“Blood take me,” he growled when I finally released him. He softened a fraction in my hand. His come coated my skin, and remembering how hot it had been, I pulled away my fingers slick with his spend and sucked them in my mouth, mixing the salty taste with the tang of his blood.
I watched him from lowered lashes as his jaw went slack.
I hadn’t known it was possible to shock Raphael like that, but I really, really liked it.
But Raphael wasn’t one to let me have the upper hand for long, even in this. With the urgency dealt with, he took his time to coax me to another orgasm with his fingers, then again with his mouth until I couldn’t even speak, only whimper. I clawed at him, nipping him again. He bit back until we were a mix of blood and sweat and sex.
After ages, we collapsed together on the forest floor, me on top of his chest while he served as a barrier from the cold ground.
The pleasure ebbed, letting my mind wander. I’d never have guessed the evening would end up with this way. There was a new sense of closeness now, one born not just of physical intimacy but of something far more significant.
“What now?” I asked. “Are we supposed to go back to Damerel like nothing happened? What if someone else finds out? Everyone is expecting you to kill the scourge—”
His grip tightened around me. “Don’t call yourself that.”
I couldn’t see him with my head resting on his chest, but I could imagine just how protective he looked in that moment. “It’s what the others will think if they find out. And they probably will, Raphael. I can’t always control it.”
“I know. So does Demos,” he said.
I stiffened. Raphael’s general knew?
“You used your magic on him, whether you knew it or not, one day when training.”
Thea had suspected as much. “He realized?”
“He did. He came to inform me right after, only for me to tell him I was already aware. He was…” Raphael paused, searching for the right term. “. . . displeased I hadn’t informed him. I forbade him from doing anything about it, especially since I suspected you had no idea what had happened.”
No wonder Demos had been wary of me after that. Raphael had kept all this a secret from me, but he’d also protected me. Was that enough?
I hoped so. There were so many problems, so many troubles tangled around us, but I didn’t have it in me to face them tonight. Maybe it was weak, but all I wanted was to stay in Raphael’s arms.
A yawn bubbled out of me as I curled into his chest. “It’ll be dawn soon. We won’t make it back to the castle before the sun is up.”
“Then we’ll stay out here. It’s shaded enough. Like we did before.”
When we’d been traveling through the Witch Kingdom. “Demos will wonder where we are.” Likely he’d hate me even more. If he knew I was the necromancer, that explained the animosity. If anything, it was a surprise he had been half as relaxed around me as he’d been, considering he knew I was the enemy of all vampires.
“Let Demos wonder. He and Larissa can spend all day looking for all I care.”
I lifted my head to frown at Raphael. “What is with you and Larissa?”
It was hardly our biggest problem, but he’d made several comments by now. My mind raced through options. Was she some former lover? I’d never given much thought to Raphael’s history, but now something dark clawed me at the thought of another person getting to experience him like this.
Raphael frowned back, as if he’d hoped I wouldn’t notice the petulant comment. “I don’t like how she looks at you.”
I tried to think back, but she’d only ever been friendly to me. “How’s that?”
“Like she could have you, if you’d let her. Like there’s a chance you might let her.”
“It’s not like that.” She was barely a friend.
“It’s not,” he agreed. “Because I’m a selfish bastard, and you may not be mine, but I won’t let you be anyone else’s.”
Darkly possessive words, said with the cadence of a joke. But I wasn’t even remotely fooled. Something about them warmed me all the same. For so long I’d belonged to no one. And I had little ground to protest, considering how jealous I’d just been at the thought of her being a former lover of his. I let it go with a slight eye roll. “You made a scene at the masquerade over me dancing with another male.”
“Idid?Youjumped off a roof to get away from me,” he countered.
“You slammed a foreign king into a column—no, not just a king. Your brother!” I hadn’t even had time to process the fact that Julian was Raphael’s brother. He’d never even alluded to their relationship.
