“I understand.”
He gave her a weak smile. “I know you do.”
“What’s the plan, then? I know you have one.”
Augustus spent the next few minutes telling her how he intended to return theEntiato the fleet currently docked in Warian Bay. In the meantime, he’d already sent a special request to a man named Taran Phya for a new build.
“Komera?” Selene asked once he’d revealed their future ship’s name. “For the Goddess of Battle? Are we going to war?”
“No.” His eyes twinkled. “Well, I don’t anticipate any.”
She laughed. “Sure you don’t.”
Augustus stretched over their legs and took her hands. He pulled her across the space to straddle his lap, holding tight to her hips. His nose circled hers. “I want our life to be what you imagine it to be. Nothing more, nothing less.”
She cupped his bristly chin. “What about what you want?”
He pulled her closer. “I only want you. I onlyneedyou.”
“I only need you, too, but lately… It feels like you’re somewhere I can’t reach. What has you so afraid? What dark things are seeping into your dreams every night?”
His fingers dug deep into her hips, almost to the point of pain, and his eyelids squeezed shut. “Selene,please.”
Selene’s heart broke all over again. She understood the loss of a mother to a violent end, but, unlike her, he’d witnessed Cassia’s death. That was a level of understanding beyond hers.
She ran her fingertips over the deep grooves etched into his face, soft strokes to erase the grief written there. One touch at a time, coaxing him back from wherever he had gone, until his lashes raised and his gaze locked with hers.
He looked like a man lost at sea who’d found the stars again. His mouth parted, then closed. When he finally spoke, it was reverent. A whisper to the gods. “I psychi mou.”
Selene cracked wide open. He’d begun using this term of endearment long before she knew what it meant. Before she realized the gravity of it.
My soul.
Notmy love. Notmy heart. As if saying her name wasn’t enough, he named her after the part of himself he couldn’t live without.
Selene swept her lips across his, a slow, sensual tease before guiding her tongue into his mouth. Hints of buttery caramel burst on her tongue—his favorite whiskey—and his skin radiated the salt of the sea and the heat of the sun. Familiar after all these months, but somehow richer with the ship’s rock beneath them and the gentle lap of water against the hull.
Augustus’s hands crept beneath her skirts with quiet purpose, skimming up her thighs, knowing the way by heart. He found her bare and aching, and the groan he pulled from her was feral.
He grinned against her mouth. “Have I mentioned my appreciation for the local garb?”
She chuckled. “A time or two.”
His fingers slid inside, slow, sure, curling just right. Selene arched toward him, breath caught as his gaze traced every flicker of pleasure crossing her face. No words passed his lips. They didn’t have to. His touch said it all.
She washis.
Now, all she needed washim. “Augustus, I need you inside me.”
His brows kicked up. “Is that right?”
His fingers left her core and circled the nerves at her apex. The pressure teased, withholding her orgasm.
“You bastard,” she rasped.
He pushed her hair aside and nuzzled into her neck. Hot breath washed across her skin. “I don’t think you’re ready.”
Selene opened her mouth to protest, but his tongue licked up the shell of her ear, and she moaned.
