It took only a heartbeat to realize I wasn’t wearing any pants. Heat climbed my neck in a swift, scalding flush.
Before I could cover myself, Malachi shifted. One massive arm uncoiled and slung across my sternum, pinning me back to the bedding. He didn’t push me away, didn’t even seem to notice the panic racing through me. He only folded into me, heavy and warm, as though he’d always been there.
The fire outside had dropped low. Light sifted through canvasin molten slashes. His eyes were half-hidden in the crook of his arm, lashes dark, features softened by sleep—less warrior, more man. Ink snaked along his bicep, a coiled serpent with flecks of gold in its scales that caught the light like embers. I found myself following the pattern up to the braids at his neck and then returning to the steady rise and fall of his chest.
His hand slid free and rested over my belly. The motion was slow, absentminded, then it wasn’t. Fingers brushed the bare skin just above my navel, tracing a lazy, intimate spiral. The touch pooled heat low in my stomach.
I should move, I told myself. Check the tents. See if Lysara was alright.
Malachi’s breath deepened. He stilled, then bent his face toward my neck, teeth ghosting the skin there. The world narrowed to that sound: his breath, the scrape of fabric, the hush of the night. My pulse thudded loud enough to drown thought.
Every nerve in me waited, taut. I wasn’t afraid, not exactly. But gods, I was unmoored. If he pressed further, if I let myself fall into this, what would be left of me when morning came?
He lifted his head and searched my face. For a heartbeat, his eyes were only hunger; the next, something softer, like restraint cost him as much as surrender would. He looked as if he were standing on the edge of a precipice, and I was the ground he might crash into.
His voice was low and rough. “May I kiss you?”
The question hollowed me out, left me trembling. No command. No expectation. Just the choice placed in my hands. After Kaelith, after the bond that would soon strip away so much, the simple act of being asked felt new.
“Yes,” I whispered, the word breaking in my throat.
He lowered his mouth toward mine. Close enough that I couldfeel the promise of it—warmth, the tilt of his lips, the brush of his breath.
Our lips met, barely—the faintest whisper of skin on skin. It wasn’t a kiss so much as a question. For a breath, I forgot everything: the tent, the blood, my home. For that breath, the world was a thin place between us.
But memories shoved at the back of my teeth. The dream. Lysara’s scream. The knife. The way I’d felt, a terrible, aching wanting that did not feel like my own. I pulled back, a breath of distance between us. His forehead rested against mine for a long second, eyes closed.
“I should check on Lysara,” I said, voice small and sudden, urgent in a way that startled me. It was the least intimate thing I could think to say—and the truest.
Malachi’s eyes opened. Something unreadable flickered there—desire, disappointment, and then, unmistakably, steadiness. He let out a laugh without humor.
“Alright,” he said, voice low. He kept his hand at my waist, thumb moving in slow circles as if to reassure me, and himself, that we still existed, and that nothing here would force me where I would not go.
I slid off the pallet, knees weak and slid my trousers on before the cold could bite any deeper. The space between us felt charged, full of postponed promises. When I stood, the night seemed colder. My pulse still hummed under my skin. I took one last look at Malachi, at the line of his throat, at the way he watched me, and then I pulled the tent flap aside.
42
Malachi
She had lain curledagainst me, hair tangled across my arm, her breath a soft whisper against my skin.
And gods help me, I had wanted her to stay. Just a little longer.
But longing did not absolve betrayal.
The ghost of her lips on mine tormented me—no more than a breath of a kiss, but it pained me more than any blow ever could. It had been nothing, and yet my body remembered it with a ferocity that mocked me. The faint tremor in her whisper when she saidyes.
I wanted it all last night. Her warmth. Her trust. The way she leaned into me when the dark came. The ache of restraint burned through me until I broke.
I remembered the press of her lips at my throat—soft at first, then desperate as hunger overtook her. Her breath burned against my skin, her fingers digging into my shoulders as if I were the only thing holding her to the world.
For a heartbeat, I wanted nothing more than to give in—to beclaimed by her need.
My hand slipped beneath the blanket, into the waistband of my trousers. I freed myself, stroking slow, my mind replaying what might have been if she hadn’t pulled away. Her mouth on mine with as much hunger and desperation as when she’d fastened her lips to my throat.
My palm tightened. I pumped harder. The images blurred—her gasps against my skin, the sound of my name broken on her lips—until the pressure snapped.
I stilled, breath harsh, guilt flooding me. I was no better than Kaelith.
