His gaze flickers to the movement, and his face immediately transforms to something softer. His looming form diminishes, and before I can process the change that has me breathing far easier, he holds out his hands.
I hesitate, but the fear is gone, replaced by the solid reassurance of my protector. Slowly, I take them.
His fingers engulf mine, so warm and solid, grounding me even as the water makes my body weightless. He guides me deeper into the pool, where the heat envelops me completely and my body goes weightless.
I let out a breathy, satisfied moan. I am warm. I am safe.
His hands tighten, and I feel his body go rigid in response. As he tenses, the glowing water shifts between us, curling in luminous tendrils. Fascinated, I let go of one of his hands to swirl my fingers through the colors, laughing softly.
He stills.
“Do that again,” he murmurs.
I tear my gaze away from the symphony of light in the water to meet his eyes. The silver reflects the bioluminescence, turning them a rich blue-green. I blink up at him. “Do what?”
“Laugh,” he says simply.
There is something reverent in his voice. Something softer than hunger that has a smile tugging at my lips. An answering one lights up his face, transforming him from fierce to fiercely happy as he sweeps me up bridal style and twirls me in a circle. As I catch sight of the glittering crystals in the cave’s ceiling reflecting the beautiful pool’s light, I can’t help but let out a delighted laugh.
I am in a secret paradise, playing with a legendary creature in a hot spring. But I don’t laugh because it’s silly, I laugh becauseit’s beautiful and free and simple and easy. I laugh because I think this is how life is supposed to feel. I had been so busy trying to get ahead and please everyone and achieve some elusive version of happiness that it took nearly dying to show me what it really means to live.
The snow and suffocation, betrayal and degrees, the elusive flower, even Ben, all just fall away. The simple joy of warm water, the natural beauty of the earth, a kind soul wanting to hear my laugh—this is living. I surprise us both when I reach up and lay a steaming hand along his jaw, finding his skin hotter than the water.
The second my fingers brush against him, his gaze locks onto mine, unblinking, hungry in an entirely different way. His grip on my waist tightens, his breath hitching ever so slightly. A flicker of something dangerous, something barely restrained, flashes through his eyes.
This time, safe in his arms, our laughter echoing in the caves around us, it doesn’t feel too big or too much. It feels just right. I know I should move my hand. I should not want this. I should be terrified, running, questioning my sanity. But instead, I tilt my chin up, caught in the blizzard of his gaze, and think—maybe I was meant to be lost, just so he could find me.
Because right now, I feel like I’m drowning all over again. I need to be saved for the third time today. And the only thing that can save me is his mouth on mine.
Chapter Seventeen
Dahlia
The already humid air thickens with the tension that blooms between us like a rare flower, beautiful and exotic. His eyes reflect my hunger back at me, but where mine is uncertain, his is knowing. Calculated. Patient.
Instead of giving in to my clear, desperate desire for a kiss, he tilts his head, studying me like I’m something fragile. Like I am already his. Then, with deliberate slowness, he runs his tongue over his lower lip, sharp teeth peeking out just enough to make my stomach flip.
Hypnotized, I follow the motion, my breath stuttering, because I swear I can feel it tracing over my skin already—his mouth dragging over my throat, my collarbone, lower—the strong tongue and wicked teeth laving my flesh.
He slides me down his body and sets me back on my feet. But as if he can’t bear to be away from my touch, he takes my hands. His fingers engulf mine, warm and steady, grounding me even as the water makes my body weightless. The calluses on his palms are rough, but the way he holds my hands is gentle.
Too gentle.
Because I see the way he looks at me. Like he’s holding back a force more powerful than an avalanche, with the unshaken resolve of the mountain itself. His eyes burn brighter than the bioluminescence curling around us, the swirling depths of silver and gray mystical. A storm barely held in check. A beast in a gilded cage of control.
And I am so damn tired of cages.
I want to feel something real. Something wild. Something I don’t have to apologize for wanting. I step closer, and his breath hitches.
I should be careful. I should think this through. But the words should and can’t and impossible have been ruining my life for years, and I don’t care anymore.
Not when his thumb traces slow circles over the back of my hand, as if memorizing the shape of me. Not when his chest rises and falls just a little too fast, his jaw tight, like he's holding himself together by the thinnest of threads.
Not when my body is begging me to break it.
I look up at him, tilting my chin so my lips part just slightly, an invitation without words.
And he—he doesn’t move, as still as the stone caverns around us. The storm in his gaze rages, but he doesn’t falter. Doesn’t take.
