Total pages in book: 140
Estimated words: 132625 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 663(@200wpm)___ 531(@250wpm)___ 442(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 132625 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 663(@200wpm)___ 531(@250wpm)___ 442(@300wpm)
He frowns. “What do you mean?”
“The sword? My utter failure to kill Erith? The way I’ve practically handed Mordeus the keys to my sister’s court?”
“None of that is your fault.”
I swallow. They keep saying that, but surely they can see as clearly as I can that my decisions got us here. “I’m going to fix it. Somehow.”
He strides across the room to the chaise in the corner, where he unbuckles his bandolier of knives and drapes them over the back of the chair.
“What are you doing?”
He shucks off his boots and tucks them neatly by the wall. “I’m sleeping here. You don’t have to share your bed, but I’m staying close.”
He peels off his shirt and folds it, and I try not to stare at all that beautiful tan skin, but my eyes seem to have a mind of their own. I remember the warmth of that skin. How it felt under my hands.
“We’ve shared a bed before,” I tell him. “I know you can’t remember.”
He catches me staring and returns to my side. “I might not have access to the memory, but I wrote about it in my journal.” He skims his thumb over my bottom lip. “How it felt to touch you, to hold you. Then you left me. You believed the worst and left me.”
I draw in a ragged breath. “I was hurt and scared.”
“I should be the one you run to when you’re hurt and scared. Not the one you flee.”
I want to kiss him so badly, but even though the ring no longer endangers him, I don’t know if I should. I don’t know if I have any right to his kisses—not when I’ll be gone so soon and when he’s to marry someone else. His queen.
Instead, I lift my hand to his bare chest and press my palm against the comforting rhythm of his beating heart. “I feel well. You don’t need to worry that I’ll fall sick again in the night.”
His full lips twist into a smirk. “You think that’s why I don’t want to leave your side?” With a single step back, he drags his gaze over me, from my head all the way down to my bare toes.
I’m acutely aware of the thin material of my sleeping gown, of the way he could see nearly everything if the light hit me right.
His ice-blue eyes darken. He takes a lock of my loose hair, sliding it between two fingers. “I just got you back. Nothing short of an act of the gods is going to tear me from your side tonight.” His throat bobs. “Unless you don’t want me here.”
I lift my hand to his wrist and lean into his touch. “I want you here.”
“I was so afraid I’d never see you again.” He searches my face. “I was afraid I’d never be able to tell you how I feel.”
I press my fingers to his lips and shake my head. “Don’t. Don’t say it now. Not until there’s . . . a reason.”
He snaps his teeth playfully, nipping at my fingertips. “I have more reasons than I can count.” He bends, trailing soft, toe-curling kisses down the side of my neck. “Let me say it,” he murmurs in my ear. “I need to tell you.”
Suddenly my eyes burn. “Why bother with words that promise a future we can’t have?”
“You don’t know that. We are going to find a way to reclaim the life you traded.”
“Kendrick.” I hold his face in my hands, relishing the feel of his short beard beneath my fingertips. “Even if we do, you are going to be the next Eloran king. You will spend your life with the next Eloran queen. Save your pretty words for her.”
Something flashes in his eyes. “Don’t do that.”
“Do what?”
“Don’t cheapen this by pretending I can pass it off to the next person. I feel what I feel for you. No one else.”
I shrug and step away, but he grabs my wrist and tugs me back. When he crashes his mouth down on mine and plunges his hands in my hair, I’m right there with him, angling my mouth under his, pushing onto my toes to get closer, as close as I can.
He smells like the clear night sky, like the night he took me in his arms and flew me to safety, and he tastes like wine. I part my lips and skim my tongue against his bottom lip, relishing the groan that vibrates in his chest. His hand drops to my waist, squeezing and pulling me closer.
As he deepens the kiss, I let myself remember our night together in Ironmoore, the way his lips felt on my heated skin, the pleasure of his hand between my legs. How desperately I wanted his mouth on mine. I want to re-create the kiss we couldn’t have that night, but this kiss can’t be the same. This is so much more because so much has changed. Because even if he doesn’t want to admit it, we’re running out of time. This kiss is a promise, an oath that he will keep me here by sheer will alone.