25. 24 #2
We stayed in that moment, his anger a blaze of fury. My own gaze numb to it all.
Then he sighed, and blinked. The rage dampened, and quelled. “Fuck.”
I frowned. “Davian.”
“I’m not used to this. Who I have become since Seera. I wasn’t like this before.”
Since Seera. Always, there was her. Of course, there was her. The maybes between us, solidified into something that could never be. I looked down at my hands. “Grief changes us.”
“No, it’s not… I am grieving for her. Of course, I am,” he said, as if he was reassuring himself. “But I’ve never felt this… possessive before.”
I looked at him, to find him staring out at the night once more.
“Seera was… family,” he started. “We met when we were childen.”
I almost stopped him. There was a part of me that felt the need to reassure him that he didn’t have to tell me this. But he knew that. I hadn’t asked. It was a selfish desire, to not have the man I was slowly becoming infatuated with speak of his love for another woman.
If he wanted to speak about the woman he had married, the woman who had died, he should be allowed that. I should listen, and offer him sympathy.
So I said nothing, and watched him in the warmth of the summer night.
“She found me in a very bad time in my life,” he continued. He swallowed, and clearly didn’t want to expand on that time any further. “She was always kind to me, even as a child herself. I’ve always envied her empathy.
“Later, when she found herself in a prison of her father’s making, with a betrothed she didn’t want and a house he was determined to keep her in, I gave her a kindness in exchange. I freed her.”
I smiled softly.
Davian’s leg bounced, and I touched it with my hand.
He sighed out a deep breath. “We kept each other alive. She was my lungs, Annie. She kept me going when I had forgotten how to breathe by myself. When I find those who killed her, I will tear them apart with my bare hands if I cannot find justice. I will avenge the loss of her. I can’t rest knowing her soul may not be at peace. ”
I nodded, my own emotions locked behind a wall.
The way he spoke of her, I tried not to feel the twinge of jealousy.
How could I envy a woman who had likely been murdered?
Who had to be saved from her family home?
This was a tale of a rescue. Davian had saved her from an unhappy life.
But that only made me care for him more.
Davian swallowed, and looked down at me. “But she was not… what we had wasn’t… it was a marriage. We didn’t have… There was no fire there.”
My heart jumped. Gods, why was he telling me this? I searched for another response, and all I had was a dry throat.
Davian scanned my face, his silver eyes darting to each of mine, my parted mouth, my pulled brow.
He turned his hips, facing me more. Our legs touched.
My hand was still on him. “I don’t know what I’m saying.
And it’s bizarre that I’m saying it here, hiding by the tree I used to climb.
Or maybe it’s not bizarre. Maybe this carnival of an evening is what I’ve needed. The fear of returning here…”
He stared at my mouth, and I inhaled sharply.
“Annie,” he said. Softly.
He was drunk. He had something to drink before we got here. He’d drank more since. There was no guarantee that any of this meant anything. And yet… He was so beautiful.
I reached my hand up from his leg and touched it to the side of his face. Fingertips against his cheekbones. Palm brushing his jaw.
His eyes fluttered shut. “Annie.”
My heart was in my mouth. “Davian.”
When his eyes opened again, the anger had been replaced by hunger. He lifted his own hand to my chin. His fingers were warm, and then his thumb brushed my lower lip. Every part of me felt exhilarated, on the edge of destruction. His gaze was molten. “Let me kiss you.”
I knew what he meant, but something flashed inside me. Fear. Uncertainty. I didn’t want to fall for someone again. It wasn’t supposed to happen, especially after we had just discussed his wife.
I turned my head, revealing my neck.
He groaned, and pressed his mouth to my neck. I slid my hand into his curls as he pressed one kiss. Then his hand moved around to the back of my neck, and he sucked the skin hard. I breathed in, a moan falling from my mouth, and he released my neck, pressing his lips in a line down to my breasts.
I was on fire, I could hardly think, hardly recall how to breathe. It was just the touch of his hand and tongue and lips; everything else had stopped existing.
His hand moved around to the front of my neck as his tongue dragged across the top of my breast. He pushed my head back against the tree, standing up as he kept kissing me, his legs parting my skirts as he stood between them.
I trailed my hand from his hair down his torso.
He pressed me firmer against the tree and let out a groan as my hand reached his crotch, and I rubbed over him.
The grip on my neck pinned me, but didn’t constrict me. Part of me wanted it to. Part of me wanted it all to be more. Everywhere. Everything.
He leaned his head against mine. I opened my eyes to find him staring at my lips, panting. He looked far, far, too tempting. I would fall to my knees right here, I would let him bury his head beneath my skirts. He could give me a single command and I would perform it without hesitation.
Davian stared at me as I stared up at him. And then he let go of my neck, and with the same thumb he had brushed my mouth with, he pushed it past my lips and into my mouth. As if by some secret code, I swirled my tongue around it.
A branch snapped, and Davian swiftly stepped back. His hands, fingers, his entire presence fell away from me. From the courtyard, the butler stepped around the bush and came into view.
I breathed hard, and I could feel my cheeks heat. Thankfully, Davian looked just as flustered, for once.
“Leader Theolis requests you return to the party,” he said.
Shit. I looked up at the facade of the House, and saw no lights in the upstairs window. How had she known we were out here? A good guess, or something more?
Davian huffed. “Eyes and ears, everywhere.”
The butler said nothing, only gesturing back to the garden.
I stood, and grabbed Davian’s arm. “I think we were just leaving, anyway.”
Davian and I met eyes, and he stared at my reddened mouth before closing his eyes and nodding. “Yes. My lady is quite right.”
The butler cleared his throat and followed us back into the House. We crossed the floor, and Davian pointedly ignored two individuals who came to speak to us. Camriel noticed our swift departure, and on the spur of the moment, I flicked my head, inviting him to come with us.
He looked relieved, if anything, and joined us as we left the House.
I wasn’t entirely sure why I’d done it, but I think it was fear of myself.
The fear of what I would do if left alone in that carriage with Davian after the memory of his skin on mine.
What I would have done if we hadn’t been interrupted.
We both needed to cool off.
The ride back had an awkward companionship to it, with both Davian and I needing Camriel’s irritation at the other nobility to pull us back into normality.
He hadn’t said anything, not really. He felt possessive of me, and didn’t like it when the other men had touched me. That wasn’t love. That wasn’t a confession of anything but lust and craving. It was a moment of desire, a moment of mutual need.
I forced myself to think of Ekris’ face, and forget it had even happened. We were getting close to answers now, and then our paths would split again, forever. It was the way it had to be.