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Because that’s what these past days had been.
Pure, unadulterated torture.
Close enough to drink in her jasmine scent, close enough to touch her velvet skin. Close enough to feel the hatred drifting off her in waves every time she set eyes on me.
I took another drink, clenching my hand into a fist beneath the table, willing some of this fucking fear to go away. After a fucking eternity, the shaking stopped, my breathing regulated.
Tristan was already half in his cups, my uncle lost in his bullshite story, but Lucius…My father watched me, even when he didn’t seem to be.
A habit of his and one I detested.
Acting like he cared when he did not give a shite. Pretending he wanted a relationship with me when he’d had a hundred years to build one and hadn’t bothered.
And what in the holy fuck was wrong with my father? He was stuck half shifted, like a pup, something I’d never seen before, much less from my own kin. Much less from aMontgomery.My grandfather’s idea of being a Montgomery involved backbones and honor and a menagerie of old-fashioned ideas that both Dane and I rejected.
Julian, however…Julian had embraced those ideals.
Julian, who’d been in love with Anaria from the very beginning. Or rather, he’d loved the idea of her saving the world and ushering in a new age, where all three realms were united and these endless wars were over. But Julian always was a dreamer.
And just like that, my brother’s ghost swept in to ruin what might have been a good drunk. Once, Julian would have been sitting right beside me. No, he would have been sitting there, right beside my father. The two of them together, me and Dane on the other side of the table, trading our bullshite stories while Julian and Lucius had their heads together and…
I sucked in a breath.
I would not do this tonight.
I would not replay the past, over and over again, hoping for a different outcome. Julian was dead. Lucius could care less about me.
And I would never have Anaria, no matter how much I wanted her.
8
ANARIA
“This was mine; now it’s yours.”
Raziel dropped a well-worn pack in front of me then nodded to the enormous pile of luggage piled in the bedroom I’d chosen. “Tavion must have lugged everything you own from Blackcastle. But we’ll be traveling light tomorrow.”
“I won’t need much.” It wasn’t like the trunks of fancy ball gowns and jeweled slippers would do me much good where we were headed. Right now, the leathers I wore were the most valuable things I owned.
This bedroom had once been as grand as any in the Fae King’s palace or the Shadow King’s Keep. Now moonlight streamed in through the holes in the motheaten drapes, dust motes floating in the silvery beams.
“At least there’s a real bed,” I whispered against Raz’s lips, pulling out both his daggers and dropping them to the floor with a thud that echoed through the entire castle. My other hand slid beneath his shirt, my fingers greedily caressing warm muscle and skin.
“I’ve definitely slept in worse places,” he agreed, urging me to lift my foot so he could slip the knife out of my boot before he worked open my jacket. He palmed my breast with a soft laugh and I swayed when his teeth clamped down on my earlobe. Then I was trying to tug his shirt out of his pants so I could touch more of him, my fingers tracing every divot of his taut stomach, the line of hair that disappeared into the front of his pants.
He groaned, and I lost myself in the sound of pure pleasure.
“Gods, I missed you all day.” He moved us closer to the bed, my heart skittering with every brush of his mouth, his exploring fingers. I cupped him through his pants, the hardness I couldn’t wait to have filling me.
“Fuuuck,Anaria. I won’t last if you keep doing that.” He claimed my mouth, fast and hard, giving and domineering at the same time. I wrapped a hand around the back of his neck and met his tongue stroke for stroke until the day’s pent-up aggravation flared.
I broke away, panting slightly.
“I would have rather been riding with you and Tristan than trapped in that carriage with Tavion.”
“Oh, I know.” His grin didn’t have an ounce of apology, and I caught his bottom lip between my teeth with a low growl. Then his tongue was in my mouth, and I forgot what I was angry about. I only knew how good he tasted.
“You realize this could be our last chance for a while.” Raz stripped off my jacket, and we became a flurry of hands and lips and primal pleasure until cold mountain air chilled my skin everywhere except where I was pressed up against him.
