“I missed you,” he says, so quietly before barking at me. “Stand up.”
“You’re insane.” Tears burn the back of my eyelids as I blink to hold them in.
Kelter shoves in closer, the start of a beard prickling my ear. “Get up and kiss me, or you’ll be sleeping withhimtonight.”
He stands and takes a step back, waiting. I look from the hairy man on his throne of teeth and horns, the ravenous way his nostrils flare, and back to Kelter’s now sculpted body towering over me. His hazel eyes plead, the green popping and the brown flecks from Eli crushing my soul. I don’t want to kiss him, but even less do I want to sleep anywhere near Zandrite. And I’m pretty sure he might eat me alive if I try to get out of this. Or chop me up and serve me to his next capture.
With my heart hammering right out of my chest, my legs weak and blood still dripping from my shoulder, I rise from the dirt floor into his arms.
I shake with hatred, with grief and fear for my life.This isn’t real. It’s not real.I repeat it as I turn my head to look up at the traitor, once my only friend. But I can’t reach his face to kiss him. Not even on my tippy toes.
He looks over his shoulder at Zandrite then back at me, his eyes unblinking and glossed over as he reaches those long limbs down to the back of my thighs and lifts me. He slides my body up along his until I’m face to face with the drying blood on his chin.
I elbow him in the ribs with all the might I can work up, hoping it’s as painful as the ache in my heart.
He grunts and almost drops me before holding me tight again.
I lean around him and smile at Zandrite, playing the part to stay alive and away from him. “He likes it rough.”
“As do I,” he says, and I cringe. How do I get out of this?
I take hold of Kelter’s ears, one in each hand, poking out through his sandy waves, and I pull his mouth close to mine, trembling.
His long stubble pokes me, and he whispers into my lips, “Like you mean it.” The tip of his tongue presses against my sealed mouth, lips brushing.
I pull back the slightest distance, trying to keep Zandrite from noticing. “I don’t fucking mean it.” I clamp my lips shut, his lingering taste of salt and raw flesh making me nauseous.
He makes a show of the kiss, bringing one hand up behind my headand tipping us at an angle while he holds me against him. I can’t escape. I don’t move, not with my muscles jammed and locked into place by panic. When he finally pulls himself from my mouth, freeing my closed lips, I bring them to his ear, my voice like ice as I pretend to hug him. “Eli will kill you for this—if I don’t manage to first.”
“I know.” He kisses my bare, bleeding shoulder and glides me back down his body until my toes touch the dirt, then rests his warm hands on my back for the briefest of seconds before tucking his thumbs into my pants and dropping them to my ankles. My mouth goes dry. Leaning in, a hand on my lower back, he pulls me into him. “But first, he’ll thank me for keeping you out of that god’s hands.”
Kelter steps aside to give Zandrite a better view. Of me. Shirtless with my pants bunched at my feet.
Zandrite purrs in approval, then his eyes narrow, his face slackening. “That stone. How—”
He leaps from his throne, landing inches from my face, and rips the necklace from my chest.
“That’s mine!” My hands fly to its rescue, far too late.
“The death stone of my first broken love? I’d say it’s mine, not yours,” Zandrite hisses, putrid breath in my face.
“You killed her! Why would it be yours?” And why am I acting like Ametrine is real? Like this man is actually a god?
He folds the stone away inside his hand and looks down at my nearly naked body, his green eyes twitching wildly. “I am the god of love. I’m responsible for every connection—and disconnection, every full and broken heart. And I won’t take you away from this young man until after he’s had a few nights to meet his needs with you. In the state you two are in, you’ll both barely be functional soon.”
What state?
Kelter exhales in relief and licks my blood from his lips.
“Give me my necklace,” I grit out, pulling up my pants and collecting my shirt. I process his words, but they don’t make sense.
“Fuck her until she stops whining about the damn thing,” Zandrite says, clapping Kelter on the shoulder and pushing me into him with his other hand—without jolting in pain. No reaction at all.
Kelter nods and grabs my upper arm with a rough yank. “I won’t disappoint you.”
Chapter 24
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