Brand was even larger without any clothes on, every hard inch of him flexing and straining as he bent and then dried himself. Slowly.
Her mouth had actually watered, fangs itching to sink into any part of him. There was no way it hadn’t been on purpose,meant just for her, and she’d practically run out of the river when his head had fallen back and he’d?—
“Don’t you—” Brand cleared his throat. “Don’t you need undergarments?”
If she wasn’t completely breathless, Lunara might have laughed outright.
“Ah, uh… I don’t generally wear undergarments?” It came out as a question, but Lunara was fairly certain. “What can I say?” She shrugged. “I hate them.”
It’s possible he maybe, definitely, didn’t need to know that about you.
Brand said nothing. His throat worked as he stood there, still as a statue—rather gratifying, actually, to see him speechless when faced with the prospect of her naked body.
“Literally never?” he finally rasped.
She reveled in the way his eyes narrowed as he perused her from head to toe. “Do stockings count?”
“No,” he growled, and the sound sent a shiver racing down her spine.
“Then literally never.”
Brand let out a slow breath through pursed lips before he tugged and wrapped the drawstrings of her dress around and around each hand to pull her in. Awareness of him, of his size and heat, bloomed over every inch of Lunara’s skin the closer she got until—with a final, gentle yank—she was pressed against him. Her dress fell further apart, until it would take nothing more than a single, heaving breath for her to spill out and bare herself to him.
For a stand-still second of madness, she gave in and imagined a future that held everything she’d ever actually wanted, everything she wished for. Just a glimpse of what life could be like if things were different.
Stars, how she craved it.
No one had ever looked at her the way Brand did in that suspended moment. While they hovered there together, Lunara lost in the speckled depths of his eyes, it was so fucking easy toforget.
His fingers landed on her collar bone and crept down over the swell of one breast, dipping under the open seam of her bodice.
Oh, just do it. Just arch your back and?—
Brand pinched a wayward curl that had gotten stuck underneath, the ends tickling in exquisite ways as he drew it out.
“In all my long years,” he said, dragging the length across his open mouth down his bearded chin, “I don’t think I’ve ever seen anything quite so magnificent as these wild, untamed locks.”
“Oh.”
Stars above.
Not what she’d expected.
Brand tucked the strand away and laced his fingers with hers. Bringing them up to the hard plane of his chest, he left hers there to plaster his own at her lower back, her nape, hauling her more firmly against him.
His gaze dipped her lips, a muscle ticking in his jaw, and her sharp fingernails dug into his unyielding flesh in answer.
Blessed moons, he was going to kiss her. Ruin her. She would never be the?—
“Your Highness?” Hedda’s voice was like a punch to the gut. “Lunara?”
She jumped back, closing her dress with a thought as Brand whipped around and scrubbed a hand down his face.
Still wrapped in only a towel. Barely.
Sisters save her.
Seconds later, Hedda ambled into the clearing. “Forgive me. We were worried. It’s been quite a while.”
