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I leaned in, brushing her hand with my lips—not a kiss, but more of a promise.

“Because you’re the first thing in a thousand years that’s made me feel love, and not just lust.”

Gods help me.

“Got any coffee?” she said, casually brushing past me.

I didn’t move.

Couldn’t.

My hand flexed against the stone railing. My skin burned with phantom memories of her pressed against me, of her voice in my ear, of her fingers trailing too low on accident and not apologizing.

“You’re wearing my shirt,” I said and the sentence sounded like a prayer.

She paused at the top of the stairs, arching one brow like she didn’t know exactly what she was doing.

“Laundry’s still being sorted. Diana said I could borrow it. Problem?”

“No,” I murmured. “None at all.”

Lie.

So many problems. Starting with the way my blood was heating in places I wasn’t proud of, and ending with the way I wanted to see her in nothingbutthat shirt.

Hell. I wanted to see her take it off.

Wrath tilted her head, eyes narrowing as if she sensed the war happening in my head. Of course she did. Wrath and Lust had always been close cousins—passion and fury from the same ancestral line. But now that Wrath wore a woman’s skin and walked through my home barefoot in my shirt?

I was drowning.

“You keep staring,” she said, voice low.

“You keep giving me reasons to.”

Her lips twitched. Not quite a smile. Not quite a warning.

I took a step forward. She didn’t move.

“I’ve spent lifetimes chasing pleasure,” I said quietly, each word deliberately measured, “but never once have I wanted someone the way I want you.”

Her throat bobbed as she swallowed. “Is that because I’m Wrath now? A challenge?”

“No.” I reached up and slowly tucked one loose curl behind her ear, letting my fingers graze the curve of her jaw. “It’s because you make me feel something before the touch.”

Her breath caught, and for a moment—just a moment—I thought she might lean in.

But Wrath only smiled, soft and dangerous. “Careful, Lust. You keep talking like that and you’ll convince me you’re sincere.”

“I am sincere,” I whispered, bending just enough to feel her breath on my lips. “That’s the most terrifying part.”

Then Pride’s voice echoed from the hallway like a cold wind through an open door. “Wrath? Diana’s asking for you in the west wing.”

Wrath blinked, the spell shattering. She pulled back, adjusting the collar of the shirt absently as if she hadn’t nearly undone me.

“Guess I’m being summoned,” she said, already walking away.

My shirt swayed against her hips like it had been designed to haunt me.