With mischief curling at the corners of her mouth, she lifted the sheet and admired his body. He was long, large, and thick in all the right places. He stirred. Then stilled.
A slow smirk tugged at his lips before his eyes even opened. “Do you see something you like,” he murmured, voice graveled-deep and rough with sleep, “Or, something you want again?”
She leaned forward and pressed a feather-light kiss to the center of his chest, just over his heart. Thaelyn grinned, looking up at him, her hair spilling over his chest. “I’m still trying to decide,” she whispered.
“Mmm.” He cracked one eye open, the scar at the corner twitching as he looked at her. “Need a closer inspection?”
She arched a brow. “Maybe. Though last night gave me a pretty thorough overview.”
“I can offer a refresher,” he said, reaching up to cup her hips and draw her against him beneath the sheets. The sudden press of him, hard, warm, and very much awake, made her breath hitch.
“You are insatiable,” she said, biting her lip as he leaned in.
“And you, Thae, are my little terror. You are going to make us late to flight drills if you don’t stop looking at me like that,” he growled against her neck.
She laughed, threading her fingers into his hair as she kissed him slowly and deeply.
When they finally pulled apart, breathless and flushed, sherested her forehead against his. “Let’s be late.” She said with a devious smile
He groaned, “You truly are a wicked, my wicked little terror. Don’t tempt me, Stormborn. I’d like to keep you in this bed and never leave.”
Thaelyn rolled her eyes and pushed herself up. “As much as I’m enjoying this, I need to change before drills. And if you keep staring at me like that, I’m never going to make it out of this bed.”
Thorne gave her one final, shameless once-over as she stood and reached for her scattered clothes. “Can’t help it,” he said. “You’re kind of breathtaking when you’re just mine.”
She paused, turning back to him as the words settled between them. No teasing in his expression now. No smirk. Just the truth.
“You are a menace.” She walked back to the bed and kissed him, softly this time. Slow. And then whispered, “But, you are my menace, every single inch of you.” She smirked and walked off towards the bathing chamber.
By the time Thaelyn reached the upper floor of the female cadet wing, her legs ached like she’d run every length of the Scorchfield twice. The stone steps groaned beneath her boots, but it wasn’t exhaustion that slowed her stride. It was him.
Her body still hummed with fire, as if Thorne’s hands lingered at her waist and his lips still claimed hers in the hush of morning shadows. Her hair hung loose, and her lips remained swollen, kiss-bruised, tingling with the memory of a hunger that had begun as a spark and risen into a storm.
She shoved the door open, trying not to look like she’d just wandered out of some moonlit fever dream.
Inside, the dorm was warm with the scent of lavender soap and steel. Iri sat cross-legged on her bed, humming tunelessly as she polished her throwing knives with unnerving affection. She looked up the moment the door creaked and smirked.
“Well, well, well.” Iri set the blade down with theatrical reverence. “Look who returns from her secret tryst with the Prince of Smolder.”
Thaelyn rolled her eyes and kicked off her boots, aiming for casual. “You’re impossible.”
“That’s not a denial,” Iri pointed out, springing to her feet with predator’s grace. “You’ve got ‘he laid siege to me against a bed’hair. That hair’s seen combat, sister.”
From the other side of the room, Feyra looked up from where she lounged upside down on her bunk, legs propped up against the wall like a lazy cat. “You were gone all night.”
“Was I?” Thaelyn muttered. “I didn’t notice.”
“Yes, now give us some details,” Feyra replied, arching a golden brow. That’s not ‘I hung out and talked hair, that’s someone tangled it withintenthair.”
“Insufferable,” Thaelyn groaned, dragging a hand over her flushed face as she collapsed onto her bed. Her pillow swallowed the sound of her voice. “I hate both of you.”
“No, you don’t,” Iri said sweetly, crawling across the floor like a shark scenting blood. “Come sit, and tell us the juicy details. Did he finally admit his undying love? Or just pin you to the bed and ravish you all night long?”
Thaelyn lifted her head just far enough to glare. “You read too many romance scrolls.”
Feyra twirled a lock of her hair around one finger, her grin feline. “She’s avoiding. That means it wasgood.”
Iri gasped in mock offense. “He didn’travishyou against the training dummies, did he? Because I am never touching one again.”
