My gaze drags over her face, down her throat, back to her mouth. “You’re flushed.”
Her eyes narrow. “No, I’m not.”
“Liar,” I murmur.
That gets me another flicker of heat in those ice-blue eyes. I step in, two slow paces, and she goes still, like an animal trying not to show it’s cornered. I don’t touch her yet. I let her feel the difference in size. Let her notice how close I am. Let her body react before her brain decides how she’s supposed to react.
“Have you eaten?” I ask.
Her brows snap together in utter disbelief. “Excuse me?”
“Breakfast,” I say. “Did you eat it, or did you just glare at it to prove a point?”
That gets me the smallest twitch of her mouth. Defensive, fast. “I ate.”
“Good girl,” I say softly.
Her breath hitches, but her eyes freeze over immediately, a glare pinched in place by sheer force alone. It makes my cock twitch. “Stop fucking saying that,” she seethes.
“No,” I say. “I don’t think I will.”
Her jaw tightens.
Her mouth is ridiculous up close. Full, stubbornly set, and bruised. I have an awful urge to drag my thumb along the split and feel the warmth there. See if she’ll let me. See if she’llbite mefor it.
Control, Caelum. I shift my weight, tilt my head, study her. “You look tired.”
“I didn’t sleep,” she says with a scoff.
“I can see that,” I reply with an eye roll.
“Youdon’t look tired,” she says, taking in my stance.
“I didn’t sleep either,” I tell her. “Difference is, I’m used to it.”
Something flickers behind her eyes. Not pity. God no. She doesn’t pity me. She doesn’t like me enough to pity me. It’s closer to…recognition.
“Do you get nightmares too, Your Majesty?” she asks, lacing the title with sugar and venom both.
“Yes,” I say simply.
Her mouth opens. She blinks. She wasn’t expecting me to give her that. Good. I want her a step off-center.
“What,” she whispers, “you’re just going to admit that?”
“Why wouldn’t I?” I ask.
“Because you’re—” She gestures at me. All of me. The lines of my shoulders. The way I’m standing like I own the air in this room. “This. You’re not supposed to admit weakness.”
“This isn’t weakness,” I say. “It’s maintenance.”
Her brow creases. “What the hell does that mean?”
“It means,” I say, “that if you don’t bleed, pressure bursts you open in places you can’t sew back up.”
She stares at me. That slow, suspicious stare of hers. Like she thinks every answer I give her is a hand grenade wrapped in silk. After a second, she says, voice quieter, “What do you see?”
I blink once. Interesting choice.
