Chapter 15 #2
Caelian’s mouth opened and closed multiple times, but no words came out.
Because how in the heavens could she explain she’d discovered a most gratifying book, and that it made her practically desperate to lose her virtue.
She could hardly admit such a thing, especially not to Kjeld, but he was staring at her like he was hungry. Starving. And she was his next meal.
“I…it’s a….” She fumbled, licking her lips. A mistake as his heated gaze immediately tracked the movement. “A book.”
“I can see that.” He rounded the desk and strolled toward her. Easy. Unhurried. Unbothered. “What sort of book, Starweaver?”
“The kind…” She swallowed. “Where…”
Where you take me a thousand different ways and I unravel every time.
“Where?” he prompted, closing the distance between them, overwhelming her personal space.
“Where things happen,” she finished pathetically, her voice barely audible in the stillness.
He moved closer and she plastered herself to the bookshelves at her back. Her palms were damp, her chest heaving with each passing second.
“Interesting.” Kjeld snatched the book from her grasp and opened it, his pupils expanding when he caught sight of what she’d been “reading.”
The glow of the lamp flickered over his features, dousing half of him in light and shadow.
Where the golden spill of color hit, that was the Kjeld she knew, the one she continued to love.
But in the darkness, in the crawl of shadows where the light did not reach, that part of him she did not recognize.
That Kjeld was powerful, aggressive, and a little wilder.
He snapped the book shut with a flick of his wrist, then straightened, leaning in to grab the shelf near her head, barricading her against him. “This, my lady, is not the kind of information we’re trying to find.”
Was he angry with her? Teasing her? She couldn’t tell. His expression was too even, too impassive for her to read. His tone wasn’t sharp, but there was also no mockery in his eyes.
Caelian tried to steady her breathing to no avail.
Kjeld was simply too close, too much. It was like the closet all over again.
The solid wall of his chest was shoved against her breasts, making it impossible to find air.
There was only him and his intoxicating scent.
Cold pine. The rush of a frozen river. The tang of the sea.
She drowned in him, melted into him. Her knees softened, her nerves flared to life, sparking at his nearness, silently begging for his touch.
“Of course not.” She couldn’t stop looking at the rugged planes of his face. The shadow of scruff lining his strong jaw. That beautifully jagged scar cutting down his thoroughly kissable lips. “I was…I was just about to put it back.”
The corner of his mouth lifted in a half smile. “I think you’re lying.”
Caelian scowled. How rude of him to verbalize such a thing, even if it were true. “I most certainly am not.”
“Oh, you are.” Kjeld’s voice was decadent, rough like gravel yet smooth like honey, and it made her body quiver with need. “I know for a fact.”
That she found incredibly hard to believe.
She canted her head to one side. “Prove it.”
“Very well.” When he smiled, it was vicious. “If you insist.”
Kjeld dropped the book, and it slammed against the hardwood floor, shattering the quiet of the study.
His hand molded to her hip, the other sliding around the back of her head, exposing her neck.
He dipped low, the warmth of his breath drifting over her skin, sending a shiver of apprehensive delight racing down her spine.
“I can taste your pulse on my tongue.” His whisper made her dizzy. Her mind went foggy, incoherent, as he licked the base of her throat where her heartbeat thundered. Longing coiled through her, tightening, until it was ready to snap. “It flutters, it pumps.”
He shifted, his hardened length nudging against her lower stomach.
“Your heart owns me. It muddles my mind. Its constant beating rushes in my ears and causes my blood to hum.” Kjeld sealed the area his tongue laved with a feathery press of his lips.
“Every moment I spend in your presence is utter agony. But I have my own battles. There are things I…I must learn to accept, to overcome, before—”
He clamped his mouth shut, and she wished he would continue.
For a part of her knew this conversation, whatever it may be, would be pivotal in rebuilding their relationship.
The words that remained unspoken between them were essential, they were carefully laid bricks, each one gradually forming a bridge. A connection. A bond.
“Before what?” she asked, the anguished whisper ripping from some desperate place in her soul.
“Shit.” He pulled back, his gaze darting between the lamp and the door. “The queen. She’s coming this way.”
Caelian couldn’t help it, her jaw dropped. Impossible. There was realistically no way Kjeld could know such a thing. Holding her breath, Caelian kept herself pressed against the bookshelf and listened. Strained to hear something.
“How do you know?” she hissed, more annoyed than anything that their moment had been ruined.
“Her perfume. I tracked her the minute she stepped out into the courtyard. Violets and rainwater.” He glanced at the lamp, concern marring his brow. “Too late to snuff it out, the stench of smoke will give us away.”
A bubble of indignation swelled in Caelian’s chest, flamed by jealousy. Frustrated and now seething with envy, she planted her hands on her hips. “And I imagine you make it a habit to know what every female smells like?”
Kjeld rounded on her. His large hand closed around her neck.
He applied no pressure but pinned her to the shelves.
“Every sense of mine has been magnified infinitely since the day I turned fae. It’s why I know exactly where you are in House Celestine, every hour of every day.
It’s why I’m so attuned to the beating of your heart.
It’s why, even now, the tempting scent of your arousal makes me want to bend you over that desk and fill you with my cock. ”
He adjusted his hand, letting his thumb tug on her bottom lip. “I can hear you in the midnight hour when you cry yourself to sleep. And it takes all of my energy not to go to you, not to comfort you.”
“Kjeld.” All the things she wanted to say earlier evaporated, leaving her mouth parched. “I didn’t know.”
“Because I never told you.” His thumb was tracing the line of her lips now, memorizing their shape. “Just as there are many things you have never told me.”
Regret gnawed at her. “I wish I had, I wish I had told you everything.”
Determined footfalls sounded down the hall.
Kjeld was right.
Someone was coming, but now it was too late to escape.
They were about to be caught in King Marius’s study and had nothing to show for it.
No plausible reason or excuse. They would be sent back to Aeramere, shamed and humiliated, and she would never make it to Wenfyre to uncover the horrible truth about her mother.
Or worse, what if the queen saw fit to punish them in Brackroth instead?
Would they be thrown from a cliff? King Marius had tossed Creslyn from a cliff out of spite.
Maybe they let the dragons incinerate criminals?
What if Queen Viktoria locked them in a dungeon? What if—
Her panicked thoughts were silenced when Kjeld hoisted her up against the shelves.
His rough palms slid under her gown and cupped the globes of her ass.
Scraping. Squeezing and gripping. Books toppled to the ground and her legs immediately wrapped around his waist, her fingers grasping at his leather vest for purchase.
There was no time to question, no time to object, because then his mouth was trailing a series of kisses down her neck.
Carefully, she wove her arms around his neck, drawing him closer, pulling a groan from within some cavernous part of his chest. His teeth nipped as he dragged them across her flesh, as his mouth made its way to where her nipples were so aptly displayed.
He sucked one into the hot confines of his mouth.
A strangled gasp escaped her. But she was wound so tightly, she felt stiff and uncomfortable, unable to relax.
She kept waiting for someone to barge through the study door, to haul them to the gallows, or wherever they sent nefarious delinquents.
Kjeld pulled back a breath. “Focus on me. If we want them to believe we stumbled in here by mistake, if we want them to think we’re stupidly in love, then I’m going to need you to act like you don’t want to jump out of my arms.”
“I don’t want to jump out of your arms.” If anything, she’d never felt safer in the whole of her existence.
Lines of worry deepened across his brow, and he stole a hasty glance at the door. He adjusted his hold, his hands gently massaging her bottom, angling her so his erection rubbed nicely between her legs. “Then I’m going to need you to pretend as though you want me.”
Caelian shook her head. When she spoke, she never looked away from the determination of his gaze. “I don’t have to pretend.”
“Fucking hell.” He jerked his hips forward, grinding against her, making her want to writhe and moan. “I knew you’d say that.”
His mouth crashed against hers.
Caelian froze, eyes wide as his were closed, his lips roving over hers.
“Kiss me, Starweaver.” He bit out the words.
Her eyes closed at his gruff demand and then his tongue was sliding into her mouth.
It wasn’t gentle and exploratory like she’d always imagined.
It was brutal and rough. A slashing of lips and a clash of tongues.
Kjeld devoured her, he kissed her like she was the only air he needed to breathe, like she was his source of life.
His kiss was devastating. Punishing. It left her reeling.
Mind numbing. Heart pounding. He took and took and took. And she gave it all.
She was ready to live in this destructive kiss.
To die in it.
Because there was no rush of power, no explosive display of a bond snapping into place. They weren’t mates, and they certainly weren’t fated.
Because Caelian’s magic had been taken from her.
And Kjeld held no magic at all.