Rhen’s gaze traveled over her slowly.
The woman who had arrived cloaked in rain and magic was beautiful, but desire alone did not explain the force of his reaction. His body knew the shape of her before his hands touched it, and every curve struck him with the violence of remembrance denied.
She shifted beneath his stare.
“Are you reconsidering?”
“No.”
The answer came too quickly to contain doubt.
Rhen removed his clothing and returned to the bed, although he kept his weight braced away from her weakened body. She reached for him immediately, drawing her hands along his chest as though learning him by touch.
When his mouth returned to hers, she wrapped one leg around his hip and pulled him closer.
The heat between them became unbearable.
Rhen’s hand moved down her side, following the curve of her waist until his fingers reached the inside of her thigh. He paused there, watching her face.
“Still your choice.”
“Yes.”
He touched her.
Her breath broke against his mouth as his fingers moved between her thighs, finding her already wet and trembling.Rhen watched every change in her expression, learning which pressure made her hips lift and which slow movement drew his name from her.
“Rhen.”
The sound of it in her voice nearly ended his control.
He lowered his mouth to her throat, stopping above the place where his blood had begun changing her. His fangs remained hidden.
“I will not bite you.”
“Why?”
“Because we have enough unknown magic between us without adding another blood exchange.”
Her fingers moved into his hair.
“That may be the most sensible thing you have said.”
“Do not become accustomed to it.”
She laughed softly, and the sound struck him with such profound familiarity that he stopped breathing.
For an instant, the room disappeared.
He heard that laugh in a sunlit library, beside a garden wall, and across a dining table surrounded by brothers who had temporarily remembered how to behave like men instead of weapons.
Then the memory vanished.
The woman beneath him touched his face.
“Where did you go?”
Rhen caught her wrist.
