This, every ragged breath seems to say.This!every beat of my heart screams. At long last I have him. I feel him. And it is better than my imaginings. Every wave of bliss that crashes over me, leaving trembles in its wake, is better than the last.
As the passion builds in my body, I find myself trying to hold back. I’m not ready for it to be over. But Evander knows me, somehow, as well as I know myself. He knows just where to bite on my throat, just where to push, and pull, and pinch.
“Give yourself to me,” he commands, looming over me.
“Everything.” The word is little more than a gasp as pleasure crashes over me. It’s enough that my mind goes blank. That all doubt and fear is erased—if only for a few blissful seconds. But even as the rush fades, there’s still him there and I find I don’t want to push him away.
When he finally leaves my body, I expect him to dress without word. To act as if what we just did didn’t happen at all. Wetness drips between my thighs. I hope Conri never comes in this tent because I imagine our scent has soaked into the canvas. At the very least, Evander’s bedroll.
But, despite my expectations, Evander stretches out on the bedroll beside me. He lies slightly on his side; one arm beckons. The other reaches up toward me.
“May I hold you?” he asks. “Not for long…but I think we have time. I doubt Conri has even noticed your absence yet.”
“You want to hold me?” A slight smile curls my tired lips. All the muscles in my face, so recently twisted in pleasure, in thepain of keeping in my moans, relax. “I didn’t think this was that type of relationship?”
“If I am completely honest with you, Faelyn, the warmth of a woman next to me is more satisfaction than the act of having her,” Evander says. “But to answer you directly, yes, I want to hold you. I want to know a different kind of intimacy with you.”
After searching his face for any hint of deceit and finding none, I lie down next to him, shifting until I am settled within the crook of his arm. He is against my back—it seems to be the most natural position for us to fall into—and that thought causes me to wear a satisfied smirk as my eyes flutter closed, mind already filling with ideas for the next time. Evander is pure heat and it soothes my delightfully aching muscles. His left arm wraps around my waist, pulling me closer. My legs curl and tangle with his. I use his right arm like a pillow.
For being a man who threatened to break my heart an hour ago, he is nothing but sincerity and tenderness now.
Evander’s soft, steady breaths on the nape of my neck cause my own breathing to slow. And, in turn, my heart. All that muscle behind me is like a wall that is strong enough to block out and hold back the horrors of the world…if only for a little while.
A sigh escapes from me, taking with it my consciousness as I slip into an unintentional, but complete and dreamless slumber.
CHAPTER 24
I am joltedawake by a loud, sharp howl. Even though I am no lykin, I know something is wrong by the sound alone. And I suspect I can reason what it is since I am still naked, in Evander’s arms, and not in Conri’s tent where I am meant to be.
Evander is up in a blur, tugging on his trousers.
“How long was I asleep for?” I ask as I follow his lead and hastily pull on my clothes as well.
“I don’t know, I was asleep, too.” His worried expression only heightens my panic.
“You said it wouldn’t be long, that you would?—”
“Well you wore me out,” he snaps. Though there’s a flash of amusement in his eyes, briefly chasing away the agitation.
“The howl?”
“Conri.”
“Shit.” I situate my cape around me. I had been hoping my instinct and guess had been wrong. “What are we going to do?”
“I’m trying to think.” Evander rubs his temples.
Another howl. It rips through me like the night I met Aurora. The noise of a predator. Of warning.Run, it causes a voice in me to say. But there is nowhere to go.
“Mary,” I say, leaning toward the grass. Two marigolds bloom like eyes. “I need you, many of you. Perfume the air, then neutralize your aroma, make this place void of all other scents.”
A thousand tiny marigolds carpet the tent. I bury my fingers in the ground between the buds, pouring my magic into it. There’s the sharp aroma of flowers, followed by an atmospheric ethereal haze of almost too fresh air. It’ll do…I hope. It’ll have to.
“Thank you,” I say to my friend. “That’s all.”
The flowers disappear.
“What are?—”
