Chapter fifty-five
When we returned, Gavrin was waiting for us in the foyer. It was nearly dawn, and he looked like he hadn’t slept at all.
He was alone.
“Eryk got away,” I said, reading the room.
Fear licked at the back of my neck and snaked down my spine.
Kaed’s hand brushed the back of mine.
My breathing quickened and steadied at that small gesture.
But it was enough.
Eryk wasn’t here. And Kaed was.
“He won’t have gotten far. Is Denora looking?”
Gavrin hesitated and then shook his head. “She’s been summoned to Hayden.”
The timing was strange. But there’s no way Eryk could have gotten a message to Hayden, and why would he? Kaed didn’t seem to think that Tir would start a war over faebane and choose Eryk Selldayne as his ally. And Eryk didn’t seem to even know about the faebane.
“She’s the Head Sentinel of Hayden. She answers to Tir, Kaed. Not you,” Gavrin said before pacing.
“You are one of Hayden’s sentinels.”
Gavrin scoffed a laugh. “Yes, but Tir knows I’d tell him to shove it if he tried to make me move against you. I think he assumes Denora is more loyal to her position. She has honour.” He raised his eyebrow into a peak, and his eyes glowed with roguishness.
How was he joking at a time like this?
“Denora wouldn’t betray you,” I said, without any claim to back it up.
Kaed nodded twice, as if wanting to believe me but having no grounds to do so. His hand pinched the bridge of his nose as he thought. “Whatever the summons, it doesn’t matter. We can’t stop it without inciting violence from my father. And Hart.”
Hart. His name cooled the air around it every time it was spoken.
Kaed sighed heavily. “We’ve enough to deal with in this city alone. We can’t worry about Hayden right now. I’m sure Hart will make his play known soon enough. He’s already been moving through the Corners searching for—” Kaed stopped as he looked at me.
He didn’t ask. And I didn’t offer the faebane source.
Gavrin gave a tight nod.
“Is Audrie okay?” I asked, trying to redirect the conversation away from me.
Gavrin was tense when he spoke. “With Ashen and Hael. She’s spending the night there.”
“Tomorrow,” Kaed said, as if Gavrin and I weren’t really there. “We will figure this out tomorrow. We need to speak with Huxley. I trust Celeste with my life, but her son is a wyrm that would betray her in a heartbeat if he thought it would benefit him.”
With that, Gavrin was gone.
“What about us? Me, I mean.” I scrambled to correct my assumption.
“I, for one, am going to sleep. While I still can.”
I let him lead me by the hand through the Alabaster Palace’s quiet hallways. Our footsteps sounded like echoes in a cave as we broke the silence of the early morning.
“What are you doing?” I halted, but Kaed pulled me past my door and down the hall towards his.
“Don’t worry, peach. I won’t tie you to my bed. This time. That’s a punishment for another night. But I’m not letting you out of my sight after tonight.”
The sun was streaming onto my face from the balcony. I hadn’t made a fuss last night about being in his bed. I was too tired.
Careful not to wake him, I turned to face Kaed.
He’d replaced the sheets after I’d stolen the previous ones.
Today they were the darkest forest green, and they were gathered around his waist. His chest was bare.
I didn’t remember that detail from last night.
I was certain he’d been dressed in his tunic as I’d fallen asleep on his chest.
It had been the most natural thing.
Kaed lay down on the bed on top of the sheets. He lifted a corner for me, and I slid in beside him with only the thinnest of barriers between us.
Before I’d even found the words to tell him I should be in my own bed, not his, I’d drifted. My head fell heavily to rest on his heart, and a dreamless sleep took me.
Staring at his body, the rise and fall of his breath was hypnotic. He really was beautiful. I’d imagined the plane of his abdomen, the slope of his obliques. But seeing the dimpled muscles of his torso rippling before me was … a lot.
And I suddenly found my thighs rubbing off one another at the sight of him. And only then I realised I’d discarded my beaded dress sometime in the night.
I clutched the sheets close to me at that.
Frantically, I twisted in the bed, looking for my clothes. Save for some lacy undergarments, I had nothing on.
“Peach.” Kaed’s voice was husky from sleep. His eyes stayed closed. “If you’re going to bounce around on my bed, we are going to have a very fun but unproductive morning.”
I flushed at his words, and I was glad his eyes were still shut.
How did I get out of here without either ripping the bedclothes from him or skipping across the room nearly naked?
I pushed my mussed hair from my face, and I was cursing some god or other when Kaed turned to me, his head propped on his hand.
And not for the first time, I thought he looked like a godstatue, only this time he was like something from a house of art, barely covered in sensual fabrics and tempting the mortals to touch his form.
I pulled the dark sheets up around my chest. “I’m looking for my clothes.”
“I can’t help you there. Well, rather, I could. But I don’t want to.”
I lobbed a pillow at his beautiful face. “Close your eyes,” I demanded as I shimmied to the side of the bed.
“I’d much rather not.” I could hear the smile that curled around his words.
Fine. I didn’t want to suddenly end up with his fingers under my chin and tracing my lips with his.
I wouldn’t think straight if he kissed me like he did last night.
And now he was only half clothed. Or possibly not at all.
The thought sent a shiver all the way to my sensitive centre, and I suppressed a moan.
I gathered the sheets, and instead of leaving the bed, I turned and brought myself right up to him.
Shock at the sudden contact stilled him.
With a gentle hand to his bare chest, I pushed him back to lie on his pillow.
“Now,” I said in a hushed tone as I knelt up and allowed my hair to drape over my shoulder.
“You”—I pushed again, a little harder—“are going to close your eyes for me. You are going to keep them closed. Until,” I bit out and allowed my finger to trace up from his clavicle to his jaw, “I say so.”
It was a bluff, but I knew it had paid off when Kaed let out a strangled sound.
“Can you do that for me?” I said, leaning in until my breath kissed along his scar. I pulled away and waited.
Kaed closed his eyes and set his jaw like it might break from the effort.
“Good,” I breathed before climbing away. But not before I saw his chest rise and fall like he was struggling from the effort of keeping his eyes closed.
I had a feeling I’d pay for this in some way later. And that thought thrilled through me, igniting something addictive in my blood.
I shimmied into the closest thing I could find. Kaed’s shirt was huge on me. It smelled just like him, and my body clenched in response.
Glancing over at Kaed, I watched as he fought the urge to open his eyes. His forearm even came up to cover them.
It was wrong to do it, but I watched him when he couldn’t watch me. His body, that same chest I’d fallen asleep on, was carved from stone. His bare arms flexed with the pull of lifting them overhead. I followed the lines of his abdomen as they disappeared beneath the sheets.
“I can feel you watching, peach,” he ground out, frustration cauterising his words.
After a deep inhale, I released him. “You can open your eyes.”
No sooner had I spoken than he was in front of me, silk sheet in place around his middle.
His gaze raked down me, draped in only his shirt that skimmed across my bare legs, the sleeves too long around my hands. Kaed swallowed. “Do you know how torturous that was?”
Even clothed, I felt naked under his stare.
“Torturous?”
“Mm-hmm.” He nodded as he came closer. “And I won’t forget that.”
I actually found myself hoping he meant that.
“I will get something I want today, however.” Kaed brushed my hair from my shoulder and placed his hand on the back of my neck to guide me to his lips.
Why had I wanted to get dressed again? I couldn’t remember the logic behind that one. His shirt and dark silk sheet were all that separated us.
And I couldn’t resist falling into his kiss.
But he stopped me just before he let me touch him, his fist twining in my hair. Just as mine had been in his last night.
A choked moan escaped my lips at the restraining hold he had on me. I wanted to demand he kiss me. But all that came out were sounds. Plaintiff, yearning sounds.
His mouth moved past my lips to my neck, and he planted little roses of fire along my body. They bloomed everywhere his lips touched my skin. Up my neck to my jaw and all the way along it. I moved to try to meet his lips, but his grip on my hair tightened.
Kaed pulled his head back and shook it.
“No.” The command was painful, but I stilled under its weight.
And then his lips found my skin again, and the fire raged inside me until I felt my core go molten and wet. The slickness between my legs was a delicious agony as it built with each kiss.
Kaed moved to kiss along the other side of my jaw and down past the collar of the shirt. He stopped before reaching the exposed part of my chest. For the briefest of moments, he paused and looked into my eyes. I gave the most imperceptible tilt of my head under the restraint of his hand in my hair.
Yes, I wanted to breathe, but I was afraid more tangled noises would escape instead.
His tongue traced my collarbone until I cried out. My skin pebbled where his tongue drew lazy lines across me.
“Kaed …” I breathed, and I didn’t even know what I wanted to say.
My fists were bunching in the fabric of his stolen shirt.
Gripping and releasing.
That ache in my centre was growing. Building.
Kaed pulled away and stood to his full height over me.
Gripping my wrists, he pushed my hands to my sides.
Neither of us said anything. Words would have been a waste with the command rampant in his gaze. I stilled under the stare he gave me.