13 Imogen #2
His firm body pressed me harder into the wood. Warmth curled around me as he lowered his lips to my ear. “I thought making you angry might draw you out.” He pulled back, slowly, just far enough for our eyes to meet. “I’m sorry.”
My breath faltered completely. Even in the mist, his eyes were like emeralds caught in the sun.
I could smell his soap and how it mingled with the scent of his skin.
His attention bore down on me, breaths and body tight.
He finally pulled farther away and let his gaze trickle down the front of my body.
Theodore’s face was a collection of hard angles and planes, and I’d always thought his mouth to be uncharacteristically soft in comparison. It opened and closed, his dark brow furrowed, as if he searched for, but could not find, the right words.
“It fits you perfectly,” he finally said, his voice betraying an emotion that I could not see on his face.
I shoved my fists against his hard chest, my hurt and anger blooming hot. He had no right taunting me with a gown like this. Making me wear something so thoughtfully wrought, with my feathers and his vines stitched together over my heart.
As if he could hear my thoughts, his features folded with an apology.
“Look at you,” he mumbled to himself. His remorse wasn’t enough to stop him from drawing a slow finger across the edge of my neckline.
His touch whispered against my skin, down the low cut of the bodice.
He traced the embroidery. From leaf to feather and back again.
It made my skin stipple. Made my lungs constrict and my heart kick up.
It made that alarming thrum in my middle start again too.
Fear tumbled through me. “Stop it.”
His finger stilled, and then, after a heavy exhale, fell away.
Lachlan called through the fog. “Queen Imogen?”
I opened my mouth to call back, but Theodore covered it and touched his cheekbone to mine. “We need to speak alone.”
Every inch of my body began to spark. I mumbled against his palm, shaking my head. “It’s your wedding feast.”
“It’s a farce.” His voice was rough and hot in my ear. He let his hand slip slowly down, pulling at my lips, until he cupped my chin.
A shaky breath left me. “We can’t speak alone. We need Lach—”
He shook his head.
“What if I kill you?”
His shoulders stooped, his own breath fluttering across my cheek. “That would be a good death, Imogen.”
I jutted my chin away from his touch. “Theodore.”
His eyes flared with some wild, furious look, and he pressed his strong body harder into mine. “Then bind yourself to me. Right now. You will never be hurt like that again and I will be safe from you. We’re together, stuck on this ship. Give me one good reason not to—”
“Your wife,” I snapped, too loudly. “And the child you promised her.”
He flinched like I’d struck him in the gut.
“Queen Imogen?” Lachlan called again, this time closer and more annoyed.
Theodore took a step back, his handsome face going pale as the heavy fog swirled in between us. He took another step back, and the thought of him turning away from me, disappearing into the white, and leaving each other like this was suddenly one I could not bear.
I lifted the length of rope up between us. “Tie me up.”
Theodore froze. Blinked. “I beg your pardon?”
“So we can speak alone.” I pressed the rope to his chest. “It’s a small protection, but it’s something.”
His mouth took on a wry tilt. “Come here.” He took the rope and slipped his other hand through mine, guiding me through the mist like it was a clear day, anticipating masts and passageways before I could even see them.
We passed the shadowy outlines of the musicians, revelers with goblets of sparkling wine, sailors and their ropes, until finally I recognized where we were.
The bow of the ship was empty, and he led us toward the small upper deck where Lachlan and I had first snuck aboard.
He straddled the railing and started unwinding the rope, glancing up at me from time to time with a stoic look.
The air between us was so heavy, so charged, it felt as if it were material.
A wall, a body, a barrier that I did not know how to breach.
A sad smirk ghosted his lips. “Your hands, if you please, Your Majesty.”
I offered so the insides of my wrists and my palms touched. “You’ll have to wind it around my fingers too.”
Theodore held my gaze as he wrapped the rope agonizingly slowly around my wrists.
With each loop, he made sure his fingers grazed my skin, sending fiery shocks of anticipation through me.
As my heart began to speed and a warmth began to pool in my lower belly, I questioned if this was one of the worst ideas I’d ever had.
“This is reckless.” It didn’t come out as an admonishment at all.
Instead, it came out breathy and languid and low.
He went even slower as he looped the rope around my fingers, using his teeth to hold the end of it so he could adjust his grip. “I thought I’d go slow…” The corner of his mouth lifted, pulling in the dimple that marked his cheek. “So as not to spook you.”
I remembered the way his skin had punctured beneath the pressure of my talons. “Don’t laugh about me hurting you.”
“I’m not.”
“Then why in the bloody Gods are you smiling?”
He knotted the ends of the rope with a tug.
“Because I’ve imagined you like this before,” he said, keeping his deep voice smooth.
He let go of my hands, his heated eyes lingering on my lips, and leaned in.
“Only in my imaginings, I was allowed to touch you.” He threw his legs over the rail and balanced on the lip of the deck with ease.
“Two can fit nicely on the net below the bowsprit. No one will find us there in this fog.” He extended a hand to help me.
I tried to peer at the net over his shoulder but could see nothing at all. “Did you learn about this hiding spot during your pleasure-cruise years?”
The full smile that broke across his face was shining and mischievous. “Oh no. I had no need for a net when there was a bed in my stateroom.”
I looked skyward in an attempt to seem exasperated, but I simply couldn’t bear the way his smile made my stomach fly up toward my heart. “We’ll speak quickly. We’ll say what we need to, and we will not linger. Agreed?”
He worked his jaw. “Agreed.”
I moved awkwardly with my hands folded up against my chest, but he helped guide my hips, then my legs over the rail. Finally, when I stood as he did, toes on the lip of the deck and the netting behind us, he stepped backward and set his boots onto the wide knots of the footropes.
His grip found my waist, and he hauled me backward, until I was pressed firmly against the front of his body. He spoke in a breathy croon at my ear. “I actually found this spot when I was a ruttish adolescent. Privacy was a difficult thing to find for a young prince.”
Despite my mood, I tipped back my head and laughed. “You poor thing.”
His own chuckle was a deep vibration against my back, enticing me to stay like that—backed against him, head on his shoulder—for a moment too long. His hands sank lower until they sat upon the curve of my hips, where he dug in his fingers.
He groaned, then released me in a rush. “Forgive me.” He helped lower me to the netting, then lowered himself to sit across from me, close enough so that we could see each other through the mist.
The water crashed against the hull below, rolling the ship up and down, and a gnarled silence grew between us. It looped and choked the way untended roots do, but I had no idea how to begin to unfurl it.
“Is Eftan…” I began, clumsily.
He looked away. Shook his head. “He’s fine.”
“I’m sorry. I lost control—”
“Imogen, he tried to kill you.” He adjusted himself on the netting, crossing his arms against the cool air. “Are you all right?” he finally asked, tentatively.
It was a simple question, but my throat clamped shut.
The word no tried to escape from deep inside my chest. No, I was not all right, and I had not felt the true strain of everything that had happened until this very moment.
I wanted to wrap my arms around Theodore and weep.
I wanted to confess how horribly I missed him and tell him every monstrous thing I’d done.
I wanted to believe he’d see past my offenses, still see me as worthy, and understand why.
Then I reminded myself it wouldn’t matter if he did.
The musicians started a waltz that warped around us through the dense air. He tilted his head at my silence. “Immy?”
“Please don’t call me that.”
His look turned stern, hurt.
“I’m…” I stared down at my bound hands. “I’m all right. I’m so tired.” I finally looked up into his eyes. “What is it you needed to say to me?”
His brows drew together. “I needed you to understand the circumstances of this… marriage.”
“I do.”
“You don’t.” He took a deep, livid breath. “I wrote you. The letter is still in the pocket of that dress. I made you a promise in it and it remains. If you still want me, whenever you might want me, I will cut myself open again—”
“Stop it.” I struck my bound hands against my knee. Theodore straightened, affronted, but I went on. “Your wife is on that deck, celebrating your marriage, waiting for you to join her in a Godsdamned waltz, and you’re here with me—”
“Keep your voice down, Imogen.” Theodore thrust a finger toward me. “You are the only blood-bound wife I have had or ever will have.”
My chest seized. “What do you—” My thoughts had muddled. “What are you saying?”
“I didn’t bind myself to Halla. I refused. I changed every contract and agreed to a sham of a marriage—”
“You agreed to give her a child!”