Page 129 of Blood Stone

Adrian…Roman…smiled a slow smile that she might have called sexy on any other day than this. “I worked in his palace, Kate. I was one of his counting clerks. I’d learned how to write by then, so I was a valuable commodity and I couldn’t be bought, so Murad trusted me.”

“Youknewhim.” And just like that, she burst into tired, ragged tears. It was exhaustion, she knew. But all she could think of was the weeks and dreary months of research she had done to dig up authentic details about Murad and here was Adr—Roman, who had lived in the man’s damned palace and could probably tell her what side the man dressed on…or even if they worried about such things then.

The mattress dipped and his arms went around her. “Don’t,” he said softly. “Please don’t, Kate. I feel bad enough about this, already.” He pressed her head against his shoulder and it felt perfectly normal, just like every other time she had rested her head there.

“Y...youfeel bad?” she said, and her breath hitched in her chest. “You got to meet Murad. I had to do shitty research instead.”

She felt his shoulder shaking and lifted her head. “You’re laughing at me?”

He shook his head. His face was devoid of mirth, but his eyes were glowing with warmth.

“You are!” she accused.

His mouth turned up at the corners. “Sort of. But more about what you just said. It sounded…strange.”

“About Murad?” She played it back over in her mind. “It does, doesn’t it? Very fractured reality.” She touched his chest. Lightly. Carefully. “You…you’ve never told anyone before, have you?”

He drew in a breath. Let it out. “No.” His voice was low.

“God, the guts that took,” she breathed.

He was staring into her eyes. “I want to kiss you.” His voice had the low timbre that always marked powerful need in him.

She spread her fingers across his chest, feeling the flesh beneath. “What’s stopping you?”

“The fear that you’ll be repelled. That you’ll turn away. This is where my courage really fails me, Kate. I don’t think I could stand it. Not now.”

“Keep still,” she said and reached up to press her mouth against his. His mouth was exactly the same as it had been the dozens of times before when they had kissed. He was no different now.

Then she forgot about comparing differences, because there were none. This was Adrian that she had come to know…and love…a tiny voice whispered in the far off distant recesses of her mind. She gave herself up to the pleasure of simply kissing him.

He groaned and kissed her back, his arms tightening and drawing her closer. It trapped her hand between them, her fingers splayed across his chest. The thin tee-shirt was stretched across the width of it and only became loose further down where his hips narrowed and the flat washboard abs she loved began.

Stomach. Blood.

She tore her mouth away from his. “Garrett!”

“He’s fine,” Roman assured her. “He’s been stuck with bigger things than my switchblade before now.”

“But he doesn’t know I’m okay,” she told him, struggling to pull out of his arms. “The last thing he saw was me staggering away to vomit.” She stood up.

“He’ll be gone, Kate,” Roman told her.

“What?”

“As soon as he healed enough to move freely, he’ll have left.”

She sprinted for the front door, panic rising in her.

Behind her, Roman’s heavier steps followed. “Don’t do this, Kate,” he called as she skidded down the tiled stairs two and three at a time, clutching at the bannister with a grip worthy of The Hulk. “Think about your movie if you can’t think of anything else!”

Normally, such an appeal might have halted her. But her guilt was in the driver’s seat this time.

The front room was empty and silent. No Garrett. She looked out the window for his car and driver. A cab was pulling up beside the curb where Garrett stood waiting.

Her heart leapt high and hard.

Roman spoke right behind. “If not for your movie, then me. Don’t go out there because I’m asking you not to.”