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After removing his boots, he’s climbing into bed with me. The goose-feather mattress creaks as his weight settles in, leg touching my leg, arm pressed against my arm. Nothing to see except the soft glow of the lamps, flickering across the ceiling.
Will he touch me again now that we’re away from the wandering eyes of the tavern?
Dessin shifts to get comfortable and brushes my leg with his own. He stills.
“Not a lot of room,” he justifies. I can hear his breath, his heartbeat, his mind racing. The hairs on his leg tickle my knee as I shift it to rest over his thigh.
He doesn’t move an inch.
“It’s more room than your creaky bed at the asylum.”
“You’ve been thinking about lying in my bed?” There’s that unmistakable mischief in his tone. I’m glad he can’t see my smile in the dark.
“I haven’t even thought of it until this moment.”
A closed-mouth laugh rumbles under his chest. “Liar.”
It’s chilly in this cave room, but luckily the feathered blanket is trapping Dessin’s radiant body heat around us like a cocoon. Yet I still want him to hold me. I want his arms to pull me against his chest.
“That was quite the convincing performance you put on today,” I muse.
“Oh?” His voice is low and gravelly.
“I thought you were only pretending until I felt it.”
“Felt what?”
I huff. “You know… your excitement.”
“I’m not sure what you mean,” he says, a smile creeping in like a slow leak from a faucet.
“Really? It wasn’t exactly subtle.”
Dessin’s quiet for a moment.
“I’m afraid you’re going to have to show me with your hands.”
I bark out a laugh. “Well played.”
We lie there for several minutes. And it’s long enough that I think he’s sleeping with long peaceful breaths and complete stillness. I close my eyes; briefly, that is until his hand caresses over mine. The tips of his fingers graze my knuckles. And he’s gentle. I ache inside, a slow throb in my heart and between my legs. Please just hold me.
He doesn’t hear my silent plea because he lifts his hand away, slow and hesitant. But I’m not done yet. That can’t be all after everything that’s happened today. I snatch it back, slipping my hand around his, folding my fingers around his palm. I wonder if he can feel my heartbeat through this touch.
Adrenaline runs hot through my veins.
It still isn’t enough. The need to feel his lips on my neck again fills me with wanton urgency. It’s a feral itch in my lower belly. A beastly need to be touched. And I don’t know where it’s coming from. My back arches. My breath quickens.
“If you move your body that way again, we’re going to have a problem,” Dessin growls, sounding strained and almost fearful.
It’s right here in this moment I know how I affect him. Every muscle in his body is stiff and rigid, while mine is floppy and languid. My movements control him, and it’s wildly addicting. To the man who controls all, knows all—I am his downfall.
“What happens if I don’t?”
“Skylenna,” he warns. If it weren’t for the known fact that he won’t hurt me, I might actually take his warning to heart.
“Show me what happens.” It’s indecent and wrong. He’s my friend. He was my patient first. But that time has come and gone, and I desperately need to know what he feels like. The tavern was a taste. It was exhilarating and nothing like our lives back in the city.
His body softens like a sigh of breath. And he doesn’t move.
