Page 110 of Gilded Curses

“What are you doing?” he asked.

“Removing the tracking spell.”

“No. Leave it.”

“But it’s what you’ve been asking for ever since I put it on you.”

“I know, but now I want you to find me whenever you need me. I won’t let there be a time when you can’t.”

A lump formed in Sahira’s throat as she stared at him. “You just want me to get trapped with you again if you stumble into another Cursed Realm,” she quipped as she tried to keep herself from crying.

He grinned at her. “I did enjoy being stuck with you. It was the best thing that ever happened to me.”

Unable to stop it, a single tear fell free. He wiped it away with the pad of his thumb. “Me too.” She swallowed the lump in her throat. “Then the spell will stay.”

“Good.”

“Okay.” Looking to change the subject, she recalled her conversation with her brother. “Del asked me if I thought you might be my consort.”

“What do you think?”

“I don’t know. I never considered it until he mentioned it. I knew vampires had consorts, but it never crossed my mind it could be you… probably because you pissed me off so much.”

He grinned. “But I turn you on more.”

She rolled her eyes but couldn’t stop smiling back at him. “Maybe.”

“Maybe?”

He ran his hand up her back in a leisurely caress that caused her eyes to close as a shiver of pleasure ran up her spine. Lifting his head, he nibbled at her bottom lip before slipping his hand between her legs.

“This is far more than a maybe,” he said against her mouth as his finger stroked her wetness.

“Maybe not,” she teased.

With a growl, he hooked his leg around her and spun her to the side so he was on top, looking down. His shaft lengthened against her. Sahira had to bite her lip to keep from squirming beneath him.

“You know,” he said as his eyes settled on hers, “when all this is over, Brokk’s home, and Lexi and Cole are married, I’m going to ask you to marry me.”

Her eyes widened at his words. “Orin—”

“You don’t have to say anything now because I’m not asking yet, but you should know my intentions. After Lexi and Cole have their wedding and the time they deserve, our time will come, and once it does, I am going to ask you to marry me.”

At first, she couldn’t speak, but then she beamed at him. “And I’ll say yes.”

The beautiful, cocky smile that could incense as well as melt her heart lit his face. “I already knew that.”

Sahira laughed as she playfully slapped his chest. “Since you intend to marry me, do I finally get to see how many ciphers you really have?”

He tilted his head to the side as he studied her before something in the air changed. Her skin tingled as the power surrounding him wavered before slipping away.

As if someone were taking a pen and writing on him, more ciphers materialized across his flesh. The markings had always been visible across his upper chest and both arms before ending at his wrists.

Now, they spread past his wrist to his fingertips on his remaining hand. She recalled sitting at a table with him and Belda in the Cursed Realm and seeing a flicker of black on the back of his hand. At the time, she’d questioned if it was a hidden cipher; now, she knew it was.

More ciphers etched his chest and abdomen to his waist. When he shifted so she could see his back, she noted they ran down to his waist there too.

“Oh, Hecate,” she breathed as her fingers traced the marks. “They’re beautiful.”