Byron kisses the back of my head. “Absolutely amazing.” He pauses. “Can you stay, or will your dad worry if you’re gone too late?”
A smile slips across my lips. “He couldn’t keep avoiding his weekend business trips. He won’t be home to notice where I am until tomorrow evening.”
“Perfect,” Salvatore rumbles, stroking my hair.
My eyelids drift shut.
My last thought before sleep settles over me is that this is the first time since Asher died that I’ve really felt safe.
Forty
Byron
Irest my head next to Elodie’s as her breath evens out into the softer rhythm of sleep. This close, I’d swear I can feel the slowing thump of her pulse through the mark on my palm.
With every inhalation, more of her sweetly tangy scent seeps into my lungs. I want to wrap myself in it, to smell nothing else for the rest of my life.
When I pictured myself with a match before, I never imagined an interlude like this, getting her off with another man. But feeling her come so thoroughly apart between us… I don’t think I could give it up now that I know what it’s like, even to have her all for myself.
Elodie needs more than one match. The sense of my own glim tickling through my nerves is giddying, like I’ve got electricity literally flowing through my veins. With a glim like hers…
I can’t help wondering just how much power she holds in this slim body that she hasn’t even uncovered yet.
Why else would fate have given her four mates to balance her out?
That line of thinking makes my chest clench up. I prop myself up on my elbow to get a better look at my match’s peaceful face—and to glance over her at my partner in our interlude.
Salvatore hasn’t dozed off either. When I first look at him, he’s gazing at Elodie as avidly as I probably was a moment ago.
I’m still not sure Ilikeher being tied to an unrepentant criminal… but I can admit that he’s proven himself completely devoted. I get the impression he’d sooner off himself than hurt her.
Salvatore lifts his gaze to meet mine and arches an eyebrow. “It’s a little late to get possessive. She has both of us. Deal with it. Soon we’re going to be dealing with the Raiths nosing into the bedroom too.”
Through my instinctive irritation at his tone, guilt pinches at my gut. Can I really be surprised he assumes that’s what I’m thinking?
I shake my head and keep my own voice carefully low to avoid disturbing Elodie’s rest. “I’ve dealt with it. That’s not— Do you ever wonder if we should really be doing this?”
The other eyebrow shoots up. “Doing what—making her come harder than she ever has in her life?”
I wrinkle my nose at his crudeness, but he’s given me a reasonable opening. “We don’t even know if that’s true. She hadyearswith the other versions of us…” The words snag in my throat for a moment before I can force them out. “Do you think it’s right for us to push into their places? Should we be trying to send her back to them?”
A flicker of something that might be anger or fear ormaybe a mix of both tenses Salvatore’s face. “Did she say she wants to go back?”
“I—no. It just seems like an obvious question to ask. If we really care about her?—”
He sets his hand on her side—gingerly, not wanting to wake her any more than I do. “I haven’t got a fucking clue how we’d even start to consider sending her across parallel universes. But more importantly, I don’t think they deserve her. You’ve seen how scared she was to trust us, to let us in. How the hell could she feel like that if they’d treated her right?”
I pause. I hadn’t thought about the situation exactly that way before, but he isn’t wrong. Elodie’s reluctance to tell us the truth, to rely on us, to even accept our eyes on her body has gnawed at me.
I assumed it was because of howwe’vetreated her since she arrived… but it isn’t just that, is it? Some of her reactions are clearly deeper rooted, twisted up in insecurities from long before she arrived in our world.
“Mr. Overly Fucking Honorable here,” Salvatore mutters into my silence. “Don’t youwanther? If you’re not committed to making this union work, there’s a door right over?—”
“No.” My horror at the idea of leaving Elodie propels the refusal from my throat before he can finish his sentence. “No, I—I just want whatever’s best for her.”
My gaze drops to her sleeping form again. The swell of emotion in my chest creeps up my throat. Every particle of my being thrums with the need to shelter her, to please her…
“I love her,” I say, knowing it down to my bones as I form the words. I repeat it with proper emphasis. “Iloveher.”
