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“Great. Do you have a map?”

“Wait.” Raven stood up. “I mean, we don’t even know if we can trust them. Or him.” She indicated the reverend. “This might be a trap.”

“A trap?” The reverend looked insulted, as though because he wore a clergyman robe, we should believe him. I had lived too long and seen too much of the hypocrisy to know it wasn’t true.

“Why would he bother?” I snorted. “He could just open the doors and call the guards in right now to get us.”

Raven didn’t look convinced, her teeth worrying her lip.

“Hey.” Facing her, I lowered my voice, my hands cupping her face. “That temple is close to the caves. We can leave if you don’t feel comfortable. But it might be a good place to hide out, get supplies. I won’t let anything happen to you.”

Her mouth opened to counter me, but I placed my thumb over her lips, gripping her chin with my fingers. “This is the best plan for us. We can’t stay here any longer. It’s very dangerous.”

I felt a shiver go through her, her gaze meeting mine. The sudden impulse to kiss her slammed into me like an avalanche, making it hard to breathe and almost blinding me. Stepping back, I quickly dropped away from her before I acted on it, twisting back to the reverend.

“How do we get there?”

“I can take you as far as I can this evening. From there, you will have to hike up.” He padded the coats again. “Through heavy snow, but there shouldn’t be any soldiers that way.”

“Even if it’s dark, how do we get out of this town without them seeing us? They’re stopping everyone, right?”

“You become alms for the poor.”

The wagon rocked roughly back and forth as the horse labored down the cobbled streets. My body spooned Raven’s without fully touching her, our figures tucked in the corner, covered in heavy bags of grains, beans, flour, medicine, and clothing.

On the premise the reverend was visiting his poorer congregants to deliver provisions for the holidays, his one-horse wagon filled with supplies headed down the road carrying two criminals, unbeknownst to him if we were caught. It was the best plan we could come up with to escape the heavy eyes watching this city for us, though it could so easily fracture. Either by the guards or some do-gooder, thinking they were doing the right thing by turning us in.

Raven hadn’t spoken since we gathered up what little we had and helped load the wagon. I could sense her nerves, the anxiety rising in her, reality finally sinking in, comprehending how dire this was.

The wagon wheel thudded over a pothole, slamming us against the board and almost tossing us across the bed.

“Fuck.” I hissed to myself, instinctively grabbing for Raven. Yanking her into my frame, I tucked her head under my chin, an arm looping around her, the other holding the base of her throat to keep her pinned to me. Protected.

I felt her swallow a gasp, suddenly making me very aware of her body against mine. The way her ass pushed into my cock, her natural smell wafting into my nose, which was dark and wild but held a sweetness, the curve of her throat against my palm. With her uneven breaths, her heart hammered in sync with mine, and all I could think of was what we were doing this time yesterday. My body marked the exact time I had been feasting on her and craved more.

My breath drifted down the back of her ear to her neck, and I felt her shiver. Her response was addictive, clouding my logic. This time I couldn’t blame it on drugs, though I felt like I was on them. I adjusted slightly, my arm wrapped around her, and my palm grazed the patch of skin where her sweater pulled up. The heat of her soft skin went straight to my groin.

She pulled air through her nose, feeling how hard I was against her.

This was not the time or place.At. All. Yet, I couldn’t seem to control my need. My fingers aching to push into her pants, greedy to feel her again, to see if she was as wet as I had a feeling she was.

It was so subtle, but I swear I felt her hips open, inviting me to do it, to sink inside her. Biting down on my lip, my hand vibrated, trying to hold back the overwhelming craving, but it was a losing battle.

“Hey!” A voice boomed in the dark, freezing the air and jarring me out of the moment. “Stop the wagon!”

Raven and I froze, dread cracking us like a whip. Fear pulsed in my ears as the reverend slowed the wagon to a stop.

“State your business,” a guard barked in Romanian.

“I’m taking provisions to those in need,” the reverend’s throaty voice replied.

“Now?” another man asked. I could sense and hear at least a handful moving around the wagon in the darkness. “Kind of late, isn’t it?”

“It’s Christmas. And I have some who are very sick. They need medicine.” I noticed how he never actually lied. There were people out there sick and in need. He just wasn’t visiting them right at this time.

“Medicine?” a younger man’s voice questioned, hearing him move to the side of the wagon, lifting something. “What do you have back here?”

“Medicine, supplies, food. It’s for thosein need.”