Chapter 22 #2
I don’t back down. “I’ve always thought men look better with scars, and he’s already a looker.”
“And here I thought I’d be helping Rune write his wedding vows soon.” She finally looks at me, completely unentertained. It makes me smile wider.
“I do prefer a man with a little more hair. Up top.”
Soraya snorts into her eggs.
Relenting, I lower my voice. “Why do you guys hide it? Rune approves wholeheartedly, trust me—down in the tunnel he waxed poetic about dying before you came out and admitted your feelings.”
“He did not.”
I shrug. “He didn’t. But if he had, he wouldn't have been wrong. I don’t need to scent anything to know.”
Tavi sends an accusing look towards Soraya, who puts both her hands up before saying, “I just thought some frank honesty would be nice on this ship for once. And the girl has a right to know you can tell they’ve been . . . close.”
“I can’t tell—” Tavi cuts off with a sigh and sends her eyes up like she’s beseeching the deck above us for patience. “It’s vague. Especially—”
“With the stink?” I throw my chin at the line of sailors behind her.
She nods, but her lips curl up on one side. “My bloodline mixed with humans a long time ago, so the sense isn’t as sharp as it might be for others.”
“Is that also why you’re afraid of the dark?” I ask innocently.
“Why I—who told you that?” Her forehead pinches, just slightly.
I shrug. The line behind her moves forwards, most of the others either quiet or somber.
She breaths so deep it’s almost a sigh. “Some elves are born with darkvision, some aren’t. Like I said, we mixed with humans a few hundred years ago.”
It’s not an admission, but it’s close.
“It’s the same with me,” Soraya says. “Human father, siren mother. Fifty-fifty shot of being able to shift, but I can’t.”
That takes me by surprise, but it makes sense. The voice, the allure. I almost bring up that I can shift, but the thought of talking about it has the exhaustion rushing back in. Rune likely told them the moment he found out.
The animal in me has been . . . quieter.
Even with our return to the water I’ve yet to feel the tightly wound tension of her beneath my skin—her warnings and whispers.
I should be angry at Rune for goading me.
For pushing me to lose control. But the truth is, that as terrifying as that run had been, my blood had thrilled in a way that almost made me mourn how I’d shoved her down so long.
Almost. I’d kept her and me both alive. I’d stopped her from taking over, from bolting, again and again.
Softer memories brush the edge of my subconscious.
Older, washed in the faded watercolour of time.
My mother, nuzzling me in her deer form.
Teaching me the patience needed to learn the animal’s drives and needs.
But it hadn’t been enough. The grasp I’d have would slip every time we returned to the water.
And then she was gone.
“Well,” I say, standing and pulling up my empty plate, “thanks for lunch ladies. It’s been . . . enlightening.”
We should be close to the next island, but there’s no shadow on the horizon, no matter how hard I squint my eyes against the glare of the water.
Bodies churn on and over the deck, directed by Elio, who has to shout over the crash of waves that carry the ship through open water.
The darkened sky behind us bodes ill, but at this time of the year, the wind should carry any storm far to the south.
A few of the crew note the plate in my hands, including a swooping bird’s shadow that I scowl at as I cross to the captain’s quarters.
The damn thing has been messing the deck like it means to.
It’s surprising no one has put a bolt in it yet.
I shove down the annoyance, ignoring it all the same way I ignore the rising swell of nerves in my stomach.
I knock, then chastise myself. If Rune wanted privacy, he shouldn’t have forced me to share a room with him in the first place.
The moment I walk in, I spy familiar rope and leather waiting on the bed. “Is that my bola?”
“It seemed time to return it.” His voice is heavy behind me, and I turn to find him taking up an impossible amount of space while sitting in that damned chair.
His eyes are trained on the plate in my hands. “Otto wanted me to bring you food,” I say by way of explanation.
“Otto said that, did he?” The words are teasing enough that I freeze, realizing too late that there are empty dishes on his desk.
I set the plate down on the desk and face him.
He’s sprawl legged in a surprising amount of captain’s finery.
A navy jacket with gilded buttons, dress boots, a white shirt that strains over the width of his chest. He’s washed too, based on the dampness of his wavy hair and the scent of oranges that envelopes the room.
For a moment, I wonder if they use scented soaps in Nareth.
I shrug, knowing neither of us will believe what I’m about to say. “This plate was left alone, and I was already on my way here. Figured it must take a lot of energy to run your mouth as much as you do.”
He huffs a laugh, but it’s subdued. “So you brought me food?”
“So I brought you food.” I hadn’t seen him grab any, and it was the least I could do after . . . I swallow, too proud to admit I’d been caught.
He says nothing. Only studies me with an aggravating, knowing look.
“Are you going somewhere?” I push on, gesturing to his state of dress as I study the dishes beside him, because the weight of the last two days is dense between us, and both walking away and looking him in the eye seem like they’re each on separate lists of bad ideas.
“There will be funerals tonight. On this ship we honour our dead.”
The word settles on my shoulders, the rage in Reid’s words ringing in my ears again. I know it’s worse for Rune. The Vipers wouldn’t have spared the thought, but Rune looks like a mountain has crumbled around him, pinning him under the grief.
I should reach out to touch him. Curl in his lap and let my weight remind him the world is still beneath us. Our boundaries are tangled, blurred in places they should never have been blurred, but in this moment it’s simple comfort he needs.
I’m just not sure I’m capable of it.
I feel his gaze on me like a challenge now, and force myself to meet it.
He’s tired. Even more tired than I am. Dark circles nest under his bright-blue eyes.
There’s a healing cut over his cheekbone and probably all over the rest of him, if my own small wounds are any indication.
The temple had tried to swallow us whole.
Had tried to polish its stones with the grit of our bones.
I grit my teeth, shoving it all down again, as far to the back of my mind as it will go.
I’m not capable of comfort, but we do distraction well.
“Think Tavi will let you borrow the Captain’s hat?” I say.
He turns to the bottle beside him and pours the waiting glass till it’s full of liquid amber, then pulls another from the wall bracket and fills it too. “Hate hats. They make my hair flat.”
When he hands me the second glass, he’s got the ghost of a smirk on his lips.
I down it in one go, watching his eyes flick from my face to the skin of my bare neck as I swallow.
When his gaze flicks lower, going molten, the air shifts.
The sweet heat of the alcohol mirrors the feeling that teases my core and makes my breasts feel heavy with need for a hand or lips or the flick of a tongue.
I can still taste him. Can feel the space between us charged with the friction of who we are and what we want and what we’ve already endured together.
He downs his, never taking his eyes off me. “Was there something you needed, little doe?”
There’s something in the question. Another dare, maybe.
“I planned to sleep,” I say, honestly. “Until this evening at least. You could join me . . . if you don’t take up too much of the bed.”
Neither of us moves, the implication thickening the air between us.
He watches me with that too-discerning look again, like he’s picking the words apart.
Like I don’t see how the knuckles of his hands have gone white where he grips the arm of the chair.
“Are you feeling breathless out of the water too?” He smiles.
“Here I thought you were an honourable pirate, never taking more than you need.”
My cheeks flush. “I’d argue your greed rivals my own. Unless you’ve chosen to forget what happened in that water?” I suppress a shiver as the memory of his taloned hands on me, his tongue brushing my lips, asking for more. Red crawls up his neck as his eyes go dark. I know he’s thinking the same.
“Just because I kissed you . . .” His voice rises, rough, his body going still like a predator waiting to strike. “. . . doesn’t mean I want to bed you.”
I take a step towards him, drawn by the taunt in the words and by his gravity, the way his presence takes up the entire room.
“Just because I tolerate you”—I brace each of my hands on the armrests and lean over into his space, letting my voice drop to a murmur—“doesn’t mean I don’t want to kill you.”
Fast as a viper, he hooks a hand around the back of my neck and yanks me so close I can feel the kiss of his breath.
On instinct, my hand moves to the bone dagger at my hip, and I catch myself with a leg over his waist. A thrill runs up my spine at the firm press of his cock on the inside of my thigh, even as, again, I press the blade to the base of his throat.
“Do it,” he says, grinning now, the metal glinting between us. His other hand embeds in my hip, squeezing hard enough I can’t help the whimper of need that escapes me. “I’ll wait.”
I just grin back as the hand on my hip releases to peel the dagger from between us.
I don’t fight it. The bone clatters on the floor, and then his hand is back on me again, searching, while the other is a vice around the back of my neck.
His touch moves over my leg, ghosts over my ribs, and stalls on the dull kitchen knife I’d tucked beneath my wraps.
“You’re a menace,” he says fondly, and fire follows the trail of his fingers as they slip under my blouse to tug the weapon from its hiding place.
“You didn’t really expect me to go into that forest completely unarmed, did you?” I breathe, pulse racing. I let my fingers hook and drag under the collar of his shirt, while his slip beneath my thigh, tugging me closer.
“I’m learning I’ve no idea what to expect from you.” His hand stops, his thumb tracing circles around the sharpened duragan bone tucked low in my pocket.
Victory shines in his eyes as I pull up on my knees so he can grab it, then settle the rest of my body on top of him, molding to him even as he holds my face still.
The grip wars for my focus. The heat of his body is a caress on its own.
My nipples ache for attention and I’m already a puddle where his length thickens further between my thighs.
Immediately, his other hand lands on another weapon—a throwing knife wrapped and tucked by my ankle.
It was easy to nick from the mess of the second deck.
“Really, Odelia?” he asks, but there’s nothing but amusement in his tone.
“Viper, Rune.”
“I didn’t know vipers could be so eager to be unarmed.” The words vibrate in my chest.
I bite back a whimper as his fingers finally circle the peaks of my nipples in turn, sending an electric arc of need shooting low, then they slide up, and I gasp as they dip down the front of my shirt, snaking past my wrap to snatch the bundle secured between my breasts.
“You ass!” I spit, trying to push away, but he doesn’t let go.
Instead he slips the most recent key into his shirt pocket and pulls me closer, wrapping an arm around my hips and grinding our bodies together. My breath hitches so sharply my back arches, and he takes the opportunity to nip at the taut bud of my breast through my shirt. “I told you I’d get it.”
I suck in a breath, but wrap my fist into his shirt, shoving him back into the chair. He just pulls me down with him, grinning as his mouth crashes into mine.
My knees sink into the cushion as he pulls us closer, every inch of his firm chest crushed into me down to where our hips meet.
I grind into the sweet pressure between my legs as his tongue slips over my lips, begging for entry.
I open for him, flicking mine into his mouth, there and gone again.
He groans, and the sound vibrates through my entire body.
One of his hands slips under the back of my pants to cup my ass, while the other makes it under my shirt, palming my breast over the cloth that binds my chest. His pinky finger brushes against the blunted end of his letter opener and he pulls away, his chest heaving against mine.
“Fuck Odelia, where do you even keep all these weapons?”
“Keep going and find out.” I pull him back into me, sucking his lower lip into my mouth to nip, letting my hips grind over him in invitation. He tangles his fingers into the fabric of my blouse, lifting it up over my head.
Then there’s a knock.
We still, chests heaving. His pupils are blown wide, nothing but iris in the dim light.
“Yeah?” Rune calls, his eyes pinned to mine.
“Storms coming.” It’s Elio. His voice is strained, muffled by the wooden door.
Rune sighs, letting his head fall back to rest on the back of the chair. “What do you mean?” The storm should have continued far past us.
“Just come see,” Elio calls, his voice fainter, as if he’s already walking away.
We shift, untangling our limbs and freeing ourselves from the grip of the chair. His lips are pink, and his eyes flick over me as I reach for my shirt.
“I’ll be back.” He moves to leave, but stops. His voice is gravelly, but low. “You should get some rest. It may be a rough evening.”
The door whines as he goes, then closes with a soft click. Then it’s just me, the heat in my veins, and the knowledge that I am absolutely, undeniably, completely willingly fucked.