Rook squeaked with surprise, her eyes shooting wide.
Breaking the kiss, I frowned. “That’s twice now. What exactlyisthis place? And how the hell do we keep tripping into it?”
“You’re asking me?” She shivered as she stepped out of my embrace. “I had no idea the first time, and I’m even more confused now. How are we doing it? Where are we?”
“Your parents never documented anything like this before?”
“No one lived long enough to question them.”
“Do you think it’s death?” I turned slowly on the spot, the light from the swirling snowflakes and embers danced over my skin like smoky starlight. “Is it similar to what people see when they’re dying? You know? Like the light at the end of the tunnel...but for us it’s a snowy purgatory?”
“Maybe?” She padded away, stretching out her arm as mist ribboned around her wrist. “So you’re saying the longer we stay here, the faster we’re dying in the real world?”
I followed her. Every step of my bare feet on the foggy, nondescript ground erased all my aches and pains. Every breath I took fixed what was broken, filling my body with entirely different urges.
I sucked in a breath as my gaze locked on Rook.
She stood just out of reach, and haloed by soft blue light. The white nightgown with its long sleeves and hem clung to her just like the mist weaving around her arms. She looked ethereal and royal and so fucking beautiful it hurt.
She was everything I ever wanted and the only woman I would ever desire. She was my missing piece. I needed her mind, her secrets. I needed her soul entwined with mine forever.
I took a step, then another.
The storm hushed around us as if sensing the rising tidal wave of yearning inside me.
The starvation was back, but this time...it knew exactly what it wanted.
It wasn’t food or drink...it’s her.
It wouldalwaysbe her.
“Rook.” My voice came out rough and reverent.
She spun to face me, a faint flush pinking her skin beneath the stencils of white snowflakes. Her ice had returned, and the familiar delicious coldness tamed me, seduced me.
She didn’t speak as I closed the distance between us, my hands rising to frame her face. My thumbs brushed the delicate skin beneath her eyes, tracing the shadows of exhaustion that even this place couldn’t fully erase. “I need you.” Pressing the softest kiss to her forehead, I murmured, “I need you with every bone in my body, and the longer we exist in this place, the stronger the urge becomes.”
Her lips parted with a quiet moan as I bent over her and dusted her brow, nose, and cheeks in kisses, heading toward her mouth.
“Lucien...” Her fingers curled into the front of my shirt; the same one I’d been wearing when we collapsed back in the real world. “But if we’re dying, shouldn’t we—”
“Enjoy the final moments we have left?”
She huffed breathlessly as I changed direction and kissed her throat instead.
She moaned again. “You make a good point.”
From the very first moment I’d seen her in Cinderkeep, I’d been besotted, but...this was different. This was deep and raw andurgent.
“I need you more than I’ve ever needed anything in my entire life.” I kissed her neck, nipping gently with my teeth. I breathed her in and that delectable scent of frost and sugar shot up my nose as if I inhaled her very spirit.
I froze at the thought.
Spirit...
Could that be what this place was?
A hidden pocket in the bond we shared, allowing us to connect in an entirely different way than normal?
