And Erevos tensed.
She saw the way the muscles across his arms, shoulders, and neck tightened all at once, like cords pulled taut beneath his skin.
“Oh, I’m so sorry!” she blurted, her hands lifting instinctively, moving to his face without thinking, her palms cupping the sharp lines of his jaw.
She realized what she was doing only after the warmth of him burned against her skin, and she started to pull away??—
But Erevos leaned down and caught her hands with his face again.
A low, deep sound rumbled from his chest, so heavy and deep that for a second, Lyssena thought the bed beneath them was about to crack apart.
As he lowered himself even closer, his body now brushing hers fully, she felt something hard pressing against her knee. Something very, very hard.
And growing.
“Why do you smell so sweet?” he murmured, his voice brushing against her nose. “Too sweet, songbird. What is that?”
Lyssena had been brave yesterday—and apparently, today as well—because the next thing that came out of her mouth was something scandalous, something she never imagined she would dare say aloud, or frankly, even think of.
With her heart pounding against her ribs, she whispered, “Could you find where it’s coming from?”
And the moment the words left her lips, her hands flew up to her face, covering her cheeks in hot, trembling panic.
Since when did she speak like that?
Perhaps since her Erevos had reclined in that ridiculous, charming pose, or since his deep voice had started saying things that curled around her thoughts.
She wasn’t entirely sure what he smelled on her, but she had a very specific suspicion. Maybe it was something wet. Something between her thighs.
At least . . . that was what shesecretlywanted to believe, for no reason at all.
Right?
Erevos was so close now, so unbearably close, that if he had a nose, he would’ve surely bumped it against her hands from how quickly and firmly she pressed them against her burning face.
After a long, low hum, he dipped his head to the crook of her neck and inhaled again, and Lyssena exhaled just as deeply, unable to hold it in, her breath trembling on the way out.
No man had ever looked at her like Erevos did—unblinking, intense, as though her soul lived beneath her skin and he could see it—and after asking a question so sinful, so suggestive, having him stare into her eyes now was challenging to think of anything.
She could barely hold it.
The room was so quiet that all Lyssena could hear—besides the frantic thrum of her own heartbeat—was the shifting of sheets as Erevos moved lower, his massive body sliding down the bed as he sought the source of the sweet scent he had spoken of.
He passed over her breasts, though Lyssena found herself wishing he might linger there for just a moment. But he didn’t stop.
And when he reached just above her belly button, a high-pitched, involuntary sound slipped from her throat—half gasp, half whimper—and Erevos paused, lifting his gaze to hers.
“My apologies,” he said, and lifted himself back up, rising to sit on his heels.
It was only then that Lyssena realized her eyes had been closed.
She had been so tense, so consumed by everything happening around and inside her, that she hadn’t even noticed how her nerves had taken control.
She blinked, staring at the ceiling above her—a canopy of black and lace—and tried to breathe, tried to anchor herself in something real before turning her eyes toward Erevos.
And what she saw made her breath catch all over again.
There were spikes—thick, long, jagged spikes—jutting from the back of his head, down along his spine in a sharp, dangerous trail that hadn’t been there before.
