Chapter 11 #2
“It does not matter if I was asleep.” His voice is firm. “The responsibility is mine. I will make this right.”
“How?”
“I saved your life,” he says simply. “Now it is my duty to keep you safe. To honor you. To ensure no further harm comes to you while you are in my care.”
Duty.
The word sits strange. Like we’ve time-traveled to some era where men swore oaths and protected women not because they had to, but because honor demanded it.
“K.” I step closer. Too close, maybe. Close enough to see his cock jump at my proximity. “I’m not angry with you.”
“You should be.”
“Well, I’m not.” I reach out before I can stop myself, fingertips touching his jaw. His skin burns against my palm—not uncomfortable, but unnaturally warm. Like touching sun-heated stone. “I was confused yesterday. And hurt. But not because you kissed me.”
His eyes search mine. “Then why?”
The truth tries to claw its way out. Because you pulled away as if I disgusted you. Because you’ve been cold and distant ever since. Because that kiss was the first time in years someone touched me like I mattered, and then you looked at me with horror.
“Because I’ve spent my whole life being temporary,” I hear myself say.
The admission shocks me. I don’t do “emotional.” Don’t expose the raw parts.
But something about K—about the way he’s staring at me like my forgiveness is important to him—makes the words spill out.
“Temporary homes. Relationships that don’t stick.
Friends who drift away. I’m always the one people leave behind.
And yesterday morning, when you kissed me and then looked at me like I was a mistake—” I stop.
Swallow hard. “It just confirmed what I already knew. That I’m not the kind of person people want to keep. ”
K goes very still.
Then his hand comes up, covering mine where it rests against his jaw. His palm is so warm it almost burns, but I don’t pull away.
The heat seeps into my skin, into my bones, chasing away the mountain cold and something deeper. Something that’s been frozen inside me for years.
“You are not unwanted,” he says, voice low and fierce. “You are brave. Strong. Sharp-minded. You survived impossible injury and still climb mountains. You face danger without flinching. You are—”
He stops, something shifting in his expression. His grip on my hand tightens fractionally, and I feel the tremor run through him. Not from cold. Something else.
His gaze drops to my mouth. The gold in his eyes brightens, pupils dilating.
The air between us shifts—charged, electric. Like the moment before lightning strikes.
“You are not a mistake, Mara.” The words come out rough, strained. “Never think that.”
His thumb traces my cheekbone, and I feel the heat of him everywhere. Not just his hand on mine, but radiating from his whole body.
Old blood runs hot, the woman said.
She wasn’t kidding.
I should step back. Should preserve whatever dignity I have left.
I don’t.
“K,” I whisper, and it sounds right on my tongue.
Something flares in his eyes, bright as flame, gone in a blink. His free hand slides to cup the back of my neck, fingers twining into my hair.
He’s still holding back. I feel it in the tension coiled through his body, in the careful way he touches me. As if he’s afraid of his own strength. His own heat.
Afraid he’ll burn me.
I make the choice for both of us.
I rise up on my toes and kiss him.
For a heartbeat, he doesn’t respond. Just stays frozen like he’s not sure this is real.
Then he kisses me back.
Not desperate like yesterday. This is slower. Deliberate. His mouth moving over mine with focused intensity that makes my knees weak.
And God, he’s hot.
Not figuratively. Literally. His lips burn against mine—not painful, but intense. Like kissing summer itself. The heat from his skin warms me where our bodies press together, and I feel myself leaning into it, into him, chasing warmth I’ve been starving for.
The hand at the back of my neck angles me for better access. The kiss deepens, and I make a sound that should embarrass me but doesn’t.
He tastes like mountain water and fire and… I want more.
My hands move without conscious decision. Trail down from his face to his shoulders—God, his shoulders—feeling the shift of muscle beneath skin that radiates warmth like a living furnace. Down his chest, fingertips tracing the tattoos that wind across his torso.
The heat intensifies where my palms flatten against him. The water on his chest evaporates under my touch, and I feel more than hear the low rumble that builds deep in his chest.
Not quite a growl. Not quite a groan.
Something not quite human.
The sound should terrify me. Should remind me that I’m kissing something I don’t understand.
Instead, it makes me feel powerful. Wanted. Seen in a way I’ve never been.
My palm flattens against his stomach. His muscles contract under my touch, and I feel the sharp intake of his breath.
Lower still.
My fingers brush the trail of hair below his navel. His cock presses against my hip, thick and hot even through my clothes. I want to touch him there. Want to wrap my hand around all that flesh and—
“There is fire waiting.” The voice cuts through the moment. “But not here. Not now.”
I jerk back and spin around.
The old woman from yesterday—Dragana, I think her name is—stands on the path. Arms crossed. Expression unreadable.
“Oh, my God.” The words come out strangled. “I didn’t… We weren’t—”
“I see what you were doing,” she says dryly. Her English is heavily accented but clear. She looks pointedly at K, then back to me. “My grandmother warned of such things. When the old blood wakes, it burns everything it touches.”
The way she says it—not metaphorical, but literal—makes my stomach lurch.
K steps between the elder and me so smoothly that I barely register the movement. Protective. Instinctive.
Still naked. Still hard.
Still completely unbothered by either fact.
“We apologize,” K says, voice perfectly level like he wasn’t just seconds away from—
Don’t think about it. Do NOT think about it.
Dragana’s sharp gaze moves between us. “You are fortunate I found you and not the younger villagers. They would talk. And talk leads to questions.” She focuses on me. “Questions you are not ready to answer.”
“What questions?” I manage to ask.
She looks at me like I’m particularly slow. “About what walks beside you. What sleeps under your roof. What you allow to touch you.” Her attention shifts to K, and something almost like respect crosses her weathered face.
K goes very still. “What do you mean?”
“You will know when you are ready.” She pauses, then her gaze returns to me. “You. Come. We will talk.”
“About what?”
“About what you know. What you hide. What you fear.” She turns and starts walking back toward the village. “The fire-blood may join us when he is finished bathing. Properly this time.”
Fire-blood.
That word again. It rolls through my mind, connecting to half-formed thoughts. K runs impossibly hot. The flames that protected me in the crash moved like they were alive.
Fire-blood.
Shit. What the hell is going on here?
She disappears around the bend.
I stand there, face burning, trying to process what just happened.
K steps closer. His hand finds mine, and even that simple contact radiates heat up my arm. “I am sorry. Again. I should not have—”
“Don’t.” I squeeze his fingers, feeling the pulse of warmth beneath his skin. “Don’t apologize for that. Please.”
He looks down at me, and for just a second, I see gold swimming in his eyes. Not brown-gold. Not hazel. Pure molten gold, bright and inhuman.
Then he blinks, and it’s gone.
“I do not understand what is happening between us,” he says quietly.
“Yeah.” I laugh, sharp and awkward. “Me neither.”
“But I do not regret it.”
The words hit me sideways. Warmth floods my chest—different from the physical heat he radiates, but no less powerful.
“Good,” I whisper. “Because I don’t either.”
For a moment, we just stand there. Hands linked. The mountain stream rushing past. Air crisp enough to fog when I exhale.
Yet when he exhales, the air shimmers with heat.
K releases my hand. “You should go. The elder is waiting.”
“What about you?”
“I will follow.” He glances toward the water. “After I finish. Properly.”
The corner of his mouth twitches. Almost a smile.
It transforms his face. Makes him look younger. Less burdened.
I want to kiss him again.
Want to taste every inch of him. See if he’s as hot inside my mouth as he is everywhere else.
Instead, I turn and head back toward the village. Toward whatever cryptic conversation the old woman wants to have.
But I can’t stop thinking about the way his skin burned under my hands.
Or the gold that flared in his eyes when he looked at me.
Or the thickness of him pressing against my hip, hard and ready and mine if I wanted to take it.
Or the fact that the elder called him fire-blood like it’s a title. A classification.
Something everyone here recognizes except him.
Who are you, K?
And what happens when you finally remember?