Page 64

“What are you feeling?” Beau leans back on one hand, watching me.

The seen feeling increases, and I look at his face. He’s patient and waiting, as soft with understanding as Dom is stern and unreadable. Beau has always made room for my feelings. For my thoughts.

“Nervous,” I admit. “Exposed.”

“Well, that’s fair,” he murmurs, and I wait—for the reasons why it’s okay. Why I should continue anyway. Maybe an order. Possibly even an assurance that I could stop.

But he doesn’t say anything else.

He just lets my feelings be okay.

Warm, liquid sunshine springs to life in my chest, and I smile at him, relaxing. The corner of his mouth lifts further, cozy and kind.

I slip smoothly from my awkward crouch into a kneel, and it’s comfortable in ways that go so much deeper than the way my muscles flow. It makes me fall very close to Dom. Intimately close. I lift the washcloth to his face, and he turns it toward me. Watching me.

His eyes burn hot.

Not a single thing searing behind them is contained.

Slowly, I press the damp cloth to his sweaty temple, letting the cool water well up against his skin before I drag it away.

With gentle care, I tend his face, wiping the dirt from the heavy ridges of his cheekbones and around the swell of his lips.

I’m close enough that I can see every fleck of stubble on his jaw.

I can count every blunt, black eyelash and feel every breath whisper over my skin.

I drag the cloth down his neck, cooling the damp space at the base of his hair that I want to dig my fingers into. I ache as he shudders.

My skin isn’t even in contact with his, but it feels deeply intimate. With his eyes locked on my face for every stroke, the dangerous weight of him beside me, I really could be tending to a weary warrior after a long battle.

The breeze stirs, balmy and thick, and it fans strands of my hair over my face. They stick on my lips, over my glasses, and Dom lifts a dirt-stained hand to tuck the strands behind my ear.

I’m shaking by the time I dip the cloth into the shallow bowl of cleaning water and take his hand from my face.

“Tell me more,” he orders softly as I clean it. “Tell me a secret.”

I turn his hand over, and he shivers as I slide the towel over his palm.

“I don’t trust the Reapers,” I tell them.

“I don’t, and I’ve been thinking a lot about why—why, when they’ve done almost nothing to deserve it, I struggle with it.

Why I still sometimes struggle with all of you.

” I sigh. “And the more I thought about it, I think I can’t figure it out because there is no reason.

I just think it might be me. I’ve never trusted anyone easily—especially men.

.. and especially over the last few years.

I did everything for myself, and that was it. It’s become an instinct.”

I stop moving the cloth, realizing his hands are more than clean. They’re large and strong and steady under mine. I squeeze his hand lightly and look up.

Our gazes crash together.

“I want to create new instincts.”

A deep, rumbling sound erupts from Dom’s chest, his face inching closer. His eyes are intent, intense, and the tiny hairs lift on the back of my neck.

By now, I know the feeling of being hunted.

“What are your instincts saying now?” Beau teases gently, but his eyes as heated and heavy-lidded as Dom’s. His accent is sinfully thick, and this time, I don’t think it’s on purpose.

Dom’s mouth hovers over mine, and he watches me as our breaths twist together, our lips barely brushing. I can feel the hot, demanding heat of him like a waiting avalanche, just a brutal, bone-jarring millimeter away.

But he’s not Jayk.

I’m his to claim, not the other way around. Not unless he commands it.

There’s a sharp, punishing whistle from the music room window, and Dom looks up.

Away .

I shudder, heat pounding through me with ferocious force.

“Incoming,” Sloane shouts down, throwing a thumb back behind her, and disappointment throbs—so acutely in this moment that frustration burns in my throat, and the usual humor I can find in it is missing.

Maybe this is how they bond, but I’m ready for it to be over now.

Dom seems to be thinking along similar lines. “Motherfucker,” he curses, reaching for his bag. “I’ll take care of it. You two stay here.” His expression is intent, grim—more certain than I’ve seen it since Cyanide. “I’ll buy you a few hours.”

I want a few hours with both of them. I want a lifetime.

But for now, I’ll take what Dom can buy me... and I’ll continue making sure Jayk knows he’ll always be a priority. That I’m not leaving him, no matter what.

Because that’s where this comes from. Jayk has been left behind too many times.

And him needing to know that I won’t is the only reason I haven’t castrated him in his sleep.

So I nod to Dom, accepting it, and he stops, looking at my face.

“Is that okay?” he asks.

A question from Dom always sounds like it borders on a command, but there’s something in him right now that feels like he’s waiting on an answer. That if I told him right now it wasn’t okay, he’d string up that bow and hold Jayk back by whatever means necessary.

He’s listening.

Some of the tension eases from me, and my next nod is easier. “Yes, sir. It’s okay. Thank you.”

My gaze slips to his mouth, and I bite down on the miserable, regretful whimper that wants to escape me.

“Anything else you feel like sharing, little librarian?” he asks, and this time, his deep voice is dryer than dust.

I look up from his mouth, and his eyes are still molten. The things behind them are still scalding enough to make me flush.

“I want you. I want you so badly I think I would strip naked right here if you asked.”

The husky words are out of me before I’ve thought them through, and Dom’s eyes flare. Behind him, Beau groans. Distantly, there’s a commotion in the house, but none of us pay it any attention.

Dom’s gaze runs over my body, hot and impatient. “Then kiss me, pet. Make it count.”

His order takes me by the throat.

I press up onto my knees, my hands tangling around his jaw and neck until my fingers press into that perfect hollow at his nape.

My mouth collides against his, a desperate moan escaping me as I suck his heavy lower lip.

He tastes like fire and dynamite, and like the other day by the cave, he takes control with fierce, uncompromising dominance.

He owns my mouth, overwhelming me easily until I’m squirming against him, riveted by need and trying to crawl up onto his lap.

He’s never finished inside me. I’ve never seen him come.

God, all the ways I need to be fucked by this man.

Suddenly, his mouth is gone, and he wrenches to his feet. I fall back to my knees, back to the dirt, shaking. Throbbing and dazed.

Dom drags his hand over his mouth, looking down at me.

“Every day, pet. We find time every day for this.”

I gasp for air. “Jaykob?—”

“Jayk can keep his nights for now, but your mornings are for us. I had fun with his game, but I’m done playing.” Dom’s jaw firms, and his eyes blaze as his shoulders—finally—straighten. “Come to us at dawn. No one will stop you. You have my word, Eden.”

My lips part, as pure, filthy lust shudders through me.

Just like that, I believe him.

I don’t know what he’s about to do, or say, but this is our commander, and he’s taking control.

“Yes, sir. I’ll be there.”

He nods once, then storms toward the house. Civilians part around him like water, and I’m not sure they even realize they’re doing it.

“About time. I was wondering how long it would take before he stopped playing nice,” Beau drawls.

I duck my head, trying to steady my breathing. “The tripwires? The sucker punch on the porch? That was nice ?”

Beau just smiles at me. “Not as nice as we plan on being to you.”

Wicked, sinful things are alive in that smile, and I become aware of how he’s stretched out over the grass. Of all that bare, naked flesh I can do very little with out here.

Silently, I pick up the other cloth without looking at it.

“That’s right, darlin’.” His eyes twinkle in the fading light. “Don’t you forget about me.”

In my mind, Dom’s hand is on my ass and Beau’s cock is in my mouth as he demands that very attention. Wetting my lips, I kneel closer to him and press the cloth over his chest. Over his heart.

“I’d sooner forget to breathe,” I tell him fiercely.

His face softens, and slowly, I slide the cloth over his skin. Suddenly, he catches my wrist.

“I have something to share, too.”

Apprehensively, I pause. I hadn’t really anticipated that, but it is only fair.

Beau’s tongue slides over his lower lip, but his expression is serious now and a little hesitant. His thumb coasts over my wrist.

“I’m sorry for how I treated you after Cyanide.

I was unkind and unproductive and... I shouldn’t have cut you out.

I was so caught up in being hurt that you didn’t talk to me, I didn’t stop to think about why.

I made it worse than it had to be, and I’m sorry I hurt you.

I never meant to make you feel like I didn’t still care. ”

He sighs, and something in me eases at the ring of sincerity in his voice.

I knew he was sorry. Sorry enough that he’s been meeting with Jasper often.

I’m still glad he said it.

“It won’t happen again, Eden. I’ll talk to you if I have a problem, I promise.” He grimaces uncomfortably. “If I’m mad.”

“When.”

He looks up, and I smile softly.

“When you get mad,” I correct him. “It will happen, Beau. Just like I was mad at you for being a wretched, miserable, uncommunicative plague on my days.”

His lips part incredulously, and he huffs a laugh. His thumb stops tracing patterns on my wrist, and he grasps it, yanking me, and I collapse over him.

The green in his eyes becomes wooded, the gold sparkling. “More honesty.” His lips tilt. “Keep it coming, pet. I can take it.”

Wrapping a hand around my cheek, he kisses me deeply.

When he finally stops, I’m breathless and filled with the same elated giggles I hear whispering from the bridge, and my whole body is shivering as I pick up the cloth again.

I clean him, and we flirt.

We flirt until the flirting turns to talking, and we talk until it flows like air.

We talk long past sunset, and for once, no one comes to bother us.

Beau tucks me against the new sprouts in the tree and sinks me between its roots with kisses that feel like home.

We talk about serious things and inane things, and his therapy with Jasper.

We touch on my worries and hopes and I give up pieces of secrets like I’m baring my throat, and he takes them carefully, gratefully , like he’s seeing now how much they cost me to reveal.

We talk about my past and my herbs and he asks questions about tinctures and teas with rapt attention.

We talk and flirt, and he holds me until we fall asleep against the tree the way we used to in our bed.

We fall asleep to I love yous.

I fall asleep with hope.