d imagined what it would have been like to stay. To remain curled beside her in that narrow bunk