Then his hand moved to rest on my hip.
I froze, and he jerked away as if he’d touched a hot burner.
“Apologies—”
“No!” I fumbled for his wrist and guided his hand back into place. “It’s just new.”
After a moment, his thumb moved slightly, a barely there caress that sent a shiver up my spine.
Near my ear, his heart thundered. On a spurt of courage, I let my fingers skate up to the golden hair spread across his pillow.
“May I braid this sometime? I mean, if you don’t mind.”
Fire ignited in his eyes, a banked forge roaring to life. I didn’t understand it, but it made my breath flutter and my lower belly feel tight and warm.
“Anything. Everything. All I am, all I have, is yours.”
“You mean it?” My eyebrows shot up.
“Test me. Do something.”
The permission unlocked something reckless inside me. I tilted my head slightly, my gaze tracing the line of his throat, the sharp angle of his jaw, and the delicate dip between his collarbones. It was such a small thing, that little hollow, but it drew me in, like a secret only I could see. Slowly, giving him time to retreat, I pressed my lips there, and salt and heat burst across my tongue. He made a sound deep in his throat, his hand tightening on my hip.
“Seri. That’s…”
“Too much?” I worried.
His laugh came out strangled.
“Not enough.”
Before I lost my courage, I traced the shell of his ear with my fingertips, and he went still, so still I thought he might never move again. As I was marveling at what my featherlight touches could do to him, his head came closer until his lips hovered above mine.
“Slowly,” he murmured, although I wasn’t certain which of us he was telling.
The first brush of his mouth against mine stole the oxygen from my lungs. Not a kiss, but the ghost of one. His exhale trembled against my chin as he slanted his head, and his second pass was firmer. Warmth bloomed behind my breastbone, spreading outward until even my toes tingled. I forgot to breathe. Forgot everything except the velvet slide of his lips and the way my pulse thrummed in time with his.
When he pulled back, his eyes glittered like a galaxy of stars.
“Still with me, my love?”
I nodded, dazed. My fingertips drifted to my tingling mouth. Kissing Zane’s forehead during the shampoo adventure had been like patting a friendly dog compared to thismagicthat turned my bones to honey and my thoughts to dust.
He caught my hand and held it over the frantic rhythm beneath his ribs.
“I want to devour you,” he said hoarsely, “but I want to shelter you, too. I want to protect your innocence as much as I want to take it.”
“But I don’t want to be protected from you,” I blurted, the words tumbling out before I could stop them. “I want you to be mine. All three of you. And I don’t want anyone else to have you.”
The moment the words left my mouth, I wanted to crawl under the blanket and never come out. But he didn’t tease me or pull away. Instead, he chuckled softly, and his thumb stroked over the back of my knuckles.
“You don’t have to worry about that,” he murmured. “We waited for you. There’s no one else. There never was.”
My chest swelled with something I couldn’t quite name. Relief, maybe, or something deeper, something that made my heart ache in the best way. I burrowed into him, breathing in his moonflower scent.
“That was my first kiss, Simmy,” I whispered as I closed my eyes.
“Same, my love. Now go back to sleep. It’s too early to be awake, and we have a big day tomorrow.”
