“And hey.” She followed me to the counter where the peppers waited. Her fingers caught my sleeve, tugging once, and my pulse kicked hard enough that I had to set the knife down. “You promised you’d help rebuild my shop. Remember?‘I’ll do anything for you.’Your words.”
She was using my own declaration against me.
I kept my eyes on the cutting board.
The dye in her hair had faded further again. Her lips were rosy from the cold, from biting them, the restless energy that made her chew on her lower lip when she was frustrated.
I wanted to bite it too. Wanted to catch that lip between my teeth and pull until she gasped.
I closed my eyes. Breathed and opened them.
“I told you. It’s dangerous.”
Mira frowned and scoffed. I turned back to the counter for the garlic, and when I turned around, she’d planted herself on the counter directly in front of my cutting board. She shoved the board aside with one hand, forcing my attention from the ingredients to her face.
Her legs dangled off the edge. Her eyes held that stubborn defiance of hers. “Did you switch souls with Lucian?”
Despite myself, a breath of amusement escaped through my nose. She was relentless. A force that couldn’t be reasoned with.
I set the knife down and stepped closer. Mira sat up straighter on the counter but didn’t move back, and I closed the distance until I stood between her knees, my hands braced on the counter on either side of her thighs. My arms caged her in, my face dropped to her level.
Her breath caught. The defiance in her eyes faltered, replaced by awareness.
The specific kind of awareness that made her pupils blow wide and her pulse jump at the base of her throat. My own pulse answered, a hard kick behind my ribs that I refused to let reach my face.
“No,” I said. My voice came out lower than I planned. “But this time, I agree with him.”
Her scent intensified this close. Old books and honey and underneath, that maddening sweetness that made my blood run south.
My gaze dropped to her mouth. The rosy lips she’d been biting. I dragged my eyes back up, and the effort it took settled into my shoulders as physical tension, coiling through every muscle in my arms where they caged her.
“I don’t want to scare you.” Each word was measured. “But I think Hudson has been working with others. That’s what makes him harder to track. And those others...” My eyes met hers. “Put you in more danger than he does alone.”
She didn’t respond or blink.
Mira’s lips parted, and I watched her chest rise and fall with breaths that were coming too fast, too shallow. Her knees had drifted inward, pressing against my hips.
She probably didn’t notice.I noticed.
I noticed everything about her body when it was this close to mine. The flush creeping up her throat. The way her fingers curled around the counter’s edge, knuckles white, holding herself in place when every other part of her was leaning forward.
My hand moved without permission. Rose from the counter, crossed the distance between us, and my thumb found her lower lip. I pressed against the soft skin there, traced the full curve of it, felt the warmth of her breath against my knuckle.
Her mouth trembled under the contact. A tremor so small but I felt it travel through my thumb, down my wrist, and settle low in my gut where it burned.
My touch was possessive and the look in her eyes when my thumb dragged across her mouth told me she understood it perfectly. Her thighs tightened against my hips. An involuntary squeeze that sent heat flooding through my abdomen, and my free hand gripped the counter hard enough that the wood groaned beneath my fingers.
“I just want you safe.” My voice had dropped to a whisper. “I want you to let us protect you.”
Her gaze held mine.
The kitchen shrank to the space between us, the heat building in the inches separating my chest from hers. Her hand released the counter and landed on my forearm. Fingertips against bare skin.
Every instinct demanded I close the gap, tilt her chin up, and take the mouth my thumb was claiming. My body swayed forward a fraction. Her chin tilted up to meet me. The distance between us thinned to nothing, to a breath, to the width of a decision.
The pot on the stove boiled over.
Water hissed against the burner. The smell of scorched broth filled the kitchen, and the moment shattered into practical reality.
