Townsfolk laughed, chatted, and danced circles around me, some accidentally bumping into my shoulders from my lack of attention. Nerves bubbled in my stomach, and I rubbed the tip of my ear, pulling some of my hair over it.
“Sylvie,” Jack said, but he sounded far away. A hand delicately wrapped around mine and guided it away from my ear, leaving it exposed.
There was a flash of Jack’s face, the same devious grin dancing on his lips, but Finneas’s giant minotaur head soon blocked my view. Gasping, I shimmied past Finneas, ignoring his grumbles and mutterings of what was wrong with me. But Jack had already disappeared again. Was this his magic? Was he evenhere?
It had become an ethereal game of jacks, andIwas the bouncing ball.
Jack’s mocking chuckles echoed off the walls, and I stood still in the middle of the dance floor, frustration cinching my spine. “Are you looking for me, faerie? Got worried I stood you up, did you?”
Glaring into the void, I forced my wings to settle, only flapping languidly now. “Don’t flatter yourself.”
A male basilisk in a dark blue tuxedo, dancing with a female demon, gawked at me warily, a film flashing over his large, black orb-like eyes.
“Not you.” Wincing, I lifted my hands. “Not to say you shouldn’t be flattered by?—”
Chilled lips pressed to the shell of my ear, scents of fresh snow and vanilla sending a furious blizzard swirling through my stomach. “How sweet,” Jack said, his voice a low rumble that enticed a tightening in the depths of my core.
Chelsea’s words about his true desires for a queen and my own determination to get the truth out of him catapulted me into whirling around to face him. I opened my mouth to speak, to yell, to demand answers, pushing away from him. Jack’s hand snatched my wrist and pulled me toward him, my chest colliding against his ribs.
His actions were so brazen and abrupt that the words got lost in my throat. “What are you—” The mask Jack wore took my breath away. Not only was it entirely carved from ice, but it emerged from his skin likebone. It was a form of macabre beauty I never knew I could appreciate so fondly.
“I’ve come to realize that I’ve been going about this entirely the wrong way.” Jack rolled his shoulders, drawing my attention to the satin shoulder pieces flaring from his jacket, the snowy white lapels with glittering silver filigree.
I wanted to run my fingers over the embroidery and even went so far as to lift my hand, but curled it away. “Oh?”
“Mmhm,” Jack responded in a gravelly growl. “I believe my approach in persuading you needs to be a bit more—” Jack leaned forward, his bottom lip ever so slightly brushing the tip of my ear. “—tactile.”
A pulse between my legs had me clenching my thighs together, his feathered touch on the point of my ear more sensual than I could’ve imagined. “What does that?—”
Jack pulled me tighter against him, one hand trailing to my lower back, the other slipping into mine in an invitation to dance.
There were two sides to me now—the one that wished to throw all caution to the wind and give in to this, and the other that warned to seek out his intentions first. “If you think man-handling me is going to coerce me one way or the other, Jack, you’ve got another thing coming.”
Jack trailed a finger up my back, sending delicious chilled magic through my skin with each vertebra he passed. “You haven’tbegunto feel the way I could handle you, Sylvie. What’s your name, anyway? I imagine that’s short for something?”
We slowly began to dance around the sea of townsfolk, a wintry waltz now playing over the speakers—a mix of violin, sleigh bells, and fantasy.
“Is it really that important to you?” I couldn’t help roaming Jack’s face, the chiseled bone structure, the well-kept beard—he was just so unbelievably handsome.
“Ah,” he responded, moving his hand across my back, a knuckle grazing the bottom of one wing.
The brief touch made my breath catch in my throat, and I tensed—not because it hurt or because I didn’t welcome it, but because it feltnice.
Jack’s brow bobbed at my reaction as if he was storing that for later. “You feel like revealing such a secretive thing as your real name will put you at a disadvantage, I see.” Jack picked up the tempo, flawlessly cascading us around the space without brushing another couple. “Let me take away that burden for you, then. My name is Jakzair.”
His reveal had my mind humming, and a small smile edged my lips. “Just Jakzair? Not Jakzair Frost?”
Jack teased the callused tip of his middle finger against my palm and pressed his cheek to mine, his lips hovering by my ear. “Just Jakzair. Just Jack.”
Without thinking, I nuzzled against him. “Sylvaria,” I whispered.
Jack’s grip tightened at my back, and a low growl bubbled in the back of his throat. “Did you happen to notice I designed this dress to accommodate your wings?”
Suddenly beginning to enjoy this game we were playing, I fluttered those same wings and leaned back to catch his gaze. “How thoughtful. Was it not also to have easier access tootherparts of me?”
Jack’s smile turned wicked, and he dipped a finger into the seam of my dress, his skin grazing my ass beneath the fabric. “Guilty. And you look—” Jack chewed on his bottom lip, his eyes scanning the bodice, the full tulle skirt, and the magic I’d sprinkled onto the fabric. “—like winter’s radiance.”
It was like a fairytale—the setting, the music, everyone dressed to the nines with masks, and the laughter surrounding us. As magical as we both were, though, the reality of it was anything but fantastical. Forcibly dragging myself from the cloud I’d been floating on, I moved one of my hands to Jack’s shoulder, the other curling under his chin.
