“Thing is,” Thorne added, voice thick with emotion. “Alaric wasn’t the one who failed the kingdom that day. It was me. Hathor, for all her wisdom, had punished the wrong royal. Had I been here, things may have been different. Once I realized what had happened, I swore to remain at Alaric’s side until he was whole again.”
“That’s why you basically enslaved yourself to him.”
“It was my fault. If I had been here...”
I clenched my fists in my lap. “You forget I’ve seen what The Dark One can do. He’s a plague of locust infiltrating every crack and corner. It’s unlikely you could have done anything to defeat him once he was inside.” And from what Alaric said, some traitor had basically given the invading monsters the keys to the kingdom.
“Guess we’ll never know,” Thorne said, tone despondent.
I’d never seen him like this. With his confident swagger tossed aside, arrogance scattered like ash. Fractured. Vulnerable.
Something inside me clenched hard. The flame he’d given me writhed beneath my breastbone, pressing outward until it hurt to breathe. The distance between us became intolerable.
Before I could second-guess it, I slid from the bed and dropped to my knees before him. My palms found his thighs, solid, warm, trembling with the tension coiled in him.
“Tell me something. If given the chance, would you have laid down your life for your kingdom? For your brother?”
“A million times. Yes.” The word bled from him like a confession, drowning in a pool of regret so deep I thought it might drag him under.
I sank my fingers into his thighs, forcing his stormy blue gaze to connect with mine. “Listen here, Thorne Blackwing, and listen good. Fate had other plans for you. You were not meant to die with the others that night. Besides, who would have looked after Alaric if you had?”
Who would have looked after Speck? If my life had been different.
I’d failed him so many times. Yet even through the guilt, a fragile hope stirred—that somehow, together, Thorne and I might still find a way to save the ones we loved.
It couldn’t be a coincidence that the goddess brought us here to this place. At this time. Just as The Dark One resurfaced. But in that moment, none of it mattered.
All I saw was him.
My chest ached, my mind catching on the truth neither of us dared speak. We were both drowning, and the only way to stay afloat was to cling to each other.
I let my forehead dip against his, my voice a hushed plea. “What if we stopped fighting ghosts? Just for tonight. No past. No future. Only this.”
His breath hitched, hot against my lips. Slowly, dangerously, one brow arched, though the shadows in his eyes didn’t vanish. “And what,” he murmured, voice rough, “do you propose?”
Chapter Twenty-Six
THORNE
The saucy smirkthat twisted Sera’s full lips quickened my pulse, burning away the ache of ghosts and guilt until nothing remained but her. Pain-filled thoughts sank beneath a haze of need. Her slim fingers skimmed up my thighs to my belt. In little time, she had me unbuckled, my pants unfastened. My breath caught as her heated palm encompassed my throbbing length.
She nibbled her full bottom lip, eyes gleaming with mischief and hunger. “I want to taste you.”
Surely, I was dreaming. “I am all yours, Princess.” The words came easy, but the truth behind them went deep, touching an empty place inside me I hadn’t known still existed.
Her hot tongue slid up my length from base to shaft, and a low groan escaped my throat. I raked trembling fingers through the curls spilling over her shoulders, desperate to see her face while she worked her magic. When she took me deeper, my head dropped back, every wall I’d built threatening to splinter.
“Flames save me, you are divine,” I groaned.
Serafina hummed against me, her wicked mouth coaxingnoises I hadn’t made in years. She wasn’t rushing to finish, wasn’t detached like many lovers of the past. She reveled in me. Worshipped me as though she wanted this as much as I did. As if I were worthy.
With Sera, it wasn’t a conquest. It was a surrender. And, gods help me, surrender had never tasted so sweet.
All too soon, I was out of control and on the verge. It was embarrassing how quickly I was ready to explode.
“Come here, Princess.” I cupped the back of her neck, and she released me with a long, slow glide before peering up at me.
“Something wrong?”
