And made me nod.
He set aside the tray, then leaned forward like the guy in that reboot holo ofSixteen Candles.
Aengus cupped the back of my neck with one large hand, steadying me like he suspected I might startle. Then he pressed his mouth to mine, and suddenly…
I was the girl in the romance, being kissed.
His lips were gentle. Careful. Like he was asking a question and waiting for me to figure out the answer.
It did not take long, especially when his tongue snaked into my mouth. It was forked, yet strong, which set off my curiosity even further. I pushed at the v of it—exploring, licking, reveling at the way it intertwined around mine.
The kiss deepened into something that tasted like woodsmoke and sweet Pleistocene pears. I stopped thinking about doors and dragon keys and unbinding spells entirely.
Suddenly, I was in his lap without remembering ever climbing into it. The bulge was back, and my legs wrapped around his waist, trying to get the secret part of me the bathwater soothed post-training closer to it.
I loved my jumpsuit. It was the perfect piece of clothing as far as I was concerned. But that morning, I hated it. Why couldn’t it be gone? This kiss was the best thing that had ever happened to me. I wanted to get closer to him. I needed more. I?—
“Dorcasss, no.” Aengus wrenched away from our kiss. Like I was a painful bandage he was ripping off. “Thisss is too much for usss.”
It was the best thing that had ever happened to me. Then, suddenly, it was over.
“You have training in a pair of pauses.” His voice had a tight quality to it, the same as when he became Diarmuid and could barely control his obvious disapproval at my poor conditioning. “We must take leave.”
Pauses were approximately what I’d called an hour. So it was plenty of time.
Yet, Aengus lifted me off his lap and set me aside like I had somewhere urgent to be.
I felt bereft. Abandoned in a way that didn’t make sense.
“Did I do something wrong?”
He rose to stand in that liquid way of his. “We will talk at last meal.”
“I don’t have to go to training,” I climbed to my feet, too, even though my legs felt like jelly. “I can skip one day.”
“You cannot. It is important that you increase your stamina and physical condition. Just in case…”
“Just in case, what?”
Needing some reassurance—any reassurance—I desperately wanted to hear the words he said three weeks ago after I met his dragon.Just in case we get to keep you.
But no answer came.
He raised his hand. Hovered it. Then dropped it at the last moment. “There are things we must attend to. We will talk again at last meal.”
He’d warned me about my temper. So many times before unshelling his dragon and knocking me on my back, despite my best efforts.
But I couldn’t keep my anger in its container.
“I want to talk about it now!” I growled. My wolf paced back and forth inside my chest, awakened after that kiss. Technically satiated on the boar meat we’d eaten that morning, but not at all satisfied.
“You have your training,” he said again.
I silently fumed. I didn’t want Diarmuid in a couple of hours. I wanted Aengusnow.
The knot in my belly was so tight, I could only imagine how I smelled on his forked tongue.
But if he could taste my desire, as he’d claimed, it didn’t show on his face.
