15. Chapter 15
Lunette
I’d begged him to stay. Please tasted as bitter as an unripe crabapple.
Pathetic, Luna. He’s probably had a hundred women throw themselves at him just like this.
I tried to convince myself that it was only concern over his wound that had made me do it, but deep down, I knew the truth.
Loneliness was driving me mad. That was why I’d confessed my sins to him even though he hadn’t asked about the worst of it.
Because my heart ached for someone to share it with.
It had been so much safer before he’d arrived on my doorstep.
I didn’t know his name or where he’d come from, yet I was inexplicably drawn to him. And I couldn’t control my racing heart around him, no matter how hard I tried.
Rowan hadn’t yet opened his eyes, but he said, “Lunette, I—”
“You ripped open your stitches,” I interrupted, hating how defensive my voice sounded. “Without treatment, your skin will pull whenever you lift a sword.”
Solid. Logical. Didn’t sound like pining at all.
I thought for certain he would remove his hand from mine, but his thumb found its way across it instead, stroking lightly, tiny, pleasant sparks lighting between us with every movement. I forgot to breathe long enough that I had to cover my sharp intake of breath.
His eyes opened slowly, the pain in them ebbing as my magic receded.
The irritation or even disgust at being trapped here with me for one more night wasn’t there, as I’d feared.
Only that same disarming softness that made my heart forget how to beat.
And something else, something I hoped wasn’t my silly mind trying to make my fantasy real: longing.
I offered a weak smile, my heart a tangled knot of shame and desperate hope.
“Lunette,” he said, voice hoarse, “I would get hurt a thousand times if it meant protecting you.”
That wasn’t a safe thing to say to me. I already felt myself falling.
I couldn’t look away. Not when he looked at me like I meant something, like I was wanted, for once. Rowan lifted his hand, hesitated for one heartbeat then settled two fingers under my chin and tilted it up toward him.
Only then did the position I was in strike me: still kneeling between his legs, hands under his shirt, like my body had chosen where it wanted to be before my mind dared.
The cold from the floor had started to seep into my skin, but he was warm enough that I didn’t need to move—not while his attention held me so completely.
Gods. I fought to control my trembling spine, but it was like trying to still a bowstring that had already been loosed. The thought of rising to my feet slowly, of raking my hands up his bare torso became a fire in every muscle.
“Please don’t kneel for me,” he murmured, voice as rough as gravel. His thumb brushed along my cheekbone, and my eyelids fluttered closed.
Dangerous.
When he removed his fingers, I feared I’d lost that new, fragile connection to him forever. But they only moved to my wrist—featherlight, hesitant, but still sparking awareness along every nerve. “Please, Lunette.”
As if that mattered when the feel of his touch was humming through me like the sweetest music. Still, the plea in his voice undid me more than a command ever could.
His thumb stroked the inside of my wrist, slow and careful, the roughness of his skin sending a thrill up my arm. He was right. I should put distance between us before I did something unwise.
“I need to see that you’re okay,” Rowan said, softer, another stroke of his fingers forcing me to hide a shiver.
And just like that, the familiar urge to vanish dissolved, and in its place, a wave of impossible peace washed over me.
Gods…maybe I wasn’t the only one feeling like being a bit foolish was exactly what I wanted.
With steady, patient pressure, he coaxed me upward until I found myself seated on the edge of the bed beside him, close enough that the warmth radiating from his body made my skin tingle with a thousand tiny electric jolts.
“Better,” he whispered, still holding onto me.
His hand withdrew slowly, almost reluctantly, to settle against his thigh. But his eyes—as dark and rich as winter wine—remained fixed on my face, searching, questioning, wanting.
I swallowed, suddenly aware of every inch of space between us—and how much I wanted it gone.
“You’re still in pain,” I whispered.
“This,” he said, gesturing at his wound, voice low and intimate, “is nothing compared to the battle going on in my head.”
Every ugly possibility rushed in at once, and my stomach flipped. “Battle? Are you married?”
His jaw flexed.
“Rowan?” I hated how this complete stranger had reduced me to not caring that I craved things I could never keep. Hated how easily he’d walked into my life and left me feeling more vulnerable than I ever had.
And, gods below, I also hated myself for wanting him so badly that I was willing to leave myself defenseless against it. But being married was a line I wouldn’t cross.
“Not married or connected to anyone in that way,” he finally said.
“I’m not either,” I said, taking in a relieved breath. “Sorry for letting you guess about that.”
“The battle,” he said, eyes smoldering, “is to hold myself in check. You make me feel wild, Lunette.”
My breath stuttered out of me in a tiny, helpless sound. Something thick and molten curled in my belly, rising like a tide I couldn’t fight as he leaned forward slowly—too slowly.
“Tell me you want this,” he whispered. “I won’t take anything you don’t freely give.”
Freely give? I wanted to wrap myself around him skin-to-skin until I wasn’t certain where I ended and he began.
Neither of my former lovers had ever been so tender with me—and I hadn’t even kissed this man yet. My comfort mattered to him. I mattered. Losing that might be devastating. But never having it would be catastrophic.
Even so, the choice landed heavily in my chest. Maybe I should’ve told him to stop. It was so much risk for one night of pleasure. Because that was all this could be. One night.
But I couldn’t stop because I wanted it with every fiber of my being.
“Luna,” I said, leaning in, while silently handing him the key to my heart. “Call me Luna.”
Only people who deserved to stay in my life got to use that name. The power he already held over me was enough to destroy me, but he wouldn’t—not Rowan.
For a moment, his eyes burned with unspoken words that seemed to claw at his throat. The anticipation of what he was holding back was almost unbearable until his mouth met mine in the faintest brush. His warm, hesitant breath ghosted over my lips, erasing every worry from my mind.
“A precious gift,” he said against my lips. “Thank you. I won’t misuse it.” The possessive way he whispered my name next sent shivers rippling down my spine. “My Luna. My moonlight.”
“You called me that before,” I said, loving the way my name sounded coming from him.
He leaned his forehead against mine, his nose brushing mine, and whispered, “Because you’ve been a guiding light since I first met you… Luna, you make me want to be better than I am.”
I was already melting, but at those words, I turned to liquid in his arms. I smiled against him, loving the closeness, the warmth and intimacy of his heart beating right next to mine.
“Gods, you always smell so good.” His thumb found my lower lip and dragged down it with almost sinful suggestion. “Like the sweetest dessert. I want to devour this.”
Finally, he broke free from whatever had been holding him back, and the rejection I’d been unconsciously bracing for disappeared.
His kiss wasn’t gentle. Wasn’t chaste. It was his power brushing up against my years of isolation, colliding in one impossible, perfect explosion of sensation.
I kissed him like I needed him to breathe.
His hand slid into my hair as his mouth moved against mine, firm and hungry and reverent all at once. My fingers curled helplessly into the fabric of his tunic. Gods, when had I grabbed him? I pulled him closer as heat roared through my body.
He groaned low against my lips. My mind blanked to everything other than the feel of his kiss, his hands moving to cup my jaw, down the back of my neck, my shoulders, to my waist…
Was attraction supposed to feel like this? If so, I’d been doing it wrong my entire life.
Magic flickered wild and bright beneath my skin like it recognized him, like it was getting everything it needed from this. Every sensation between us was an answer to all my questions—to all my secret prayers.
His hands urged me forward until I was half in his lap, one leg across his. Throbbing, expectant heat rose in my core at the brush of my thigh against the rock-hard bulge in his lap.
This was how unexpected futures were born, but I didn’t care. Closer. I needed to be close enough to—
His wound. Reality slammed back into me, hard enough that it shocked me still, even through the haze of lust.
I pulled back abruptly, face flaming, heart pounding like it wanted out of my ribs so it could hide under the bed.
“Sorry—I— Gods,” I stammered, wiping a trembling hand over my mouth. “I don’t want to hurt y—”
“Don’t apologize. You stop, I stop.” His voice was thick with passion, breathless. His pupils were blown so wide I literally couldn’t see the whites of his eyes anymore. “Lunette, I—” He stopped, swallowing hard. “I’ve wanted to do that since the moment I first opened my eyes to see you.”
The confession rooted itself somewhere deep and permanent in my chest.
His hands kneaded my back as he added, “Dreamed about touching this since seeing you in those trousers.”
“But your wound,” I said, panting.
“What wound?” His hand came up to tilt my chin until my eyes met his. “I want to run my fingers through those red curls and bury myself inside you until the world outside ceases to exist.”
Heat flooded my core, and I stopped pretending I needed convincing. I removed the space between us by wrapping my arms around his neck, careful of his bad side.
Then he claimed my mouth again, letting out a quiet growl against my lips.
Oh, gods, that sound. It shot a second wave of heat between my thighs, crumbling the last vestige of my worries. If that growl meant he felt the same way I did, neither of us would get much recovery sleep tonight.
The world narrowed to the warmth of his skin beneath my fingers, the press of his hands on my hips.
I’d never felt this ravenous before. As if yearning had purged the cobwebs from around my heart, with hunger arriving just after it like a wildfire burning through everything else to make room for one thing: him.
He broke away from our kiss for a heartbeat, midnight eyes drinking me in.
Even as I mourned the loss of his lips, I melted under his smoldering gaze.
He looked at me as if he were seeing me anew, as if his mind had just settled on something momentous.
His stare was starved but also longing in a way I’d never experienced before.
I wanted to drown in the heady sensation of being desired. Of being his.
Before I could question the look any further, he rushed back in, tracing a warm path with his lips across the sensitive skin of my neck.
When he reached my ear and sucked lightly at the lobe, the first sound that escaped me wasn’t entirely human. My next gasp, rough and nearly feral, slipped straight into a moan as his hands caressed my curves like he was trying to memorize the shape of me.
Straddling his legs, I inched up the long plane of his thigh.
His muscles tensed, and every time I moved, a faint shudder rippled through him.
Even through his tunic, I could feel the unyielding tension holding his body together, like he was afraid that if he let go even a little, we’d both be doomed.
Let it happen, I thought. Doom me. Take me down with you.
I’d never wanted to fall so badly. My aching core throbbed with desperate need as I rocked it against his unyielding warmth. A silent cry to keep going. I was so close, nearly unraveling from nothing more than simple friction.
His fingers tightened on my hips, a question I felt more than heard. Do you want more?
I tugged on his shoulders, giving my answer in the only language two bodies needed to communicate in the fading light.
I felt him smile through the kiss. Slowly, almost reverently, he lowered us both to the bed. His weight pressed down, and every inch of my skin lit up with anticipation.
No turning back now.
Clothes. We had on too many clothes. I started to work the laces of my bodice—
A wave of dark, wild magic surged through the cabin, cold and electric, raising every hair on my body.
BAM!
The front door exploded inward off its hinges.