Chapter 22
Chapter twenty-two
Robin: A Glimpse of Starlight
“What do I think I’m playing at?” Marco says, voice tight, brimming with anger. “What do you think you’re playing at?”
I open my mouth to reply, but he shushes me with a sharp gesture. “Not here.”
His hand grips my wrist, dragging me through the Emperor’s palace with the manner of someone who knows every corridor, every doorway.
The walls blur past—gold leaf moldings, crystal sconces, marble statues posed in alcoves like silent witnesses—but I can’t take it all in, as the familiarity of his movement through this place twists something sour in my gut.
Marco glances over his shoulder, then pushes open a heavy oak door. He leads me through a library lined with leather-bound volumes that gleam in the moonlight streaming through tall windows. The scents of old parchment and expensive tobacco hang in the air.
He opens glass doors leading to a balcony overlooking manicured gardens that stretch into darkness. Perfectly trimmed hedges form geometric patterns around a central fountain, its water catching fragments of light from the palace’s windows.
Marco slides the balcony door shut behind us. The cool night air cuts through the heat of my anger, raising goosebumps along my bare arms. Two oil lanterns hang on the railing, offering light but no heat.
“What are you doing, Robin?” he seethes. “You’re supposed to be down there charming sponsors, not stalking me to the Emperor’s rooms!”
“I was talking to sponsors,” I snap back. “Before the Emperor took me aside.” The ghost of the Emperor’s vile touch still clings to my cheek. I stood there completely frozen, terrified of what might happen if I flinched away. Terrified of what it meant that he was touching me at all.
A spark flashes across Marco’s face. “You need to stop attracting his attention.”
I scoff. “Attracting his attention? What the fuck is that meant to mean?” I lean in close. “Are you scared he’ll trade you in for a newer model?”
Marco’s eyes blaze. He grabs fistfuls of my robe, shoving me back against the ornate black railing.
“Shut your mouth. You know what I mean. So unless you’re desperate for his dick up your ass—”
“You seemed pretty damn desperate to fuck him a moment ago,” I spit, even though I know it isn’t the truth. I’m as sure of that as the moon in the night sky. But I want to hear him say it. Need to hear him say it. “Though the old man didn’t last very long, did he?”
“I suppose I must be just that good,” Marco says coolly.
The words seep through me, freezing my blood solid. I hadn’t wanted to believe, not really. “So you did, then?” I whisper. “Fuck him, just now?”
“No,” Marco snarls, dropping his hold on me and stepping back.
“I didn’t. His son interrupted him.” Interrupted him.
As if Marco’s just a passive participant in his own violation.
“But I’m sorry for stepping in. Next time, I’ll leave the two of you to it.
You can see for yourself how long the Emperor lasts. ”
“Marco,” I say softly, reaching for him.
But he’s already moving to the other side of the balcony, putting as much distance between us as the small space allows.
I know I shouldn’t.
We’ve been so careful over the last two months.
So good at staying away from each other, letting our eyes slide past one another, never lingering.
It’s not that I haven’t caught him staring at me—quick glances during training that he cuts short the moment I notice, his gaze tracking my movements across the gym before he forces himself to look away.
We’ve become experts at this dance of avoidance, speaking only when necessary, keeping our voices neutral, professional.
Even when we spar, he’s careful not to touch me any longer than required, pulling back from pins the second I tap out.
But the careful distance we’ve maintained feels meaningless now, watching him lean against the balcony railing like he’s carrying the weight of the world on his shoulders.
I should leave. Go back into the ballroom where Cas is probably wondering where I disappeared to, where sponsors still wait to be charmed and impressed.
Where I can pretend I don’t notice the way Marco’s emerald gown drapes across one shoulder, leaving the other bare, the golden sash catching moonlight as it falls in soft folds across his torso.
The laurel crown woven through his dark hair has shifted slightly, a few loose curls escaping to frame his face.
The truth of it all seeps through me like a warm Atrean sunrise. After all that careful distance, all the looking through me like I was invisible to the point I’d convinced myself he didn’t care for me, that what we had was a fever dream…
I’d been too blind by rage to see it. Marco’s face when he crossed the room to the Emperor and me. The way he stepped in without hesitation. It’s not that he doesn’t care. He cares too much.
I glance toward the balcony door. The sensible choice. The survivor’s choice. Yet I find my legs crossing the space between us. Find my arms sliding around Marco from behind.
Marco’s entire body goes rigid. His eyes sparkle in the light. “What are you doing?”
“I know what you did down there,” I say. “I know what you did. For me.”
His voice drops low. “Robin—”
“Don’t pretend.” It comes out almost as a plea.
“You almost had me convinced I meant nothing to you.” I rest my chin on his shoulder, breathing in the scent of him—leather and lavender and something deliciously dark.
The familiar smell makes my chest impossibly tight.
“You couldn’t stand the thought of him touching me, could you? ”
Marco tries to pull away, but I tighten my arms around him. “That’s not—”
“You still want me,” I whisper against his ear, and feel him shiver. “You still want me.”
I press my lips to his cheek, a gentle kiss. A ghost of a kiss. A kiss that I hope says: I see you. I see you.
Marco goes completely still, and I’m not surprised.
This is the most tender I’ve ever been with him.
But right now, standing here with moonlight painting silver across his skin, he seems like something truly precious.
Fragile, even. Like a piece of art I’m afraid to touch too hard for fear it might shatter.
I kiss his other cheek, just as softly.
He twists in my arms. Places a hand on my chest. “Robin…”
“Tell me I’m wrong,” I challenge, my lips barely an inch from his. “Tell me you don’t want this. That this is not all you think about.”
Marco’s breath hitches. His hand fists in the fabric of my gown. “You don’t understand—”
“Then make me understand.” Marco groans as I move down to his neck, my lips seeking his pulse point.
I suck gently at the skin there until his heartbeat accelerates under my mouth.
His hands still grip the railing, every muscle of his body tensed.
But he doesn’t push me away. Doesn’t tell me to stop.
“Robin,” he breathes, and there’s something desperate in his voice. Something hungry. “We can’t—”
“Can’t what? Can’t touch each other? Can’t want each other?” I whisper against his throat.
I drop to my knees, my hands running down those powerful thighs.
“Yes,” he says, gazing up at the stars rather than down at me. “You know that. You know we can’t do this.”
“It’s just sex, Marco,” I lie, thin to my own ears.
My hands map the familiar territory of his body, remembering every muscle, every scar.
God, I’ve missed this. Missed him. I dream about him almost every night, waking up hard as a rock each morning, waiting for Cas to leave for his shower so I can take care of myself, screaming Marco’s name into my fist as I come—half curse, half prayer.
My fingers find the edge of his gown, and Marco’s breath hitches.
I spare a peek through the balcony railing.
The garden spreads below us, empty paths winding between shadowed hedges.
Behind the glass door to the library, a heavy velvet curtain has been drawn across, shielding us from view.
Anyone could walk past that door, push through those curtains, find us here.
The Emperor. His son, Julius. Any of the sponsors mingling in the ballroom below.
Yet I don’t care.
“Just this once,” I plead, my hands sliding higher up his thick thighs. “Just this once, and we’ll pretend it never happened.”
Marco’s knuckles are white where they grip the railing.
“You can’t deny we’re both experts at that now,” I say, and the level of bitterness in my voice surprises even me.
His shoulders sag slightly. When he speaks, his voice is barely a whisper.
“You’re going to be the death of me, birdie, aren’t you?
” I palm his cock through the fabric, feeling him already half hard against my touch.
He hisses between his teeth. “Just this once more,” he says, finally looking down at me.
His dark eyes catch the lamplight, and there’s something broken in them.
Something that I long to fix, even though I know I can’t.
But I can make it better. For a short while. “The… the last time.”
I nod, my throat tight, then waste zero time yanking at his layered gown, finding the ties of his shorts, pulling them down and off his sandaled feet.
No teasing, no buildup—I just take him, all the way down my throat. His cock continues to swell in my mouth, growing thick and hard until I’m choking on him, jaw stretched wide and eyes watering.
Marco thrusts forward even though it’s impossible for him to be any deeper, and the desperate motion sends molten heat shooting to my own cock. My throat burns, but I swallow, swallow, swallow around him, drinking in his every quiet whimper, his every breathy cry.
When he finally lets go of the railing to fist my hair, I moan around him, the vibration making him shudder and pulse. He rips my laurel from my hair, tossing it to one side, and pulls, tingles spiraling through me like shooting stars.