"Sorry, I was just trying to see where you find the audacity to make comments like that at me."
He snorts, rolling his eyes at my shit joke. "I mean it."
"I have no plans to, not that it's any of your nosy, over-entitled business." I’ve never considered marrying Stellan before, but I sure as fuck am tempted to now, just to spite the Forest King. Stellan would definitely play along.
"Do youwantto?"
Fucking hell.Clearly not enough people have told this man he’s an imbecile. I vow to make it my mission to make up for lost time on that front. "I'm not sure. I don't think I'd make a good wife."
"Why?"
I instinctively laugh out loud and gesture at my general being. "Just look at me, Rexxan."
"I can't stop looking at you these days," he states, his dark gaze staring at his sword as he twirls it around skillful fingers. He says it not as a flirtatious compliment, but as an angered confession, like he’s given this fact too much thought already.
Everything he does is inherently attractive, and I wonder if he knows that. I feel the attraction. Attraction is an understatement—he has kept me up most nights—but I didn't realise it was quite so mutual.
I have to get out of here. The closer I get to him, the sooner he’ll realise the other reason that I’m here. Or worse still, who I am. "I'll come and read and sign this agreement, and you won't see me again."
He nods, and like the taciturn grump that he is, says nothing. I wish I could see even a slither of the real him. All I see is the eerily clever, ice-cold brute of a warrior who doesn't say one genuine thing. He says thatisthe real him, but I see in both Ocealia and Lynna’s eyes that they adore him like family. Could they love him so much if he were really that cold?
I shake my head to stop myself from thinking about him, and then realise that to Rexxan, I look like I’m having a twitching attack. Could I play it off as a sneeze? A cough? Fuck me, what has he done to me? I’m supposed to bethemost dangerous woman on this earth.
"I should go,” I declare, freeing my hand from his touch. I feel pulled to him like a magnet. It's unexplainable and it's throwing me off my usual ruthless schedule. Cold floods my skin from the loss of contact, and I miss the feel of his rough, hot hand against mine. He always seems to feel like a furnace, and now I wonder if it’s caused by his burns.
I pick up all four of my knives, my two swords, my bow, and my arrows, giving Rexxan a bright smile. "Sweet dreams?"
He says nothing, his face emotionless as I turn on my heel to leave.
"Left.” His husky voice breaks the silence, halting me in my tracks.
"Huh?"
"Left. The way to your room is on the left."
"Err..."shit. This area of the palace is a maze. Didn't I come from the right? Or was that the way to the libraries? No, that was the way to the meeting halls. "Left. I remember. And then….”
"Left, down past the Great Hall, right through the golden doors, through the sixth door on the left and down the hall."
I nod, remembering now. "Goodnight, Rexxan."
He stands, still twirling his sword. He’s so astronomically massive that his weapon is almost as long as I am. That did not sound right, and now I’m blushing again because I have the mind of a teenager. “Something on your mind, Commander?” He asks, his thumb rubbing his jaw as he arches an eyebrow at me.
“Your genitalia,” I clap back, and he almost chokes as he shakes his head at me in ill-conceived despair.
"I'll walk you back. I don't want you and your horrific sense of direction getting lost.”
"I remember now, so you don’t have to. Or are you that desperate to follow me around like a sad puppy?”
His reply comes without hesitation. “I’m desperate to follow you around.”
I’m laughing as he steers me left, walking beside me as I half-jog to keep up with his giant strides. I spoke at length with Lynna, his...lover? Friend? I don’t know what she is to him, but I do know that she is so attractive that I failed to form a full sentence in the first five minutes after meeting her. She told me that his grandfather was one of the gods, and was seven feet tall, so his size makes sense now.
"Where is your son?"
"He's at sea at the moment. He is a free spirit; he's never here. He works as a scout mostly."
"I think that's the most you've ever said in one go about something that isn't work."
