Chapter 17 #3
This was not the look of a man beholding a monster. Or maybe I was just the right kind of monster for him. What had Nanette called him? That man is a menace. A menace and a monster, I thought sadly. We were well matched.
“I see a brave woman who doesn’t deserve the sadness she carries,” Gareth replied.
“Someone brilliant and powerful and passionate. A leader and a teacher who is so loved.” Then he raised a playful eyebrow.
“And who, it must be said, is so godsdamned breathtakingly gorgeous that thinking about her keeps me up at night.”
This was dangerous, this softness blooming between us. This was everything I’d long ago resolved to reject. But it felt so wonderful to be held by him that pushing him away seemed impossible.
I ignored every ounce of my good sense and smiled up at him. “And what do you do, Professor, when you think of this brave woman while lying awake in your bed?”
“Mara.” He pressed his forehead to mine and closed his eyes, as if my words had pained him. “You’re hurt and exhausted, and we’re lying on the floor of a cave in a land populated by sentient rocks. But when you look at me like that, all I can think about is how desperately I want to kiss you.”
I shifted closer to him, feathering my fingers across the line of his jaw. I shouldn’t have. This was a terrible idea. Letting it happen could only lead to heartbreak.
But still I whispered, “Then kiss me.”
It was like unlocking a door that had been straining to burst open.
With a quiet groan, he took my face in his hands as if I were something fragile and remarkable and lowered his mouth to mine.
Softly, sweetly, a silent hymn. Heat poured down my body at the touch of his lips, pooling between my legs, and suddenly I wanted more, much more, than a careful kiss.
I hadn’t kissed someone in a long time, hadn’t kissed someone and actually meant anything by it for even longer.
Kissing Gareth was like lighting a fire and watching it burn—first quietly, and then with a roar.
And with his hands on me, and his tongue gently opening my mouth, and that muffled, shuddering moan he let out against my lips, I didn’t care if those flames would simply warm me or rage out of control and destroy me.
When I arched closer to him, his hand glided down my back, and he pulled me hard against him, his fingers digging into my hip.
The sudden close contact made me gasp. I slid my unhurt hand into his hair, relishing the smooth softness of every damp curl.
The strength in his wiry arms holding me to him and the heat of his arousal between my legs was its own kind of magic.
His touch swept away my pain, scorched my sadness to ashes.
I circled my hips against him, ready to reach down for his belt, heedless of how fast this was spiraling into an inferno, when suddenly he said breathlessly against my mouth, “Wait, Mara. Wait, hold on.”
I froze, though my body was screaming for more—more of this, more of him. “What is it? What’s wrong?”
“Nothing’s wrong, I just…” He shook his head, taking in the sight of me with a helpless sort of look, like I’d won an unspoken argument by simply existing.
“Gods, look at you,” he rasped, and then bent to kiss my neck, lightly grazing my skin with his teeth.
I moaned, shivering, and canted my hips toward him once more, but after a few blazing seconds of this—his tongue licking a lazy stripe down the column of my throat, my fingers tightening around a fistful of his hair—he pulled away again, with two apologetic kisses to my cheek and brow.
“No, wait,” he said roughly. “Gods, I’m sorry. I can hardly think with you looking like that.”
“Like what?” I murmured, reaching for the nearest button of his shirt.
He caught my hand with a wry smile, then brushed a soft kiss across my knuckles. “Like you want to let me have you.”
That hungry look in his eyes melted something inside me. I touched his cheek, pressed my thumb gently against the corner of his mouth. His lips fell open, his teeth scraped against the pad of my thumb, and I leaned into him, my nipples pebbling beneath my shirt.
“Then have me,” I whispered against his skin. “I’m ready, Gareth.”
He let out a desperate sound, somewhere between a sob and a laugh. “Darling, there’s nothing I want more, but I refuse to do so on a cave floor. You deserve better. And frankly, so do our knees.”
“Our knees would recover,” I pointed out.
“It’s just that I want you in my bed, or in yours,” he went on. He pressed his forehead against mine, still catching his breath. “I want you in softness and warmth, and—”
“And I suppose I want to be well enough that I won’t pass out while I’m on top of you.”
That made him laugh, a quick exhale against my lips. “Gods…” he muttered. “There’s an image.”
“Me passing out?”
“You on top of me. Beneath me. Beside me.” He punctuated each phrase with a kiss to my neck, my temple, the hollow of my throat. “The possibilities are endless.”
“Or maybe by the time we get home, I’ll have recovered enough of my senses to realize this was all some sort of fever dream.”
At that he grew quiet. When he pulled away to look at me, his eyes were grave.
“Don’t think that we’re finished talking about what made you come here today,” he said quietly. “You can’t just push it aside forever. Not with jokes, not with bravado.”
I stared at him, the shift in mood so abrupt that it took me a moment to recover my voice. I put a hand on his chest, making a slight space between us. “That’s what you want to talk about right now?”
“Ignoring the monster means it will eventually come back for more, and I won’t let you hurt yourself again.”
The word monster stung. I released him and scooted away, feeling cold and damp and strangely abashed. “You won’t let me?”
“We won’t let you, I should say.”
“What, you’ll recruit all of Rosewarren to follow me around and physically restrain me?”
He looked at me with infuriating calm. “If that’s what keeps you alive, then yes.”
I turned away, my stomach in knots. Whatever madness had swept me up into its grip was gone.
That I had kissed this man, that I still ached for more of him, mortified me.
Even worse, I understood what he was saying and why he was saying it.
But his patient regard made me feel like a fool, like I was a student whose professor was helping her understand where in her equations she had made a crucial mistake.
“I need to rest,” I said shortly. “Once I have the strength to take us home, we’ll leave.”
I lay down with my back to him, my cheeks burning, and offered him nothing more.