CHAPTER 480: TRICK OF A TRICK

What was under her fingertips felt soft and warm, a living heat that pulsed faintly, almost as if her heartbeat had began to echo from that warmth. The texture was familiar in a way that made her breath still; her mind might have been tampered with, her memories erased and rewritten by Morpheus, but her body... her body remembered. It recognized him. The warmth, the shape, the quiet pull that made her want to trace every line of him, all of it felt irreversibly hers.

Her curious fingers moved before she could stop them, pressing a little harder into that warmth until she brushed against something sharper, that sharp edge, his teeth.

Startled, she drew back, only to hear the sound of low laughter rumbling from Cassius’s throat. The sound wrapped around her deep and full of amusement, catching her off guard.

He then caught her wrist gently, bringing her palm back toward him, and with a slow, feline motion, nuzzled his cheek into her hand. The stubble of his jaw tickled her skin as he hummed, a sound of satisfaction that sent a shiver through her chest.

"Do you want to touch more?" he asked in a teasing whisper that felt too intimate, too dangerous. His voice carried that convincing roughness that always seemed to coax her into forgetting reason.

Arabella swallowed hard, her throat tightening in instinctive response.

"My eyes and nose," he said next, pressing her fingertips higher, his hand guiding hers with lazy precision until she brushed the arch of his brow. His lashes flicked softly against her touch, as delicate as butterfly wings. "Jaw," he murmured.

She followed the word, tracing down the slope of his face. His jaw was sharp, sculpted to the kind that could slice light itself. She could almost imagine that he was made up of marble under her hand, cool and perfect, flawless for there was not even a single curve on his bone that felt out of place, so perfectly fitting.

If not for the warmth that radiated from his skin, she would have thought the man in front of her was nothing but an imagination of an artist bought to life. When her fingers lingered near his ear, she felt him twitch slightly, a faint ticklish reaction that drew the ghost of a smile to her lips.

Even without seeing, she could tell. Cassius was beautiful and perhaps dangerously so. The kind of beauty that didn’t need eyes to be known, only touch was enough for the blind to tell of that charm he hold.

She could picture it: the tilt of his eyes, the slant of his nose, the lips that always seemed half a breath away from a cruel smile or a kiss that would undo her.

And yet, she wanted to be sure. She wanted to know him with more than just memory.

Her hand drifted lower, fingers tracing the bridge of his nose, brushing lightly over his lips again, settling there for longer than what she liked to admit before gliding down the column of his throat. The skin there was hot, his pulse thrumming steadily beneath her fingertips. When she reached the hollow of his neck and the edge of his collarbone, her pinky grazed over him and a deep, guttural sound escaped him, unbidden.

The sound was low, rough, almost primal. It jolted through her like a spark. Her own breath hitched and even though she was the one who had elicited such response from him; her eyes widened. And although she couldn’t quite see his face clearly in the darkness that spread over his face, deep down she wanted to.

God, she wanted to see his expression, too curious over what kind of look he wore when he made a sound like that.

"Daring, aren’t you?" Cassius’s laughter broke the spell, boyish and soft but still edged with something darker. She could tell by the way his tone dropped that he smiled, that there was a faint upward curve that softened his cruelty. "You’ve always been daring, Arabella. But I didn’t know you’d be so bold as to touch a man like this, without a shred of hesitation."

Her brows furrowed slightly, and she replied, her tone measured but faintly flustered, "I was curious."

"I can tell," he said, his voice laced with mirth. He leaned closer until she could feel his breath against her temple. "Was that touching all that you needed to feel satisfied?"

She shot back before she could think, unwilling to let him win the game, "It sounds to me that you wanted to be touched, despite your earlier words."

That earned her another chuckle— quieter this time, breathier too.

Her gaze flicked toward him again, tracing his tall silhouette through the dim light. The ease in his posture, the way he stood utterly unbothered by her wandering hands, spoke volumes. There was no shame, no discomfort, only deliberate calm.

That composure, that steady heartbeat beneath her fingertips, told her something her lost memories could not. Whatever they once were to each other... it had been something more than Morpheus’s lies. Something deeper, more intimate, forged in the kind of trust that no spell could erase.

And standing there, her hand still resting lightly against his chest, Arabella knew — even if she could not remember him, her soul already did.

But she wasn’t too sure, she was a little afraid to be too certain only to make a fool of herself.

The words that came from her lips were almost breathless as she stared into his face, that blackness spread from his forehead to his chest. There was a tugging feeling in her heart that seemed to warn her not to be too curious of who he was but another part of her seemed to be desperate, wanting to know about him.

Her heart felt torn between two choices until finally she clucthed to his clothes, her eyes burning with emotion that burned deep across her heart. "What were you to me?"

"What was I to you?" Cassius seemed to stumble upon the question but not because he was unsure of what they are, far from it, his hesitation sounded to her as though he couldn’t use words to put words the bond they have, as if words weren’t enough at all to express their bond.

"For me you’re hope," Cassius gently moved his fingers to tuck the hair behind her ears, "To each other we could sometimes turn into friends, enemies when we banters, solace for each other when we suffocate from life."

"A lover?" She whispered and he seemed to smile again.

"I promise to follow you everywhere, even if it is to hell. So yes," he whispered to her, "Lovers, even more than that."

"Is that why when I touch you I feel afraid?" Arabella whispered back to him. They were alone, away from people yet for some reason she couldn’t speak loudly, fearing as if the louder her voice was, that she would instead ruined this peaceful time.

"Afraid? Were you afraid?"

Cassius’s red eyes tried to read through her expression but he had learnt that just seeing wasn’t enough.

"Afraid," she confirmed. "I thought it was an emotion that Morpheus had altered in me but why would he ad a feeling of fright in my heart towards you when anger would have been more affective?"

"Then you mean that fear had always been inside your heart," he muttered and as if he was afraid of the answer, he then asked her again, "Was I a scary entity towards you? A stranger who you couldn’t bring yourself to trust?"

Placing a hand toward her chest, she looked down to the ground and back at him, "I am scared of you and at first I thought it’s because perhaps you have somehow hurt me. Perhaps that was why you hesitated so much to show me everything about you— because you feel guilty."

"But it’s not?" His eagerness made her smile.

"No. You are still scary," she leaned, craning her head upward until she reached her forehead to his chin, gently snuggling towards it. "But not because of what you could do. I fear you because you are just far too important to me. Now I realized that the fear I have always felt toward you wasn’t caused because I’m scared of you. It’s the opposite, it’s because I am scared of losing you. Yes. I’m scared that one touch of me could hurt you which is odd because you don’t feel weak at all."

"How odd," Cassius moved his fingers forward, gently curling his fingertips toward her red curls, slowly cupping the back of her head until he could lift her face upward and bent down until their lips brushed. "I dislike being seen as weak but why is it that your words makes me moved to tears?"

Arabella tried to reach her fingers toward his eyes, "You are crying?"

"Not if you kiss me."

Arabella broke into an unbridle smile at once. She didn’t hesitate. A part of her was embarrassed, shy even, but she managed to stand on her toes, lifting her chin upward until her lips pressed towards him.

Cassius took the gentle peck first before finally pressing his own lips, opening his mouth as if for a bite and licking her lips, prying them open.