“Are you a healer?”
“No. I only know it to be true.” He steps closer to me, lifts a hand to my face, and my breath leaves my body. “Don’t you feel it?”
“Feel it?” My mind blanks out as his rough fingertips trace my cheekbone, my chin, my mouth. Such a warm hand—do werewolves really run hotter?—and so strong. Possessive.
Then he steps back with a curse, releasing me.
Leaving me again breathless.
And he starts stripping.
CHAPTER THIRTY-EIGHT
VALERIAN
“What are you doing?” she asks, but her voice is a little faint. “Valen…”
“Taking a bath. Before the water gets cold. You should hurry up, too.”
“Hurry up?” she repeats.
“Undress. Get into the water. Unless you’d rather watch?”
An indrawn breath. “Watch? No. And I’m not… not getting into a tub with you!”
“Why not? It’s pleasant. Have you never shared a bath with anyone?”
“No.”
“You don’t know what you’re missing.” I have to peel the pants off me; the fabric is in shreds, sticking to various cuts and abrasions. “And seriously, woman, I’m being practical. This isn’t your manor. Nobody will come to empty the dirty, cold water and refill the tub. I don’t curry that much favor, not without coin.”
“So they simply assumed we’d share the bath?”
“We share the room. The bed.” I finally remain in my stained underpants. “Why not the bath?”
She’ll never join me in the tub, and deep inside, I knew that. Biting back a grin, I turn around, ready to tell her she can go first, and I’ll take the cold, filthy water afterward. I don’t even mind. Anything for my princess, dammit.
But I find her right in front of me. “Wait.”
“What’s going on in your pretty head?”
“I’m too inexperienced,” she whispers, her gaze dipping between my legs, then away. “Too naïve.”
Her cheeks are red. She looks adorably embarrassed and unsure. I’d give my right ball to know what’s going on in her mind. I tease and tease, hoping to get her to open up, relax, let down her guard, but I hadn’t meant to hurt her.
“Princess…” I start.
“I will.”
I frown. “You will, what?”
“Bathe with you.”
I almost laugh out loud, barely containing myself in the last moment. “Really?”
“You invited me in, didn’t you?”
“Sure did,” I rumble, “but…”
