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And then I kissed her.
I’m not sure what came over me; I simply needed my lips against hers like I needed air in my lungs. And she seemed to feel the same. Her mouth pressed forward eagerly.
She was always so fervent about the idea of intimacy between us. Her enthusiasm, charm, and all-out joy was addictive as hell. I wanted to own it for myself. Own her in a way I’d never been connected to anyone.
It wasn’t just a mere tupping I craved, either. Yeah, I wanted to bed her, but I also ached to share pieces beyond the physical, some inner connection of the mind and spirit that bound us implicitly, until we were—ah shit.
Like soul mates.
I tore away from her, remembering I didn’t believe in such things. And then everything else came back as well: reality, and the fact that I had lied to her since I’d met her, and that I really didn’t have time to stand here, shoving my tongue down her throat.
Sable waited.
“Fuck,” I hissed, backing away and wiping my hand across my mouth. I shook my head, eying her warily. “I shouldn’t have done that.”
Her eyes softened as if she felt bad for me. Then she stepped forward. “But, Farrow. It’s okay. We’re—”
“No.” I pointed at her sternly. “Do not try to foist that true-love rubbish on me again. It’s not so. I am not your other half, princess. And someday, I’ll prove it, and you’ll know all the lore behind your special tattoo is just a sham.”
Whenever she learned everything and could look at me with nothing but hate, she’d realize it with stark, ugly facts.
She paused at my tone and blinked, only to repeat, “A sham?” Her voice held more surprise than anger or hurt feelings, however. Then she sniffed out an amused sound. “You mean proof like that hole you no longer have in your shoulder from the arrow wound?”
My hand immediately sought my shoulder.
Hell fire. I’d forgotten about being shot by the arrow. Too much had happened in the last five minutes to keep track of everything. But when I prodded the area, trying to determine how bad off I was, all I found was dried blood smeared across my upper torso.
The wound had healed completely.
Smirking triumphantly, Nicolette arched an eyebrow. “Forgot I’d kissed that all better, didn’t you?”
I shook my head, unable to buy her story. “This only tells me you possess some kind of magical healing qualities. Maybe the tattoo contains medicinal herbs that can self-heal you and those that you kiss.” I shrugged. “It would explain why High Cliff amassed such a grand army. They can patch whatever wounds they accrue in battle and keep going.”
Nicolette rolled her eyes and folded her arms across her chest. “Now that’s just absurd.”
“It is,” I agreed when a buzzard cawed overhead. “About as absurd as being able to spot your true love at first sight, I’d say.” I glanced up at the circling bird, realized it had friends with it, and then dropped my attention to the bodies sprawled around us. “We need to go.”
“Oh, you’re not getting out of this conversation so easily,” she countered.
“I didn’t figure I would.” Slightly out of breath as I rushed to round up Mint and Caramel, I glanced her way. “But we’ll have to postpone it for another time, princess, before more Far Shore border radicals show up to greet us in a similar fashion or those buzzards mistake us for one of the dead and try to have us for breakfast.”
Nicolette looked up uneasily and winced. “I suppose you’re right.” She fumbled in her haste to mount Caramel when I tossed the horse’s reins to her.
Before scrambling into the saddle myself, I relieved a few of the deceased of their weapons and then leaped onto Mint.
Wrinkling her nose, Nicolette said, “I hope you mean to clean that chain mace. It’s positively nasty.”
“Oh, aye,” I told her with a wink. “It’s my first order of business once we get ourselves out of immediate, mortal danger.”
Urging the horse into action, I spurred us forwar
d and guided her toward the tree line that signified the boundary of my homeland. We hadn’t even stepped into Far Shore yet, and danger had already doubled. Maybe it would be best to tell Nicolette the truth now so she could return home while still on Donnelly soil. The scorpions would provide her with safe passage, I was sure. Those fucking bugs adored her.
But when I glanced her way, I couldn’t seem to part with her just yet. Her hair was still mussed from kissing me, a smudge of dirty sand streaked across one cheekbone from our skirmish with the renegades, and she still held that metal tube of death down at her side as if ready to defend us against the next attack.
It was the most glorious sight I’d ever seen.
A part of me began to wonder…
