The idea that I could feel this way about a male who only just started wanting to be near me was oxymoronic. My only explanation for it was our bond. Or severe emotional trauma.
Little whispers of feeling slithered across my hand, dancing up my arm, around my neck, and playing with my braid. Those damned goosebumps spread down my spine, and I suppressed a shiver, keeping my mind far away from that dream and his bed.
“Are you going to stare at the door the entire time, Hellion?”
“Maybe.”
“Can’t look at me after choosing him?”
I whipped around. “I did not choose him!”
His golden eyes glittered. I snatched my hand back from his.
“I didn’t choose you either!”
He sat up, his shadows brushing my lips and lifting my chin. “Oh, I know, Hellion. I’d thoroughly remember if you chose me.” He saidthoroughlyin a way that had my flush spreading down my neck. Asmug smile played at the edges of his lips, not fully there, but I could tell he was holding one back. I could feel it, but faintly. “Our situation would beverydifferent.”
I swallowed and stood, putting distance between me and his damned caressing shadows. “I’m confident I don’t want to choose either of you. I think I’d rather run away with Alexei. He seems to be the only straight male bringing me any joy lately.”
Ronen’s smile flattened, and he tilted his head dangerously. “Careful. As much as Alexei’s my brother, my shadows can barely handle one male vying for your affections.”
“I don’t believe you.” He would never hurt Alexei. Even for me. I wasn’t sure I could find anyone who would want to hurt the male who leaked humor and smiles everywhere he went. He was a ball of energetic sunshine locked in a warrior’s body.
Ronen quirked a dark brow. “No? You almost received a taste of it in the arena.”
“Because you’redrunk.” Guilt swept back through me, reminding me of his flinch and the way he stormed out.
He analyzed me, face impassive. “I’m not sure why you feel guilty, Hellion.”
I fidgeted with one of the buckles on my uniform. “Because—you know?—”
His face remained blank, waiting. Did he really need me to spell it out for him? He brought it up not even five minutes ago!
“Earlier?”
Ronen’s lips twitched. “Oh. Earlier.”
The ass was doing it on purpose.
He let me stew a bit more, the soft clink of metal filling the silence until I fisted my hand. “You think I was so distraught by you and him that I drank myself into a stupor?” He rose to his full height, sweeping around the bed and backing me into the wall. “You think I could possibly use alcohol to erase a memory that will forever be cut into my mind?” he whispered, running a single finger along my chin, down my neck, and following the line of my braid until it boldly stopped just beneath the curve of my breast.
His lips were right there, taunting me. Just like the desire that teasedour connection. It didn’t matter how muted it was or that with each passing second it faded more behind his block. Not when the heady feeling wrapped around me in an intoxicating embrace, much like his spicy balsam-and-clove scent. Finally, the smile he’d been holding back spread.
He stepped into my body, pressing against me as he leaned down to my ear. I felt like I was burning, melting, falling into a blissful drug. My eyes fluttered as his breath brushed my neck. “I will never forget. So I’ll warn you. If you act on the desire coursing through your body. If you so much as kiss me. I’ll see it as your choice, and I will claim you as mine. And if I ever saw you in that situation with him again after I claimed you, I would kill him.”
Cold air rushed over my heated skin as he eased back. I swallowed, digging my nails into my palms.
“Then I’d have to kill you,” I shot back, the lie easy and thoughtless.
Ronen chuckled.
Frustrated with his smug confidence, I snapped, “So then why were you drunk?”
“Your father isn’t doing well with his grief, and I attempted to help him. It backfired,” he said plainly.
My breath hitched. For a couple hours, I’d forgotten about my mother, even my father. I’d been so distracted by Ronen and Aspen, nothing else seemed to register. How could I have forgotten her? How could I have had a moment of reprieve from this grief?
I clutched at my chest, and my breathing became ragged.
