It wasn’t that I was scared of staying alone in this bedroom, but I was in the home of a Mafia boss. For all his guards and security, what if bad people came in the middle of the night? The irony of my deliberations hit me. The mob wasn’t made of saints andinnocents.
I realized he’d never answered me. His breaths had gentled against my neck even though the hand holding me hadn’t. He’d slipped into sleep so easily I had trouble believing that spending the night next to a woman was a first forhim.
Frustratingly, that new deliberation kept me awake long into thenight.
Chapter 40
Three knocks followedby Muriel’s voice announcing I had a visitor had my lids flipping up. I tried to get up, but a hand tugged me back, and I only managed to sit. I stared down at the hand, then at the body attached to it, and my heart wenthaywire.
I’d spent the night in the Court ofDemons.
I’d slept next to JarodAdler.
He and I had . . .we’d. . .
One side of Jarod’s mouth perked up as he observed my heatingcomplexion.
He chucked me under the chin, probably to slam my lips shut before answering Muriel in a languid yet authoritative tone, “Mimi, tell Leigh’s guest to make themselves comfortable in the study,” which caused my mouth to gapewider.
Oh . . . sweet . . . baby . . .cherubs.
Muriel now knew Jarod had spent the night with me. She’d probably imagine all sorts ofthings.
I decided that I would never again leave this room. Not even for my guest. And why did I have a guest? It wasn’t my home. Had Muriel mentioned a name? I wanted to ask, but by the time I located my voice, Jarod bumped the inside of my elbow, and I tumbled onto his bare chest with anoomph.
I hissed his name as I struggled back up, my palm pressing against the surprisingly soft dark curls on hischest.
“Yes, Feather?” His voice was deliciously deep and infuriatinglysprightly.
Once I managed to lever myself up, I said, “Muriel’s going to think—she’s going to think—ugh. . .”
The second corner of his mouth ticked up. “What is it she’s going to think?” He gently combed back my mad hair. “That I spent the entire night inside ofyou?”
“Yes. I mean,no.” I almost wished I could’ve started smoldering, because I was pretty certain my color rivaled the Demon Court’s porte-cochère.
When Jarod chuckled, I rolled onto my back and smacked my forearm over my eyes to make the world disappear since I couldn’t make myself vanish. The mattress dipped. I waited for Jarod to move my arm, but it wasn’t my arm he touched, and it wasn’t his hand that touched me. His hot mouth landed on mine, and my arm stumbled off my face, plopping onto the brassy mane fanned over thepillow.
A moan fell from my lips as his hand glided up my waist, my ribs, and . . .oh. I gasped as he palmed one of my breasts, crinkling the washed cotton T-shirt over it. He swallowed the sound, keeping up his steady assault and adding one to mynipple.
The hands trying to lift him off wound around his neck, tangled into his hair, and deepened the kiss. When he settled his lower body between my legs and pressed his thick bulge against my entrance, sanity finally clockedme.
I slid my mouth off his and panted his name into his mussed hair followed by: “We have tostop.”
He sighed, and the sound was muffled by my skin. When he vaulted off the bed, cool air slicked over my warmed skin, pebbling it. I missed the weight and heat of him, the mineral and musky scent of him, and yet the reasonable part of my brain, which had shrunk considerably during the night, celebrated having been listenedto.
Jarod smiled down at the mess of limbs and scattered heartbeats he’d made of me before extending his hand. I took it, allowing him to pull me up. I bumped into his body, unsteady like a toddler learning towalk.
Splaying his palm on my waist, he tilted his head down. “Do you want to meet Celeste on yourown?”
“Celeste?” I was fully awake now. “Celeste’shere?”
“That’s what Mimisaid.”
Crap. Crap. Crap.I swirled away from Jarod and rooted around my handbag for my phone. Ten missed calls. All from Celeste. I was the worst friend. I should’ve called her or sent her a message that I was safe and sound. I pulled out a violet crepe slip and was about to yank off my T-shirt when I remembered Jarod was in theroom.
His gaze was riveted to me. “Don’t stop on myaccount.”
Skating my fingers through my hair in an attempt to tame the thick mass, I said, “Turnaround.”
