Crap.
As if theupstairsof Ravencroft wasn’t dark and moody enough, the lower stacks in the sub-basement are, unsurprisingly, even more so.
I thank Delores for the call number she’s scrawled on a slip of paper, let my friends know where I’m going, and then head to the marble and brass staircase leading down into the bowels of Ravencroft.
A shiver ripples up my spine as I reach the bottom of the staircase and step into the heavily shadowed lower stacks. The whole library is old, but down here, it honestly feels like you’ve taken a time machine to the 1800s. Everything is old wood and stone walls, lit with those same brass and green-glass lamps.
My shoes sound unnaturally loud on the marble floor as I quickly make my way toward the back of the stacks, clutching Delores’ note in my hand. It’s rarely crowded down here, no surprise. But it becomes clear as I hunt for my book that I’m alone right now.
Cool.Soglad I spent the walk over here talking to my friends about snake skeletons and haunted houses, and ruminating over lipstick notes scrawled on mirrors.
Eventually I come to the row of ancient, dusty shelves where I’ll find my book.
The stacks down here are claustrophobically close together, the space between them just wide enough for a single person. Thisrow dead ends at another shelf of books against the wall, making it feel evenmoreclosed-in.
My eyes scan the shelves to the left and right of me as I make my way down the row, until I’m almost at the very end of it.
“There you are,” I murmur, relief washing over me as I see the book I came for.
I’m too short to reach it, but there’s a rolling ladder on a metal rail nearby. I roll it over, climb a few steps up it to snag the book…
And then I smell it, making the hairs on the back of my neck stand up and sending a chill down my spine.
Mint. Clove. Masculinely spicy.
Achilles.
“And thereyouare,” his dark, gravelly baritone growls.
My body tenses and then goes stock still, the needy, dark thing inside me winding tightly around my core and my breath catching as I feel his dark presence billow in behind me like a storm cloud.
My throat feels tight, like there’s a hand wrapped around it, as I slowly turn to glance over my shoulder.
He fixes me with his dark, piercing gaze, his uniform jacket straining around his bulging upper arms as he reaches out to grab the railings of the rolling ladder on either side of my knees.
“And now, little prey,” he growls quietly, “you’re going to turn around, sit your delicious ass on this ladder, and spread your fucking legs for me like a good girl.”
13
YELENA
My first instinctis to run.
To put as much distance between us as possible.
The immediate response tothat, of course, is howcouldI get away right now? He’s got me caged and pinned halfway up a ladder in a sub-basement with no one else remotely within earshot to come help me.
But it’s the next thought that bleeds through my psyche that scares me more.
I don’t know if Iwantanyone to come help me.
I also don’t know if I'd run from him, even if I could.
I stand there four rungs up the ladder, my back still turned to him, my head turned over my shoulder, my body frozen, my wide eyes captivated by his.
I’m not frozen with fear. This isn’t terror.
It’s darker.