Quickly, I wrap a cloth around my waist, covering myself and much of my legs, before I hand her a drying cloth too. “I’ll turn my back until you’re dry. Then I’ll hand you a tunic.”
I don’t wait for her acknowledgment before I face the shelves again, grab another cloth and dry myself off, hastily pulling on a fresh pair of long pants, studiously ignoring the next slap of wet material that indicates she’s removed her wet bloomers before the next quiet swishes indicate she’s also drying herself off.
I’m startled when, a moment later, she presses herself to my back, her naked chest connecting with my spine, her arms wrapping around me from behind.
“Thank you,” she whispers.
I freeze, my arms lifted away from my sides, struck still by the sudden contact. “What the fuck for?”
I anticipate she’s about to say for ending her attacker. Or maybe for helping her wash off the blood.
“For not taking advantage.”
I inhale a ragged breath, fighting the flood of emotion filling my chest. I can’t separate and quantify these feelings. Rage? Fear? Regret? Warmth? Fuck it, I don’t know.
All I know for certain is that she shouldn’t thank me. Not ever.
Not with what’s ahead of her.
Chapter Thirty-Seven
Antony
As quickly as I can, I reach for my smallest tunic, needing to move, to shake off the impact of Thyra’s words, the warmth that, even if I allowed it in…
Won’t survive the poison in my heart.
I pass her the tunic without turning toward her, pushing the clothing into her hand before she slips away from me.
“At dawn, we’ll return to the Starlit Court.” I clear my throat, trying to rid my voice of its gruffness. “I’ll take you to my sister first. She’ll prepare you to face my mother. Once that’s over, we can visit my family’s ancestral library. You can study everything we have on the Dragonstone Blade and the False Queen. Maybe you’ll notice something we’ve missed. You might have some knowledge about Oracles that makes all the difference.”
It’s a lot to say to her when she’s standing naked behind me, the tunic still swaying at the corner of my view where she’s holding it and hasn’t pulled it on.
Her response is quiet. “Okay.”
Then, finally, comes the sounds of her dressing,and I give her another few seconds before I turn to find her covered once more.
Even my smallest tunic reaches her knees, but that’s just as well. I’m trying to ignore the fact that she’s naked under it.
“I need to put my armor back on, and then you will get some more sleep.” I scowl at her. “I’m going to carry you through the room and take you outside. That’s where my armor is.”
I haven’t forgotten the way she admonished me when I returned, her whisper-scream when she told me not to leave her sight again.
The more I speak, the harsher my voice grows. “You’re going to press your face to my neck, and you’re not going to fucking look at the room or anything in it as we pass through it. Do you understand?”
A stern command.
She gives me a smile and steps into my arms.
I scoop her up to my chest, pulling her legs around me, trying fervently to ignore the renewed shot of heat into my cock when the damn tunic rides all the way up past her ass, pushed up there by her legs, and my right hand closes around her naked backside.
She tucks her head into my neck, turning her face fully against me, and I mentally shout at myself to move fast before I lose my senses.
I hurry through the bathing room door, stepping quickly across the main room, taking a brief glance at the body and the discarded chain still wrapped around the man’s neck. I’ll be back to assess him and clean up as soon as I’ve carried Thyra clear of the blood-splattered space and caged myself in armor again.
I need the boundaries the steel gives me. I need to knowthat the next time I touch her, it won’t be skin on skin, or I’ll lose my mind.
After adjusting her in my arms so I can pull the door closed and shut off the room, I urge her to slide back to her feet on the porch, but I hold her close for another moment, a heartbeat longer than I should, my arms suddenly refusing to open.
