Page 43 of When Night Falls
“Oh, I’m sure you’ll have more than just one more question, Lucynda. But what is it?” He stuffs his hands back into his pockets as he focuses his attention on me.
“I want to know exactly what you meant by me getting revenge. Why would you possibly think that it’s something I wanted?”
It’s somewhat of a heavy question, but he’s put a lot of focus on the topic. And I won’t lie, the idea sounded enticing. But I’m still not sure it’s something I’d want, I’m only curious to hear his reasoning for offering it to me.
“Cyn,” he calls me by a nickname that I’m not used to. My childhood nickname, the one I hate most, is Lucy. My mother started the trend when I was little and my father only used it onemore time after she left. It was a memory I have since drowned out because it hurt so much.
“I know what you’ve been through, I could feel your pain from the moment I first met you. You don’t think I could recognize the kind of anger that radiates from someone who has been made to feel like their life has no purpose?” His tone turns a bit more wicked, laced with torment and desolation. Almost as if he’s speaking from experience, but he doesn’t give the chance to ask about it before he turns his head and continues.
“Darkness doesn’t have to be a bad thing. It can be beautiful if shown the light,” he proceeds.
“But revenge isn’t beautiful. Revenge is evil and cruel, is it not?” I beg to argue, not seeing how the idea of revenge and the contradictions of darkness have anything to do with each other.
“Not when people who have hurt you get what they deserve. I find that to be rather liberating.” His tone turns cold as ice and rigid as rock. It sends a chill to my spine. I know now that he’s definitely speaking from experience.
“Right.” I deflate, visibly dropping my shoulders and starting to take slower breaths to help erase the visions in my mind of Rivian murdering people in the name of revenge. But I can’t lie, when he told me he was the one responsible for my father’s death, my head spun in dizzy circles while appreciation twisting in my heart. I felt . . . raptured.
“Well, beautiful or evil, liberating or cruel, what makes you think I have the kind of darkness that needs to live out acts of vengeance? My father is dead, remember? Isn’t that good enough?”
“You tell me, little one. Is it?” He tilts his head to me, and I know he’s trying to tell me he knows something, but I continue to argue against him.
“If you’re suggesting that I would want to hurt other people,” I cross my arms over my chest, “then I don’t think you knowme as well as you claim you do.” Part of me feels like I can be angry with him for his assumptions. I want to show frustration. But I can’t deny that once, he was right. But now . . . now I can’t imagine summoning those thoughts and manifesting them to life.
“It is not a suggestion if it’s true, Lucynda. Your thoughts do not only belong to you when I am around. Ifeelthe things you feel andwantthe things you want,” he tells me.
“Because you can read my mind.” I conclude, brow raised at him for effect.
“No. Because you aremine, remember?” His voice drops down to a husky growl, sending my body into an all out flush.
Something unchaste and licentious sinks deep into my core at his words. Why does he have to say things like that? It makes it that much harder to forget how irritatingly sexy Rivian is.
“Right.” The stupid tether, that’s what he’s referring to. But it doesn't change the fact that this declaration of his does something immoral to my body. In fact, Rivian has provided me with a lot of foreign feelings, hot and cold.
I let a few beats of silence play out between us needing a moment to feign impassiveness at his claim.
Rivian walks behind his desk and stands in front of one of the windows. It seems to look out to a mass of trees, but I can’t make out any more than that from where I stand.
I welcome the space he provides me feeling the unrelenting need to breathe something other than his intoxicating air.
“Don’t act as if you are thinking about this for any reason other than for the sliver of hope that you’d be more powerful than those who treated you so poorly.” His back remains my view, so I offer myself the opportunity to look around his office.
He’s intimidating. And while I crave to be near him, it’s a curse to feel too engrossed by someone so elusive.
“Don’t feign ignorance to those who have hurt you just because I fed you some lore of soulmates. I can see right through you.” He turns around right as my eyes look back up to him, our eye contact triggering so many emotions inside of me. His eyes are daunting and mesmerizing. His stare gives me no control over the lustfulboomin my heart.
I can’t respond to his words. I feel like he’s leaving no room for me to argue. I’m just forced to stand here and listen to him tell me what I feel and how I should act.
“But no matter, because most marriages are built on foundations understood to be only in name, power, and unity to the Society.” He finishes his statement and it’s not one that really gives me the sense of belonging like he’d once provided me with, which was the spark of my epiphany.
Now he seems to be steering me toward this idea of only fulfilling his offer for reasons he deems to be selfish. But isn’t that just hypocrisy? Wasn’t he the one who stalked me and interrupted my life for his own selfish reasons?
It's now that I start to doubt that this arrangement might provide me with anything more than what he's offering me.
It’s not right of him to assume what I want or need. He thinks my darkness is simply driven by pain and it won’t end until I see the erasure of everyone who has caused it. He doesn’t find me capable of anything more than a tortured soul who will sit by his side and be pretty while my marriage to him gives power to his Society.
Forget the idea of family, or love, which is what I've come to crave the most. I could push all thoughts of silly revenge aside; I never thought them to be obtainable until he told me it was closer in reach than I’d imagined anyway. And forget this annoying attraction I’ve seemed to develop for him. If he’s going to be this cryptic asshole about everything, that’s all the soiledinner beauty I need to see to determine that I don’t actually find him attractive.
If all he thinks of me is some sad girl who can’t be anything other than broken—if that’s all he thinks I’m good for—then fine. So be it. I can give him darkness. His doubt in me for all else sucks, it really does. Especially because I’ve never felt surer about anything in my life. Despite the fact that I tried to run—it always felt to me as if I was born to just keep running away from everything—I know that this feels entirely more palpable than anything else I’ve ever experienced.