Page 232 of The Devil We Crave
Yelena gasps quietly, her eyelids falling half shut and her body shuddering as my mouth descends on her throat. To kiss her in a place I know she loves, yes, but also to use my tongue to lick off the little drops of blood from where my knife was perhaps abittoo heavy-handed.
“At a certain point,” she giggles as I pull away, “it’ll be spring, then summer.”
“And?”
“And it’ll be a little harder to get away with turtlenecks and scarves then.” She cocks a faux-stern brow at me. “My friends will havequestions.”
I frown. “Doubt it. They’ll all be wrapped up in their own romances.”
She giggles. “Oh my God, Wren?—”
“And to thinkwewere once the scandalous pairing,” I chuckle. “Not to mention my cousin…”
Yelena’s brows pinch. “Yeah, whatisexactly going on with Selene and?—”
“Don’t know, don’t want to.” I make a face. “Truly.”
“Fair.”
I smile. “At least Galina’s happy.”
“It had betterstaythat way,” Yelena says sharply. “Or I’ll have more than words for?—”
“Baby?”
She grins. “Yeah?”
“How about we continue this conversation indoors, in bed.”
She blushes as she pulls close to me, tugging her coat around her. “Or how about wedon’tcontinue it, and find something else to do instead?”
“I did get some extra strong zip-ties at the hardware store yesterday,” I growl.
“And they say romance is dead,” she sighs happily, grinning up at me.
I smile back, cupping her cheek and leaning down to crush my lips to hers.
“I love you,” I murmur quietly.
“Promise?”
“Promise-promise.”
She beams. “I love you too.”
I take her hand and we turn and walk through the woods back to the warm, twinkling lights of Knightsblood in the freshly fallen snow.
If someone were to see us right now, they’d think we were perfectly normal.
The golden boy with his golden girl.
I think we both love that they’d have no idea what lurks beneath our masks.
Our deviance, and our madness.
But it’s us.
And to me and to her… It’sperfect.
