On impulse, she reached up to touch his scars. “I want that too.”
His voice lowered as he moved his lips to brush hers. “I want to take youhere, as well.”
A spark jumped between them. Night was falling, and they were alone, but the remembrance garden was hardly what she’d consider private.
“Not here,” she whispered urgently against his lips. “A servant could walk through at any moment.”
His lips grew insistent against hers. “I promised you I’d finish what we started in your bedroom. I mean to fulfill that vow.”
Already breathless and feeling his same urgency, Bryn glanced over her shoulder at the weeping evergreens on the far side of the garden. Once, she’d hidden in those boughs to spy on Rangar and Valenden when she thought they’d meant to start a war.
“I know a place,” she whispered with a wink and, taking his hand, tugged him away from the headstone and toward the deep, dusky shadows.
Chapter 2
LOVE IN THE GARDEN . . . a black cat . . . only two brothers left . . . a golden ring . . . time to go home
Rangar took her hard and hot beneath the evergreen boughs.
Running her hands over his broad shoulders with her head tipped back against the cool grass, Bryn couldn’t believe they were here—together. For so long, fate had toyed with them: crashing their lives together with the wolf attack, then hurling them apart for a decade, only to have them collide again and be thrust apart once more like two birds floating in a storm. Her fingers curled into his shirt, determined not to let him go this time.
Both of their breaths were fast as they coupled in the shadows, knowing it was risky to do so outside of the privacy of a bedroom. But Bryn liked having Rangar bed her beneath the bare moonlight with the garden smells around them. Here, she felt connected to the earth. To Rangar. To her own hopes and dreams.
“I thought I loved you when you were a princess,” Rangar murmured as he pressed his palm against her hip to adjust the angle, “I had no idea how much I’d want you as a queen.”
“Not a queen . . . not yet.” Bryn’s lips parted as an aching pressure built between her legs. She rocked to meet his final thrusts as he braced his hand in the grass and finished inside her.
Pleasure crested over them before surrendering into a sweet calm, leaving them panting visible breaths into the cool night air. After a moment, Rangar rolled off her and buttoned his pants. Bryn adjusted her skirt and started to button her blouse, but he stopped her hand. Slipping his rough palm against her bare ribs, he ran his hand along her scars.
“You don’t mind that the scars leave me imperfect?” she asked.
His hand pressed flat against her ribs. “The scars are my favorite thing about your body. They are a badge of your curiosity. Your strength. Even at a young age, you dared to tread where no one else would.”
“Except you,” she pointed out softly.
His hand moved up her skin until his thumb grazed the bottom of her breast. “That night, when I saw your lantern at the edge of the forest, something called to me. I knew I had to follow you.” He moved his hand to cup her cheek. “Do you believe in fate now?”
He looked more handsome than ever in the blue shadows of the moon. She tenderly ran her thumb along his own scars. “I don’t know about fate, but I believe in you, Rangar Barendur.”
He claimed her mouth in a softer kiss, but they were interrupted when a door creaked open on the far side of the garden. Going still, they both listened. But it was only a maid letting out a cat, and the door soon shut again.
Bryn sat up, finally closing the buttons on her blouse. She looked at the night sky beyond the evergreen boughs and let out a small sigh.
Rangar plucked stray pieces of grass out of her hair. “Will you miss this place?”
“Parts of it,” she admitted.
He matched her gaze up at the stars. “It’s the same night sky in the Mirien as in the Baersladen. The moon and stars don’t change. We can’t take Castle Mir’s tapestries with us, but we can take the sky.”
She settled against his chest, and he stroked a hand down her arm. Tipping up her chin toward him, she asked, “Is there any more news of your father’s condition?”
Pain flashed briefly in his eyes, but then his expression hardened—always a soldier, never wanting to appear vulnerable, even to her. “No more letters have come in the past few days.”
She sensed the worry in his voice. For all he acted like emotions didn’t get to him, she knew how much he loved his father and the extent of his concern.
“He might yet recover,” she said softly.
His jaw tensed. “My aunt wouldn’t have summoned us back if recovery was likely. My father is dying, and it does no good to pretend otherwise. It’s going to leave the Baersladen vulnerable. I must track down Broderick and prove he is Trei’s murderer before my father passes. Otherwise, the Bear crown will be in uncertain hands.”
