Clothed, but not untouched.
I dropped my forehead to her shoulder as she rocked her hips, slow at first. Creating enough friction to make me bite back a sound. I couldn’t stop my hands from sliding down over the curves I’d been aching to hold for longer than Iwanted to admit.
“Isi.” Her name was a confession against her skin.
“Trew. I need…”
“Take it. It’s yours.”
She blinked up at me a moment before finding a rhythm that drove me mad, rolling her hips into mine as her breath snagged and caught. I gripped her waist, guiding, matching each thrust, my body on fire, my cock surging against the front of my pants.
We moved together, frantic, grinding through every barrier we still hadn’t broken with words.
I slid my hand under her tunic, finding her breast and rolling her nipple. She tipped her head back, her moan ripping out.
We chased the fire, the last strike in a duel we both wanted to lose.
“I’m not afraid of you,” she whispered against my throat, her voice wrecked. “I’m afraid of wanting this more than anything else.”
I slid my hand up her spine to cup the back of her neck and hold her there.
Her thighs clenched.
My cock stiffened.
Pleasure built, a wave cresting much too fast to slow. My voice broke on her name, and she gasped against my jaw. And then we were both shaking, clinging, grinding through the rush of it, our bodies tense and trembling until the heat melted into stillness.
We stayed like that, pressed together, breathing hard.
Her fingers stroked my skin above my tunic.
I kept my hand tangled in her hair.
We stared at each other in the shared hush of something neither of us could take back.
34
ISI
That shouldn’t have happened.
But it did, and there was no going back.
I eased away from him and walked stiffly across the floor. Opened the door and stepped back out into the corridor. Then made my legs carry me to a bathing room where I washed up and leaned against the wall until I’d regained control.
Once I felt like my legs could support me, I walked to the dining hall.
I sensed more than saw him following—dressed in clean pants.
He was right. He always would be near. I was only now letting the knowledge sink in.
I wasn’t sure what I felt about it, let alone about what we’d done, so I was going to stop thinking about it for now.
I sat with my friends at lunch and did my best to eat and not look at Trew sitting on the dais. The heat of his gaze remained on me, and I wondered what he was thinking, if he was wishing it hadn’t happened.
I couldn’t find it within myself to regret, because I’d enjoyed our sparring, our kisses, and the push and pullof our teasing.
And finding satisfaction in his arms.
