Page 47 of A Castle of Broken Memories

“Now you sound like Tenebris,” I taunted, working my way around the bed in case another pillow had fallen onto the floor.

“Oh, now you’re gonna get it,” Jack growled. He lunged forward, pillow swinging over his head, and I darted backward to avoid being hit—only to trip on a box half-hidden beneath a pile of rumpled clothes. I fell onto my butt in a fit of un-Mari-like giggles.

“You win,” I gasped between bouts of laughter. “I’ll be serious.”

Jack stood over me, one eyebrow raised. “Take back your Tentacles comment, and you’ve got yourself a truce.”

“Yes, yes. You’re nothing at all like Tenebris. Polar opposites, really. Happy?”

He held out a hand. “For now.”

I rolled my eyes but accepted the proffered hand, allowing him to pull me up onto my feet.

He didn’t let go.

I didn’t move away.

His free hand drifted upward, caressing my cheek with the delicate softness of a butterfly.

The laughter fell from my lips, which suddenly felt terribly dry.

I licked them.

His gaze followed.

I couldn’t move, couldn’t breathe.

He tugged me closer, face lowering toward mine. “Mari.”

That’s all it took. Just one word and the ever-increasing proximity of the boy I’d tried so hard to forget and the man I was slowly learning would never leave my heart. He made me both weak and strong by turns, and there was nothing—literally nothing—I could do about it. Because it was him. It would always be him. I was done fighting.

“Jack.”

My hand curled around the back of his neck, fingers tunneling through his hair. The other slid beneath his vest and splayed over his heart—it pounded against my palm, each beat a match striking in my core.

And then his lips were on mine, and I was ablaze. I tore at his buttons. He fumbled with my cloak. Lips locked in a desperate need to stay connected, we clumsily shed each other’s clothes like drunken virgins on the brink of eruption. My shirt hit the floor beside his, and I fell back on the bed, greedy hands pulling him along with me.

And landed on something hard.

I broke our kiss long enough to dig beneath rumpled bedding and find the offending object. When I pulled it out, I expected to see yet another toy, but what I found was an egg.

A golden egg.

“The fuck is this?”

“Don’t know, don’t care,” Jack rumbled against my neck, his mouth blazing a steady path south now that it’d been freed from my own. I chucked the metal egg to the side as he tugged the laces free on my pants, loosening them just enough to make room for his hand while it slid beneath the leather. Calloused fingers rubbed against my clit, and I arched my hips with a feral moan.

My alpha roared with the pressing need, and I wrapped my legs around Jack’s waist, rolling him over onto his back. His expression was nothing short of awed as he stared up at me, lips parted and pupils blown to hell, and he kept those eyes on mine while his finger slipped inside, curving to hit the spot he used to know so well. He kept it there as I shuddered, hips grinding against his hand. Watching me as he added a second finger, thumb circling my clit.

Watching as I rode him straight over the edge.

My walls clenched around his work-roughened digits, and I slumped forward onto his broad chest while the release flooded my system.

His hands splayed over my back. “Gods, I’ve missed seeing that.”

I nipped at his shoulder. “You know what I’ve missed?”

His voice grew husky with need. “What?”