Page 78 of Winds of Ruin
Was this a dream? Had I fallen asleep in the parlor?
I stilled. All the air knocked from my lungs on a gasp.
A burning stare found mine. I couldn’t move a damned muscle.
His stubble was thick, and his ungloved hands flexed at his sides. A petal from the tree above caught in his dark curls.
One moment I stood there stunned; the next I sprinted toward him before my mind could catch up.
His brows rose, but his arms opened just before I launched myself with such voracity that he stumbled backwards.
Ahumphsound escaped him as we hit the snow in a pile of panting breaths and pounding hearts. I’d knocked him clean off his feet.
“Is it really you, puppy?” I whispered into his collar as his arms tightened around me. The ice crunched beneath my knees, which had fallen to each side of his hips.
“I’m here.” He inhaled deeply, stubble catching in my hair, and drank me in as though he’d been waiting for this moment too.
In any other context, if a man smelled me, I’d find it unsettling and worthy of reprimand. Instead, I reveled in the feeling of his hand drawing circles on my back, grounding me to the fact that he washere.
“You smell like flowers,” he murmured. “I don’t remember that.”
Lifting my torso up, I sat there, unashamed to be straddling his waist, unabashed to run my hands up his abdomen and to his chest. He was a solid form of muscle, and even through the thick wool coat he wore, I could feel his heartbeat beneath my palms.
Real.
Here.
“It’s the orchard,” I breathed out.
He stared up at me, mouth agape. The gold of his irises seemed to be lit from within. “Miss me?” he said on an exhale before the most devastating smile greeted me.
“More than you could ever imagine,” I answered.
I laughed and dropped my hands on either side of his head. He stilled beneath me, and his expression turned smoldering. My lips were so close to his. Physicality came so naturally to me, and my body screamed to kiss him; logic told me it was a terrible idea. Everything and nothing had changed—he deservedhis dreams fulfilled, and romanticizing the moment did him no good.
Though, I couldn’t help but get lost in the way he took me in with so much adoration.
Reeling in my desire to claim him, I placed a lingering peck just beside his mouth. I’d steer clear of kissing him again. He needn’t know about the first time, and I had no proof of whose kiss truly had woken him.
When I straightened, his light brown cheeks were flushed mauve, and I couldn’t tell if it was due to my position or the bite of frost in the air.
He took my hands and held them, bringing them to his chest, still staring at me with wide-eyed wonder. “I might be able to imagine.”
My whole body slackened in relief. I should let him up. I shouldn’t sit there atop him like we’d ever been this intimate. Before the mirror, we’d been acquaintances—well, more like I’d been a thorn in his side, meddling in his business in Helos.
I tried to use our entwined hands to push myself up off him, but he held on. “Stay a minute. Please.” His whispered plea only melted me further.
“Of course. I have nowhere in the world I’d rather be.”
I slumped against his chest and let him hold me there until snow soaked through our clothes. When he was ready to rise, he helped me up, looking entirely unbothered by the chill that reddened our noses.
I’d tried for so long to convince myself that what I felt for him would fade.
It hadn’t.
We held hands as we walked through the orchard. Every other step, I swung his arm to make sure I was not dreaming.
Friends held hands. I’d held Krait’s hand plenty, or Sybilla’s. Justifying it to myself helped take the edge off any lingering heat.
