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I pocket the flute and dive for the side of the cliff where we ascended earlier. The chimera snarls, awakened from its magical stupor. And it sounds pissed about the entire ordeal.
Right as I slide toward the edge, ready to flip around and start scaling back down, arms slide around my waist. Cold, strong, capable arms.
“This will be faster,” he murmurs. My stomach lurches as he picks me up with inhuman strength and dives toward the forest below.
The feeling of the earth leaving my feet sends a wave of panic crashing over me. A carpet of green trees grows closer with every breath. The sun is nearly set, only a sliver of fiery orange burning through the top of the forest canopy, dusky pink and red shafts spearing the air.
Midnight blue wings the same color as his hair beat the air in my periphery.
I’m not going to die because he has wings. The realization is followed by another. He has really cool, really sexy wings.
Once the thought settles into my brain, I relax in his arms. My fear melts away as I focus on the prince’s body touching mine. His cheek pressed against my cheek. His fingers splayed over my stomach.
Does he notice the way my new abs (thanks, Eclipsa) tremble at his touch? Does his body sing with excitement at being so close to me?
Oberon’s beard, I need to get a grip.
All too soon, the swampy mud squelches beneath my boots. But he doesn’t let go. If anything, his arms tighten.
Whoa.
My body responds, pushing into him. The feel of his cool, muscular form like a drug sizzling through my veins.
Oh, God. I like this feeling.
The pulse in my wrist throbs. My head spins as a hollow ache opens up inside my belly. The prince turns me to face him, or perhaps I do that on my own. It’s all jumbled. My name forms on his lips, is whispered so softly I think I imagined it.
Then he’s pressing me into the rocky cliff base. His wings—Holy Fae his beautiful midnight blue wings—spread wide behind him, encapsulating us. There’s something feral and raw about his expression that should scare me.
It really should.
But it doesn’t. Quite the opposite.
“Summer.” His voice is raspy and low, his breath a cold wind. His nostrils flare as he inhales me, his pupils enlarging at whatever he smells.
Knowing what he can do, I should be terrified this close to him. At the very least, I should despise him for the way he’s treated me. The secrets I know he keeps. But I’m not in control of my body or the way it reacts to him.
I reach up, capture his inky locks inside my fingers. He watches me while I tug softly, marveling at its silkiness.
A memory nibbles the surface of my mind.
“Why do you feel so familiar?” I whisper.
“Because I am.” His fingers trail over my cheek, my lips. I gasp as their iciness leach into the flesh of my neck. Down my throat. Over my collarbone. Despite his frigid skin, the goosebumps his touch conjures, my insides warm and puddle.
Everything feels so out of control.
This is madness; it makes zero sense. I’ve never felt this way about anyone. Or maybe I have . . . but when? Why do I get the feeling it was with him?
His lips skim my ear and I nearly collapse in his arms. A part of me knows he’s affected somehow by the flute. Knows I might be too. Knows—and doesn’t care.
This is right; so very right.
“You asked me earlier what I felt around you.” His lips drag down my neck, tasting me. His arms slide around my waist and pull me tight. “Every moment I’m around you, every time I hear your laugh, all I can think about is this. Touching you, holding you. The way you taste. I want to be near you always, Princess.”
A low, groaning sound slips from his mouth.
I want to ask him how that’s possible, when he so clearly hates me. But not right now.
