“I never used you,” I whispered, though maybe I was hoping to that night I went to his room. I still didn’t. “And itdoesn’t matter what I plan, does it? We live on opposite sides of the realm.”
“But we’re stillinthe realm. Same realm, same timeline,” March said, and when I closed my eyes, he nudged my nose with his to get me to look at him again. “It’s barely a day’s travel to your court. I’d travel years.”
My heart squeezed and squeezed, and suddenly there wasn’t enough air in my room.
I touched his cheeks, ran my fingers over the tips so this long lashes. “That’s unrealistic. We have lives. We…we have family.”
“And we’ll always have our family no matter where they are,” March said, like it was the most natural thing in the world to say. The mostnormalthing.
“We can’t just travel all the time! That’s unrealistic, March, it’s?—”
“Doable,” he cut me off. “It’s doable. And it’s not all the time. There’s plenty of space for an extra person in both your court and mine, isn’t there? There’s plenty of space in Neverwhen.”
Neverwhen.
The city of Timekeepers, of Clockfolk who wanted to pursue big careers. Of Clockfolk who started families with subjects of other courts.
“March.” I warnedhimthis time. Because what he was saying was absurd. All I’d dreamed about in secret, when I was completely detached from myself.
What he was saying was…big.
“Unless that isn’t what you want. Unless youreallyaren’t planning to see me again.” He leaned back. Looked at me. “I can live with that. Just tell me.”
My mouth opened and closed and opened and closed. “You are a fool, Heartling.” A bigger fool than I’d ever realized if he really thought I could plan to not see him again.
He smiled a little—because he knew. Deep down he knew exactly what it was like inside my head. He knew that I might not have compassion right now, but I still craved him like he was life. I still would travel decades if it meant seeing him just for a while.
“There are ways to hold on. This isn’t the end,” he said. “There have to be ways.”
“There are.” All those ways he himself just told me about.
And there was hope there—right there in the center of my chest.
“It just feels like the last timeanythingbelongs to us to in this place,” he whispered. A kiss on my forehead, and one on the tip of my nose.
“It isn’t,” I said, much too hopeful too suddenly—but the damage was already done. “We’ll always belong tothisnight, at least.”
“We will,” March said, his eyes lighting up a little bit.
“Kiss me,” I whispered when his lips hovered over mine a second too long.
“Are you sure?” he asked, so I showed him.
Gathering all my strength, I pushed him to the side hard, and he didn’t see it coming so he couldn’t stop me.
The next second, he was on his back in the middle of my bed and I was on top of him.
“The last night,” I whispered, his face in my hands, my lips on his. “I want to remember the last night.”
March wrapped his hand around the back of my neck and pulled me in.
Our kiss was frantic at first. Desperate as the weight of reality settled under our skins, became part of us. Our hands were everywhere on each other’s bodies. We breathed at the same speed, moved our hips against each other with the same urgency. His hardness between my legs made it impossible to keep quiet. I called out his name when I could, and hewhispered mine, and it was the perfect melody to make this night unforgettable.
Then we slowed down, the need to taste each other, explore each other, know every line and shape of each other’s bodies winning over the fear of the future. We spun around, sometimes March on top of me, and sometimes I on top of him, but we never stopped kissing. Never stopped touching.
Minutes or hours later, he was on top of me when I pushed back his shoulders a little, and he knew to spin us on the bed. I let go of his lips for a moment, sat up on his hips, the hard length of his cock pressed right between my folds. Clothes on the way, though. Too many clothes. I pulled off my tunic in one movement, threw it to the side, and as I reached to unclasp my bra, March’s hands were all over my torso, his eyes bloodshot as he watched me, like he was hypnotized.
When my bra ended up discarded to the side, too, he sat up, wrapped his arms around me, and replaced his hands with his mouth.
