My mouth falls open. “It worked. It actually worked.”
He winks. “Did you doubt me?”
Crossing the fallen tree is another ordeal all its own. I’ve never had anxiety around bridges, but that was before one collapsed out from under me and I got to be keenly acquainted with the terrifying river that now rushes beneath my too-narrow walkway. Dominic doesn’t share my fears, even going so far as to walk backward across the tree so he can hold my hands and guide me along.
“You’re showing off,” I say, voice uneven.
“You aren’t giving yourself enough credit,” he says. “You’re walking across a half-rotted tree that we just knocked down and is admittedly only precariously positioned on the other bank. Anyone would find this challenging.”
“Anyone but you,” I mutter.
“Anyone but me.” Another wink.
Bastard. We’re defying death and he’s…flirting with me?
Once we reach the other side, I race for the first wide pine I see, collapsing to the ground beneath its shelter of boughs. “I am never doing that again.”
Dominic crouches before me, rubbing my shoulder while a devilish smirk curls his lips. “You did great.”
After a few steadying breaths, my nerves calm down, and he helps me rise to my feet. I meet his eyes, aware of how close we are. His hand remains on my shoulder while the other comes up to brush my cheek. Everything inside me yearns to lean into him, to claim his lips with mine, but logic sobers me. There’s something we haven’t talked about yet.
“When we find the others,” I say, “this ends, doesn’t it?”
His brows pull together. He brushes a strand of my hair away from my face and tucks it behind my ear. “Why should it?”
“That was supposed to be a one-time thing. I said we’d just get it out of our systems.” My heart rails at my own words while my mind knows they need to be said. I remember the way he held me thisafternoon, brushing tears from my cheeks after the nightmare I can’t recall. I remember how tightly we held each other. It was the kind of tenderness I sought to avoid by having him blindfold me. It’s the kind of tenderness we can’t let grow. Not with where we’re headed when my term as his Summoner ends. I’ll be crossing the sea to where I can finally live freely. He’ll be diving headfirst into a war he probably won’t win.
“And have you, Seamstress?” His voice dips low and he brushes his thumb over my mouth. My lips part in response, my breaths quickening. “Did you fuck me out of your system yet? Get your fill of me?”
I part my lips wider until my teeth close over the tip of his thumb. I bite down just the slightest bit. “No,” I say. “You barely took the edge off.”
I don’t know who kisses who first, but suddenly we’re a tangle of lips and limbs. He backs me against the tree trunk and grinds his hips into mine. There’s no satisfaction with so many layers of clothes between us, but we can take care of that. He’s already unclasping my cloak, groping at my bodice. I arch into his touch as he frees one of my breasts, just enough to close his mouth over my nipple—
“Are we interrupting?”
Calvin’s voice has us freezing in place. We jump apart to find two faces peering beneath the boughs. Calvin blinks with a look of feigned innocence while Harlow smirks, eyes locked on the hand Dominic uses to cover my bare tit. I swat his palm away and tug my bodice back in place.
“No,” I say, and I’ve never heard a single syllable sound so unconvincing.
Harlow snorts a laugh, and she and Calvin stride away from the pine. “It’s about time,” Harlow mutters.
Chapter Thirty-Five
Inana
It feels good to be back with the others. It felt good to have Dominic grinding against me under that tree, and it could have felt a hell of a lot better if we hadn’t been interrupted, but I can’t regret that we were. We can’t let this…thingbetween us grow into anything more than sex. And even though Dominic whispered that he has every intention of finishing what we started the next time we’re alone, I think we could both use some space to cool off. To ensure we get our heads on straight, so when we do revisit our desire, itstaysin the realm of just sex.
At least that’s what I quickly tell Harlow when she begs me for details. It’s night now, and even though the back of the wagon is lit with lanterns, I don’t dare speak in more than a whisper or talk much at all. Dominic is at the reins, giving me that much-needed distance from him and our sexually charged energy, and we’ll have to stop before dawn because of the road conditions and the horses’ needs. That means it will be many hours before daylight makes it safe enough for a full conversation.
Once we do make camp, I’m pleased to see the snow isn’t nearly as bad as it was closer to the bridge. Only a few flakes fall here, and a break in the clouds overhead reveals a pure blue sky, bright with rays of sunlight.
“We’ll have to take the southern pass,” Dominic explains. He’s sharpening his knives while we warm ourselves around our campfire with mugs of bitter coffee and bland stew. For once, I can’t complain about the food. After two days drinking melted snow from a leaky cup, this is heaven. “It will set us a week behind, but it’s the fastest way to get to Eldeen with the bridge gone.”
“Will you still have a post?” Harlow asks, wincing as she sips her coffee. It appears being stuck with only Calvin as a cook while they hunkered down in the blizzard did no favors to her perception of his fare. “They’ll give it to someone else by then, won’t they?”
“If it escalates to an active threat, yes,” Dominic says. I hate how the mere sound of his voice has my core heating, even when he isn’t speaking to me. He meets my gaze across the fire, and I force my eyes away. Still, I catch his crooked smirk as he returns to sharpening his blade.
“Do you think Henderson survived what happened on the bridge?” Calvin asks. His eyes are glazed over, his motions languid from downing half a fresh vial of Dominic’s blood. From what Cal told us, he did his best to conserve his stash when we were separated, since he knew he’d need to keep some blood so Dominic’s Shades could sense it. “The last thing I saw was him and one of his Summoners limping away from the collapse, but there were dozens of Shades swarming the road ahead of them and no sign of their wagon. We didn’t wait to see what happened to them in case it riled up the Shades on our side of the bridge.”
