The water laps at us both as Iris turns in my arms, moving to straddle me. She puts the book down on a little table beside the tub, then she places her hands on my shoulders and looks into my eyes.
“You’re so much more than that,” she says, then smirks slightly. “...even if the muscles are really nice, they’re not your best feature.”
I laugh, trying to shake off how much it makes my heart ache when she compliments me. “And whatismy best feature, then?” I ask, dragging my fingers down her spine.
She tilts her head, a stray curl falling into her eyes. She blows it away before responding. “Your shoulders.”
I snort. “And here I thought you were getting sentimental.”
She trails her fingers down my arm, twining them with mine. “...or maybe your hands.”
I laugh, averting my eyes, but her free hand grasps my cheek to meet her gaze again.
“No…it’s that you always treated me with respect, even though I was small and a little stupid,” she says. She blushes—and it’s shocking thatshe’sthe one blushing for once. “Even that first day when you showed up at the Infernal Legion camp before we we went to the New York Public Library…you respected me. And you wereinterestedin me and no one else ever really had been before.”
“Because that was the day I fell in love with you,” I say, as if it should be obvious.
She goes still. I think I’ve surprised her—and maybe I’ve even surprised myself a little, but it’s true. The first time I saw her, dirt-smudged and exhausted and reading a romance novel that was singed at the edges, was when I fell in love with her.
“My people…” I start, frowning. “It’s an old concept, but I think I knew even then. My fated one, myfenvarra. That’s whatwe call it on Kanin. Not a lot of people find theirs, but I always thought you were mine.”
She bites her lip. “Ten years, and you never said anything?”
I shrugged. “I didn’t think I had a shot. And…I didn’t want to destroy our friendship. Because you were so,sospecial to me, Iris. You always will be.”
Her hand strokes down my chest, fingers dancing over old scars. “And now?”
“Now I get to bathe with you in my lap and call you mine,” I whisper. “It’s more than I could have dreamed.”
She leans in to kiss me, and I savor the taste of her, the pure sweetness, theIrisof it all. My tongue flicks out to drag across the seam of her lips, teasing, and she lets me in.
I can sense her arousal, her scent mingling with the team, her cunt wet as it drags against my cock through the kiss. I come to attention right away, ready for her again, but I still her with my hands on her hips.
“Iris…” I murmur. “It’s too much. You need to rest.”
She bites her lip, grinding against me despite my grip on her. “I want to, though.”
“You could hurt yourself?—”
“If this is fate, would the gods have really made me unable to take you?”
I scowl at her, already seeing the smirk on her face. “Don’t turn the fenvarra thing against me,” I grumble. “I was trying to be romantic.”
“You are being romantic,” she says, “which is why I want you inside me again.”
I laugh and take her lips with mine, but I still don’t let her sink down on me. Her pussy clenches against the head of my cock, making me want her more and more…but I resist.
“Please, Garrik.”
“You’re insatiable.”
She stops moving, her expression serious when she cups my cheek in her hand and runs her thumb along my lower lip.
“I waited ten years for this, Garrik,” she breathes. “I don’t want to waste another second.”
And because I agree…I let her do as she wishes.
I shift in the water, letting her rise and guide herself into my lap, her knees bracketing my hips. Her hands slide up my shoulders for balance, and I grip her waist, still torn between desire and concern.
