Teddy stared at her for a long moment, trying to master the strange jealousy swirling in his chest.
The corner of Stella’s lips quirked into a smug smile. “Don’t be jealous,Your Grace. Rosie has bad dreams, and she often sleeps in my bed. She kicks something vicious.”
He wanted to offer a clever comeback, but she slipped into the hall before he could counter. He followed a moment later to bathe in the washroom at the other end of the hall. He took his time to scrub the grime from his skin and clean beneath his nails in the hopes that, by the time he came back from such a thorough bath, she would already be asleep in bed.
He dried himself, changed into linen pajamas, and padded back down the hall to their room. Stella was not asleep in bed. She was still bathing.
She stepped into their room a moment later. Her skin was flushed from the heat of the bath and her wet hair dripped onto the silk, plastering it to her breasts. Teddy had been trying to forget how much of her skin he’d seen when they were bathing at the temple, but it all rushed back to him.
Stella stretched her arms up and pushed her wet hair behind her shoulders. Her nipples strained against the delicate blue silk.
She caught him looking and smirked as he snapped his gaze away. “Are you well, Theodore? You look a bit flushed.” The pleasant, teasing edge to her voice sent a surge of heat through his blood.
“Never better.” He gestured to the bed that was pushed against the wall. “Do you want the inside or outside?”
She glanced at the bed. “Outside. I don’t need you pinning me in.”
His mind filled with an unwanted vision of caging her beneath his body. He climbed into the bed, trying to shake that daydream from his head.
Stella crawled in after him and snuffed out the candle on the bedside table. She nestled under the covers.
Teddy was certain she wasn’t trying to be so close. There just wasn’t much space in the single bed.
The bond was like another entity tucked between them. Teddy waged a private war with the desire to hook an arm around her waist and tug her against his body. Her hair was pinned up on top of her head to keep it out of her face, but the soft vanilla scent of whatever she’d put in it smelled so good that he still wanted to breathe her in all night.
He was relieved at least that she was facing away from him so that he wouldn’t constantly have to drag his gaze away from the wet silk stuck to her breasts. The pale curve of her neck looked soft and inviting—the skin begging to be kissed.
“Why do you always smell like wildflowers?” he whispered.
“It’s a family spell. I smell like the day I was born in late spring. My mother bound the scent of the season to me. Why? Does it bother you? It smells the strongest at pulse points.”
Gods, hearing that made him want to bury his face in her neck. His cock twitched.
“No, it doesn’t bother me.” He sounded pained and not at all believable.
She was quiet for so long that he thought she’d fallen asleep, but then she spoke again. “I think it bothers Arden. He keeps buying me perfumes and commenting when I don’t wear them.”
“But you don’t like them?” Teddy asked.
She sighed. “They are such lovely gifts, and they all smell nice, but it feels like I’m wearing something made for someone else.”
“They don’t feel like you,” Teddy said.
She glanced at him over her shoulder. “Exactly. See. You get it. When I told him that, I think he was insulted.”
Teddy wanted to punch Arden Teripin in the face. What was she even doing with the Olney prince when he clearly didn’t appreciate her? Arden bought her perfume and flowers she didn’t like and he hadn’t even noticed.
Teddy sighed. Just likehehadn’t noticed that Grace was unhappy. He didn’t have room to judge.
In the dark, the rest of Teddy’s senses were sharper and Stella overwhelmed every one of them—the sound of her breathing growing more shallow and steady, the salt air and wildflower smell of her skin, the warmth of her body that was not quite touching him.
He sighed and stared past her at the wall on the other side of the room, waiting too long for sleep to claim him.
A warm tugin Teddy’s chest woke him from heavy slumber. He blinked his eyes open. Gray light poured in between the gap in the faded red curtains. It took him a moment to remember where he was. The Muddled Mind.
Stella was still asleep beside him, her ass pressed against his hard cock. Sometime during the night, he’d draped an arm over her side. His hand was tucked against her stomach.
She shifted and sighed, and his cock twitched as she rubbed against him.
