Page 92 of 'Til All the Seas Run Dry

“Of me?”

“No. I’m afraid to lose you. I’m afraid to keep you. I’m afraid of what I’ll lose either way.”

“You will lose nothing with me,” he said, his teeth clenched tight and his lips against the shell of her ear. “Nothing, do you hear? I will give you anything.Everything.I’ll buy the world and lay it at your feet.”

“You already own the world.”

“Not even close.”

“It feels like you do,” she said with a sniffle.

“For you. I’ve done it all for you,” he said, feeling the hollow ache in his chest yawning and sucking at him. Because of all the truths in his life, great and small, that was the grandest, most shimmering of them all.

She tried to turn to face him, but he held her fast, his lips still grazing the delicate rim of her ear. “There isnae a single thing you could ask for that I wouldnae scour the earth to find. To the depths of the sea. To the moon. There is no length to which I wouldnae go to make you happy.”

30

“To the depths of the sea…”

Jory sucked in a breath, feeling the cool marble of his palms against her scorching, aching body. Because he was wrong. There was one thing he couldn’t give her, one single thing that wasn’t in his power to give. But if she had the courage to reach for him, tokeephim, perhaps…

He dragged his teeth against the side of her neck once more, and she shuddered, wondering, not for the first time, what it would be like to feel them sinking deep. To feed him. But the thought was banished quickly by his tongue tracing the path his teeth had just forged, dragging up her neck to her ear. He bit gently, and her body jolted.

The car door was open just next to her. He had her pressed against the side of the SUV by the fuel tank door. The overhead light inside glowed brightly in the black interior.

“Callum?”

“Aye?”

His voice was hoarse, a whisper from the depths of his throat.

“Get in the car.”

“Ladies first.”

She took a fortifying breath, the intake of air bleeding into the sound of the crashing waves, of the night and all its noises. But she nodded. He loosened his hold on her naked body and she slid sideways, crawling into the back of the SUV, aware of how much of her was on display. Again.

She turned and knelt in the center, in the empty space between the two captain’s seats, and rested her palms on her thighs. Waiting.

Callum’s gray eyes were bright, glowing in the fluorescent light from the ceiling.

“Take it off,” she said, echoing his words from before. “All of it.”

A wolfish look spread over his face, hungry and ready. And then he was naked, standing in the open doorway, his arms braced on the roof of the SUV. It was gratifying to blink and see the slide deck flip from clothed Callum to naked Callum. But at the same time, she wished she’d been able to see him peel the black neoprene down his long, strong legs. To watch that slow striptease as he worked the wet, clinging material over the topography of his body.

“Get in the car.”

He stood as still as a statue. Or a tiger in the undergrowth. Not even a muscle twitched to give him away.

“Please,” she said before hastily adding, “but—” He paused. “Butclimbin. Andsitdown.” She nodded her head at the seat. “Slowly. None of that flashy business.”

He smirked as he complied, ducking his head and climbing into the vehicle, sitting on the black leather seat. Seawater dripped from his hair, sluicing down his chest.

“We’re going to ruin the leather seats with this saltwater. Do you have a towel or a?—”

“Fuck the seats,” he said, his eyes locked on hers.

He looked like a god. An ancient deity, all muscle and hardness, finding himself in a modern car and looking both at home and completely out of place at the same time.