AllFreeNovel
Share Us
We dunk her hair together, running our fingers through her wet locks on either side. Alek watches my movements closely and mimics them with careful precision.
Ivy sprawls out languid between us, her eyes closed. “Maybe we need to send an army of courtesans to deal with the scourge sorcerers,” she murmurs absently. “Anyone would give up just about any information when they’re getting this kind of treatment.”
Alek chuckles, but the offhand remark pierces right through the center of me.
I’ve found out everything I can from my past clients and my leisure activities around the college. None of the bug club members we’re keeping an eye on have been in the habit of hiring anyone from the companionship division.
But that isn’t the only place we might find useful information. Ster. Torstem has been taking his accomplices out of the college—out of the city—for all those bug club expeditions and who knows what else…
The image floats through my mind of my mother’s friend Laselle. Stopping by every month or two to lounge alongside my mother, her loose white-blond curls bobbing with her expansive movements as she gossiped about her clients.
Laselle has been in business for decades now, catering to the counts and provints on the estates closest to the capital. The conspirators won’t have been able to gotoofar abroad.
It’s possible they’ve left behind evidence of their dealings that someone has noticed and commented on.
My stomach tightens up at the idea of seeking Laselle out. The last words she ever said to me still ring out from the memory—that brief conversation at my mother’s funeral.
I hope you make something of yourself, Casimir. A good woman was ruined to bring you into this world. You’d better do her legacy proud.
They used to make a game of it, her and my mother, having me perform for them and criticizing every tiny error. At the age of six, I once pinned and re-pinned Laselle’s hair until my fingers started to bleed while she sneered at every effort I made.
Gods only know what she’d make of the man I’ve become. Of the quest I’ve devoted myself to that’s nothing like what my mother expected of me.
But what does her opinion mean compared to the chance to make Ivy’s task easier? If I can dredge up a clue that’ll help us expose the conspirators’ plans sooner, extricate her from their grasp before they harm her even more…
That would be worth just about anything.
Ivy teases her fingers along my chin and tugs me into a kiss. My pulse hitches eagerly as I drink in the sweet heat of her lips.
Apparently we are going to have more than just a bath—and I certainly won’t complain. I’ve been longing to feel this woman’s body against mine since our first and only full encounter weeks ago.
When she turns her head to seek out Alek’s mouth in turn, I nip her earlobe and flick my tongue along her jaw, earning myself a gasp.
I know I can be everything she needs. I can bring her pleasure and a way out.
It could be a dangerous journey. I’ll need to travel the estates alone to track Laselle down while keeping my true purpose hidden, and a courtesan on the roads can draw the wrong kinds of attention.
And that’s fine. Why shouldn’t I risk my life when Ivy already has and will again, over and over, until we see the scourge sorcerers fall?
Twenty-Nine
Ivy
Ithought being enveloped between two stunning men in the meeting room was a thrilling experience. Finding myself pinned between them in the steamy water of the bathtub, our naked skin softened by Casimir’s oils, is so overwhelming I might be drowning in delight.
It’d certainly be an incredible way to go.
With every brush of their hands over my body and every collision of our lips, the anguish of the past day melts away. I tug Alek even closer, arch back into Casimir’s caresses, longing to lose myself in the pleasure of this moment as deeply as I can.
So much of my life right now is out of my control. It’s barely mine at all.
But this—the unexpected connection I’ve found with these two men that I can hardly believe is real—is all mine. I want to own it, revel in it.
I shift around to reclaim Casimir’s mouth, and he strokes his hand over my bare breast. As I gasp into the kiss, Alek slides a tentative but no less eager hand down my side to my hip.
My head is spinning with the heat of the water and their bodies, with the sensations flooding me from both sides. Julita drew back into the farthest depths of my skull sometime after we got into the bath—I can barely sense her presence.
But through the blissful haze, a thread of uneasiness wriggles into my awareness. The memories of Benedikt’s face revealed beneath the shroud, of his smirk when he raised his bow to shoot at me, linger on.
