Tension melted as tingles raced over my skin. I groaned, sinking into the padded table.
“Lower back, palms just cresting her hips. Lengthen the spine,” the masseur instructed.
Ezra pressed. My body resisted, then yielded. He lingered before cupping my ass through the thin sheet, knuckles grazingthe curve of my cheek. His thumbs traced lower, brushing between my thighs. The slow burn erupted into an inferno.
“I didn’t tell you to do that,” the masseur stated.
“You didn’t have to,” Ezra purred.
“Maybe I should leave,” the masseur muttered.
“Maybe you should,” Ezra replied, voice flat as steel. “Come alone with what you want charged. Bring others, and the conversation changes.”
The sound of the door thumping open and closed again was barely audible over the still-singing harp.
My heart beat in my chest. I missed Ezra so much, but… I started to sit up.
Ezra pushed me back down. “I’m working.”
“I don’t want you to get hurt.” I squeezed my eyes shut. “Put your armor back on and get out of here.”
“The Alun’s magic let me step this far,” Ezra said. “I can’t replicate it.”
My heart sank.
“Even if I could. I wouldn’t. That man wants your magic.” Ezra rubbed his fingers against my skin. “The Westwaters are cutthroat. We will play this by ear. Trust me.”
“I do trust you, Ezra,” I said, only realizing how true it was after I said it.
Old Quinn would have worried. Old Quinn didn’t want to be a problem. But I hadn’t been Old Quinn in a long time now. Ezra was a badass fighter who could step into people's shadows and use magic. He chose to be here. I wasn’t the problem. A slight smile pulled at my lips. Ezra broke every rule because he thought I was in danger, and now he played a dangerous game to stay at my side.
I stopped resisting, sinking into the table with my arms loose at my sides. I couldn’t see his smirk, but I felt it in the deliberate way he folded the sheet to keep me modest, before sliding lower,kneading my thighs, working down to my calves, my ankles, my toes. Each stroke unraveled me. My body loosened as heat pooled deep inside—slick, insistent, tingling through every inch of skin he touched.
A knock sounded at the door. “It’s just me,” the masseur said.
“Enter,” Ezra responded.
The door opened and closed.
“Use your knuckles on the arch,” the masseur said. “Is this too many?”
A box shook, and Ezra dug his knuckles into the arch of my foot. I half groaned, half moaned.
“It’s a good start. What’s your name?” Ezra asked.
“Mott,” the masseur responded.
After a guarantee of work, if Mott ever found his way to the Architect’s Castle, I found a box of precious stones and two steampunk-looking mechanical devices placed under the table within easy grasp.
“Fill them, Quinn,” Ezra commanded.
I swallowed. “What if I break them?”
“Don’t.” Ezra’s hands dug into my thighs again. “I’m not Xan. I won’t coddle you. Control the flow, or you’ll destroy something precious and the tentative ally I’ve found in the Westwater walls.”
The tension he’d just worked out of my back returned. I placed my right hand on the biggest of the mechanical devices. Although my first time emptying magic had been the disaster at the forge, Xan had me practicing on smaller objects. The train flashed into my mind. I couldn’t stop my magic then, but that had also been really complicated.
Warm weight settled on my ass as Ezra ran his hands down my bare sides. “You’ve got this. Control. Unlike my lover, I reward success.”
