Before Lex could ask what the ladies did in their free time, because it had to be interesting, Garrin walked in.
Lex’s jaw dropped.Holy hell.
Garrin had showered and shaved, the tips of his hair still wet. The thick stubble, which had grown thicker as they traveled, was gone, and his hollowed cheeks were no longer sunken with circles under his bright blue eyes. He’d clearly eaten, probably the same food Lex mindlessly wolfed down during her bath. Or maybe Zirel had healed him more now that Zirel’s powers were fully returned?
Garrin wore a navy-like uniform, with gold-embroidered sleeves and collar that fit his tall, muscular frame to perfection. He looked fit and healthier than he had mere hours ago, and he was mesmerizing.
No wonder these women wanted to jump him.
Lex pressed her hand to her belly to stop it from quaking and straightened her spine.He’s just a man. Just a really freaking beautiful man.
How could she fault the women for wanting Garrin?Shewanted him, and she didn’t really want him. Lex would never live to be at Garrin’s beck and call.
But damn, she saw the appeal.
17
“Greetings,” Garrin said to the room, his gaze landing on Lex. Heat filled his eyes, and Lex’s breath froze in her chest.
He was really good at the fake fiancé thing. Those eyes were giving her an excellent idea of what it would be like to be desired by Garrin Branimir. And she was not immune. Combine that with her confused feelings when it came to him after their travels, and her face heated.
Garrin crossed the room and lifted Lex’s hand, his warm fingers sliding to the tips of hers. He placed a light kiss on her knuckles. “Hello.”
“Hi.”Smooth.She gave herself a mental head shake. “You cleaned up nice.”
“As did you.” His gaze skimmed her body.
Shivers raced down her spine and her belly wobbled. With food in her stomach and a warm room, her body was no longer in fight-or-flight mode and had time for less convenient reactions, like attraction. “So, futurehusband, what now?” she said quietly, though she wouldn’t doubt others had heard.
Garrin was her fake fiancé, as well as boyfriend to some thirty women. And that seemed about right when it came to her luck with men. A handsome man finally looked at her, and he didn’t have a secret girlfriend—he haddozens.
“Has my court treated you well?”
“Don’t I look well?”
He scanned her body in another heated stroke, and her mind scattered to the four corners of the universe. “Indeed, you do.”
She cleared her throat and said quietly, “Is there someplace we can talk that doesn’t contain a roomful of women waiting to jump your bones?”
Garrin chuckled, the sound like pure seduction, damn him. He placed a hand on the small of her back and escorted her out of the communal dressing room and down a corridor of what appeared to be bedrooms. He stopped at the last door and gestured for her to enter.
This room wasn’t as large as the others she’d been in, including Garrin’s dressing room, but it was huge in Earth terms, with kelly-green wainscoting, tall glass windows looking out onto the snow and ice landscape, and a two-story ceiling decorated in ornately painted murals of entwined lovers.
Lex glanced at the lovers, and her face heated. Fae were not modest by any stretch of the imagination. “How did you build this place in what equates to the Arctic?”
Garrin looked around. “This was built long before the land became permanent winter. Believe it or not, we used to have seasons, with allon trees as abundant in Dark Kingdom as they are everywhere in Tirnan. I never saw it, personally. It has been winter since before I was born.”
Garrin crossed the room and sat in a settee. He tugged his pants and crossed his leg over his knee. “Come,” he said. “What did you wish to discuss? Surely not the décor of Dark Kingdom castle.”
Lex walked over and, as gracefully as she could for someone used to wearing jeans and sweatshirts, sat beside him in her pretty dress. Though maybe she should have rethought the close proximity.
He smelled good. Better than he already had during their travels. And the attraction that made her stomach drop and spin was stronger now that she was inches from his large body.
Garrin’s gaze stroked her face, his eyes snagging on her lips—and there went the flutters in her belly.
Lex cleared her throat. “What are we going to do?”
His gaze slowly rose from her lips and settled on her eyes.
