Page 233 of Season Warriors & Wolves

“Mal, please.”

He cupped my face so gently for a man who did not know the word gentle, the rough pads of his thumbs softly caressing my cheek. “Don’t beg me,” he breathed, almost tortured. “Don’t beg me. I can’t bear it.” It might have been but a sliver of a moment, but it felt like the longest moment I had lived in when he held me there. Eyes locked. Our breathing synced. His skin on mine. His touch not burning but igniting. “If I am to die with guilt, let it be for this sin,” he said, pulling me to him so every inch of my body was moulded to his hard one.

His lips were soft against mine. He kissed me unhurriedly, gently and carefully—so carefully.

It would haunt me. It would always haunt me, dead or alive. Hells or heavens, it would haunt me.

“So sweet,” he murmured, tugging on my lips. “So damn sweet.”

Let it haunt me.

I rounded my arms around his neck and kissed him back like I wanted him to kiss me. And he did. Finally unsaddling whatever restraint he always held against me.

He felt like rain.

He was rain to me.

“That will take a lot of repenting, little bird,” he said, softly biting my lower lip. “For far too long.”

“We might not have that long.”

He left a few last lingering pecks on my mouth before pulling back. “We will. You will get to kiss many others. You will get your happy ending and you will find someone who wants you like you want to be wanted. You will get it all, I will make sure that you do.”

Except that rain was passing. And I hated sunshine. “I…I want—”

You.

You.

I want you.

He rested his forehead against mine. “What you want is not what you deserve, little bird. You deserve so much more than what you want. One day you will find who you deserve.”

For a moment, I thought about telling him that I didn't care. That I could die happy just wanting him even if I couldn’t have him. But only for a moment. If we lived, I didn’t want him to leave me.

And he would—he would leave me.

Tears burned my eyes, it took everything in me not to cry. “Promise?”

He touched my lips still tasting of him. “Promise.” Slowly, he backed away from me, holding the sceptre. “Stay here. No matter what, do not come down there, alright?”

What?

“What? Why?”

He looked over my shoulder, at where Moregan was now standing. “Make sure she does not go anywhere,” he said to her. “Keep her safe.”

No. No. I shook my head. “Why? They need us. I cannot stay here.”

“Do you trust me?”

“Yes. The only one that I trust.”

“Then you will stay here.”

One moment he was there, the next…gone.

Chapter fifty-two