Ember
The cold wakes me before anything else. Not the biting, immediate cold that forces you upright. This is worse, a slow seep through layers of exhausted sleep, creeping into my bones like water through stone. My body tries to pull me back under, desperate for real rest I haven’t had in days. But consciousness wins, dragging me up through layers of dreams about fire and falling.
Bioluminescent veins pulse in the cavern wall. Blue-green light that barely qualifies as light at all, but enough to see by once my eyes adjust. The rhythmic glow reminds me of a heartbeat. Like the mountain itself is breathing around us.
I’m warm where it counts, though. Cocooned and secure. Wrapped in something solid and steady that I don’t immediately recognize.
Then I do.
Luke.
I’ve shifted in sleep; I’m no longer lying with my back to him. I’m curled into his chest, my cheek resting against the rough fabric of his vest. His arms circle me; one around my shoulders, the other draped across my waist. His chin rests against the top of my head.
We fit together like puzzle pieces.
Except my hand has found its way beneath his shirt.
I don’t know when it happened. At some point, my fingers must have slipped under the hem where it’s come untucked from his pants. Now my palm rests against the bare skin of his ribs, feeling the steady expansion of his breathing. The warmth is startling after hours of cold. Electric. His skin smooth over hard muscle that shifts with each inhale.
My God, he’s so damned… taut.
As if sinew and muscle have been pulled over a frame of high-tensile steel. Then wrapped in warm silk.
I should move. Pull my hand away. Pretend I didn’t notice.
Instead, I lie perfectly still, fighting the urge to let my fingertips explore further.
His heart drums beneath my ear; steady and sure, like everything else about him. Our breathing has synced without my realizing it. His exhale. My inhale. The space between us nonexistent.
I’m aware of him in ways I shouldn’t be. The weight of his strong arms around my body. The scent of him; smoke and metal and something darker I can’t name but would recognize anywhere.
My fingers move without permission.
Just a fraction. Tracing the line of muscle beneath my palm. His ribs. The plane of his stomach. My thumb draws little circles as I absorb his texture. He’s all hard edges and controlled strength, even in sleep.
Heat spreads through my chest. Lower. Pooling between my thighs.
I shift—barely—trying to ease the sudden restlessness building in my limbs.
That’s when I feel it.
His body’s reaction. His cock, hard against my hip where we’re pressed together, impossible to miss.
Holy shit!
My heart slams into overdrive.
Part of me wants to freeze. Pretend it isn’t happening. Another part—the part that’s been monitoring every detail of how he feels wrapped around me—wants to see what happens if I don’t move at all. If I just lie here pressed against him with my hand on his smooth, warm skin.
Heat floods my face. Builds lower.
What the hell is wrong with me?
He’s centuries older. Mature. Worldly. And so freaking hot. Out of my league in every way that matters. And I’m lying here in the dark, acting like some inexperienced girl who doesn’t know better.
Because you are,my brain supplies helpfully.Inexperienced and foolish.
But my body doesn’t care about logic right now. It only cares about the fact that his hand is splayed across my waist, thumb resting against my ribs. That his breath stirs my hair with each exhale. That every inch of him is pressed against every inch of me, and it feels—
