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{ Chapter 15 }
Though her body still curled around him, the second she twitched and started to move off of him, his arms clamped around her and he leaned to the left, flipping onto his back on the settee with Laney draped over him. He wasn’t ready to give up her naked body on his.
Not yet.
Ever might be too soon.
Her breathing calmed as her face nuzzled against his chest and she reached down alongside the settee, her fingertips brushing along the edge of the Box of Draupnir where it teetered on the top of their pile of clothes. “Why were you so sure that man on the bridge was after the box? How would you know that? Who would even know I have it?”
He tensed for a moment and then had to forcibly relax his muscles under her. His own breath had barely returned to him and mentioning that damn box wasn’t helping the matter.
He shrugged, hoping she hadn’t noticed his instant reaction. “I presumed that was what he was after. There were plenty of easier targets to rob on that bridge, less sheltered reticules to snatch. Why you? Why tempt the fates by picking the woman with the biggest man next to her? Why bother to have to ram in between us to get it? Why not pick a lady out with her maid if some coin was all he was after? It had to have been the box.”
She untangled her naked limbs from him and picked up the box from the clothes. Shifting to sit upright, she squeezed her rear between him and the back of the settee, extending her long—exquisite—legs to drape bare over his thighs.
Flipping the box in her hands, her head tilted to the side as she studied the swirls of the grain, the tip of her forefinger tracing the smooth wood. “What is so damn special about this thing? Morty always said it was invaluable, but Morty also liked to exaggerate things. What do you know of it?”
A sigh stuck in his throat. He knew too damn much.
But he couldn’t tell her that.
“I know the same as you. What Morton told me, showed me.”
Her fingers stilled and she lifted the box between them. “He showed this to you?”
Wes nodded.
“How does it open? Morty told me what was inside, but I haven’t been able to figure it.”
His jaw went stiff. He didn’t want to—didn’t want to show her, didn’t want her to open it. Didn’t want her to know the slightest detail about the box. She was better off not knowing, not understanding.
“Show me, Wes. I can see you know exactly what I’m talking about.”
Stifling a sigh, Wes shifted himself upright, his back along the side rail of the settee, and his hand lifted, his knuckles brushing her hand as he took the box from her grip.
The odd energy of the box trickled into the bones of his fingers, his arms. The fourth time in his life he’d actually held the blasted thing. Hopefully the last.
He twisted the top of the box, making the lid slide to the side. The swirls on the outside of the box integrated so well with the line of the crack, one would have to know how to open it in order to do so.
Without looking into it, he flipped around the open box to Laney. “This is what’s inside.”
She leaned toward it, peering into the box in his palm.
She studied it, her eyes squinting as her head angled to the side to see it in all angles. To look at the nine strands of golden cords woven together to form the ring and then snake about the darkest ruby. “It’s beautiful—strange—but beautiful. But that ring, it’s entwined with the wood. How is one supposed to remove it to wear the ring?”
His fingers twitched, the bottom of the box sizzling into his hand. “It’s not to be worn, as best I can tell. Only the wood wears the ring.”
“Then how—why is it so precious?” Her forefinger went into the box, touching the golden strands of the ring and he almost snapped the box away from her. His eyes closed as he tried to force a calming breath into his lungs. She was too damn close to it.
Her bottom lip jutted upward. “The box, the ring is interesting, yes, the ruby beautiful, but I don’t see how it’s worth a fortune. Morty swore it was worth more than ten golden isles.”
His head quirked to the side. “You don’t hear that hum in your ears?”
“Hum? What hum?”
Wes’s head jerked back. He thought everyone heard the hum—he knew sure as hell Morton had. “Usually people hear a hum, or a buzzing, when they’re near this thing when it’s open.”
Her eyes went wide. “Truly? No, you’re teasing me.” Her head shook. “Why is this a joke to you? Morty thought it was important.”
