Page 59 of House of Blood and Roses: Vol. 1

"Of course not," I say gently. "Not to a soul."

Marcus lets out a sigh of relief, only to go tense when he hears the clang of someone heading up the steps. I'm about to suggest we do something that makes the situation seem a little less like we're conspiring, even though we are.

Marcus visibly relaxes when he sees Linc approach. "Linc."

To my surprise, Linc smiles at the prince, seeming as if he knows him well. "I didn't expect to see you here."

"I was showing Lord Luca the history section," Marcus says, seeming a little better at the lie than he did with me.

"Ah, yes. I see you've met Beatrice." Linc says, turning his attention to me.

"We had the pleasure of meeting at the Golden Moon ball," Marcus says. "I didn't realise the two of you had been spending time together."

"Linc's been showing me the history section," I say, realising after a moment how that sounds. "I mean, the actual books. He's been teaching me history." I throw a desperate look at Linc to help me.

He chuckles. "It's about the books," he promises. "Until the blood charts come back, anyway. Then we'll have a look at those."

Marcus clears his throat. "The books, right. Well, now I've shown Lord Luca what I intended to, I'm going to get going. I've got a kingdom to kind of run." He hurries away, with Lord Luca in tow.

"I made such a mess of that," I murmur as I watch them go. I can't help the horror building within me.

"You didn't," Linc assures me, reaching out to pull me to him. "Marcus probably barely noticed."

"Probably?"

"He'll be too worried about the fact you caught him up here with Lord Luca."

"Ah, so you know what they were doing?"

"I can make a good guess," he responds. "It's not the first time I've caught him up here showing Lord Luca something in the history section."

I put my hand on his chest. "So what you're saying is that the third floor of the library is where people come to have clandestine meetings with secret lovers?"

"Are we lovers, Beatrice?" he murmurs.

Embarrassment flares to my cheeks. "Is there an official definition?"

He chuckles, the sound vibrating through me. "I think it's fairly safe to assume we've done less than Marcus and Lord Luca up here."

"So far," I murmur.

Linc raises an eyebrow.

"I shouldn't have said that."

"I'm not complaining." He leans in, bringing his face closer to mine.

I reach up and touch his cheek, not caring that we're in full view of the staircase and anyone who might be coming up it. Hopefully, Linc's bodyguard will keep anyone away.

My eyes flutter closed as his lips brush against mine. The kiss ignites something within me, and there's certainly a part of me that wants to pull him back into the history section and find out why people decide to come up here, even if I know it's a bad decision.

We break apart but don't move away from one another.

"I'm sorry I'm late," he murmurs. "I realised I never said that."

"It's all right, I found...I'm not going to say something to entertain myself with, because that would be weird." Especially because Marcus is my cousin, and I clearly intruded on a private moment.

"It would be a little. Perhaps we should go somewhere more private in case they want to come back," he says.