My heart stopped entirely. “Like hell.”
He advanced a step, his beast’s growl rolling through me. My head tilted back like it was a fucking caress. He might as well have licked my throat. I clamped my thighs together, but knew it was useless. I was soft and weak when it came to Arran Earthborn.
“You expect me to believe that my beast allows you to sleep in your own chambers?” As he spoke, his elongated canines flashed. I wanted them sinking into my veins, nipping at my clit.
“We don’t share a bedroom,” I choked out. Which was almost the truth. In Baylaur, he’d joined me in mine without any formal discussion. But he’d never added any personal belongings or tried to change the arrangement of my things. Other than the time he’d burned my bedsheets after finding Parys in them. A spurt of wet heat slid between my legs at the memory.
Arran’s hand rose, his fingers curling toward my chin. “We do now.”
He was going to touch me. His fingers would skate along the soft column of my throat, then he would take my chin in his powerful grip. He’d hold me steady as he brought his lips downto mine with punishing force that I would meet thrust for thrust. Then there would be nothing butus. Hot limbs and soft curves and perfect rightness—
Arran stepped back.
I wished for cold air to rush in between us. But the room was hot from the fire Lyrena had lit. And the space between us would surely have ignited into an inferno if exposed to even the barest hint of a spark.
I thought I might die, but somehow I managed to get the words out. “Sleep on the floor.”
“No.”
I closed my eyes. If I had to look at him for a second longer, I would lose control. Maybe if I deprived one of my senses of him, I might be able to claw my way back to rationality.
“What are you so afraid of, Princess?”
I sank my teeth into my lower lip so hard it drew blood. I heard Arran shift on his feet. The scent of it must be doing things to him, to his beast. I could not care about that. I had to preserve myself. Cyara had urged me to let him in, but it hurt so much. And if he saw me now, if he saw who and what I was and did not want me... I crushed the thoughts into oblivion. There was no place for them here and now.
“Do not call me that,” I said softly. “Just shut up and let me go to sleep.”
That brutal mask was back in place, so I could not tell if Arran was hurt or disappointed or just as frustrated as me. With half a thought, I could have followed the bond that connected our hearts, that precious golden thread, and bathed in his feelings and emotions. But he’d asked me to stay away. So I would.
I walked to the opposite side of the bed. Arran groaned as I retreated. Yes, the translucent nightgown and the swish of myhips was torture. I buried myself under a mountain of blankets and knew it would not be enough.
Arran moved around the room. I’d spent enough nights with him to recognize the movements. But I did not let myself roll to my back and admire the broad outline of him as he completed his evening ablutions. He always slept without a shirt. The sight of a bare-chested Arran might very well kill me.
Eventually he sat, the mattress bowing under his weight. When he didn’t lie down, I knew we weren’t finished.
“We should talk about the Black Knight,” he said, voice carefully devoid of the heat that had almost incinerated us minutes before.
I kept my back to him. “What is there to talk about? Tomorrow, I will face him in the ring, defeat him, and we will have our amorite.”
Another pressure on the mattress. He’d leaned back on his fist, was digging it into the soft fabric. If I looked, would I see wolf’s claws digging into the thick quilts and blankets?
“Palomides gets to set the terms. They will not be favorable. They may even be impossible.”
He wanted to say more. I could feel it, the words he did not say, in the charged space between us. But just like Arran was fighting his physical attraction to me, I was fighting opening up my heart.
The words burned out of my throat. “We could kill Palomides, his family, and all of his guards. Summon terrestrials to man the mines, establish supply lines. We could waste weeks arranging all of it.” I had thought through the possibility again and again. But after what had happened with the terrestrials and Isolde, I was not even less sure. Even the terrestrials at Eilean Gayl could not be counted upon for loyalty. “Do you think that a better plan?”
He sucked in a breath, exhaled it slowly. Anger wouldn’t have been so easy to diffuse. So, this was something else. I could not decipher it in the simple syllable he gave in answer. “No.”
I did not respond.
Arran shifted, stretching his legs onto the bed.
Despite the weight of what was between us, and the worry over the battles the next day would bring, my eyes were heavy. As my thoughts became cloudy, I vaguely wondered if it was Arran’s presence in my bed. Wearing his tunic had been a comfort. But the weight of his body mere inches away... it inflamed me, but it also spoke to something else deep within my soul. With Arran here, I was safe.
Just as sleep took me, Arran spoke again. This time, it came out as a low growl, so deep I could have sworn he said it into my mind rather than the fraught air between us. “I do not want to see you hurt.”
But that was impossible, of course, because he had asked me to stay away.
