Page 50 of Redline Communion

“Lo.”

“What?”

“You sure?”

I stare at him. “I just interrupted Satan’s book club to announce it.”

Something that might be a cough comes from Dominic’s direction.

Rafe almost smiles.

Not enough.

I grab the front of his shirt before anybody can reinterpret what I mean.

“I choose you.”

The words land differently this time because they’re mine. Nobody offered me a choice, and Alistair certainly didn’t intend to give me one, so I take it myself.

Alistair lets me enjoy that for barely a second.

“Then let the first claim be witnessed.”

Of fucking course.

There he goes twisting my words again. I make one decision and he turns it into scripture before the sentence has finished leaving my mouth.

“The claim is witnessed,” the room answers.

Rafe hears the theft too.

I see it in the way his jaw tightens, but his eyes stay on mine.

“Still want me?”

“Ask me one more time and I’m choosing the little person with the open robe and drool on his lips.”

That gets a real laugh out of him, low and brief and completely inappropriate for the room.

Good.

I need one thing in here to be wrong because I chose it.

His hand slides behind my neck.

“Come here.”

I do, and his mouth meets mine with nothing ceremonial about it. I hold on because I want to, because I chose him, and because for the first time since Helena fastened me into that white dress, nobody else gets to decide what the next movement means.

Cassian’s fingers slide lower along my body, teasing without quite giving me what I need, and I whimper against Rafe’s mouth.

Rafe pulls back just enough to ask, “Will you beg?”

I shake my head, not because I don’t want to but because I do, and that frightens me more than it should.

“You can ask for what you want,” Cassian murmurs against my ear.

His fingers press harder, deeper, and my breath catches.