Page 55 of The King’s Man (The Kingdom of the Krow #3)

I snorted. “I didn’t see you again until the day we sat at Melek’s round table and my very presence seemed to raise your hackles like a cat with its fur petted the wrong way. By then… well, we both had other things on our minds, didn’t we?”

She dropped her head, but she’d reached for me, gripped my arms, was blinking and frowning as if rearranging thoughts in her head. “I thought… I thought you were only attracted to me because of the bond. I thought you fought it—”

“I told you, I fought for your sake. For ours. The curse is real, Dee. I wouldn’t put you through that—”

“That’s not what I meant,” she breathed.

I frowned down at her. “Then what?”

Her brow furrowed and she searched my eyes like she wasn’t quite sure what she was searching for.

“I don’t know,” she admitted a moment later.

“I was certain that you’d come to this with contempt for me.

That you have been making the most of it—I know you mean your words, Jann.

I don’t doubt your loyalty. But why… I doubt why you’re loyal.

I thought… I thought you were fighting the attraction that was only physical—”

“Do you fight your attraction to me?” I growled.

“I did at the beginning, yes.”

“Since the bond took?”

“No, but… it’s overwhelming, Jann. You can’t tell me that you don’t feel drawn into that ocean of current— I do! Our bodies respond to the connection and—”

“You think I only want your body?” I muttered.

Her lips thinned and she gave a one-shouldered shrug. “I suppose… yes?”

“Do you only want me for mine?”

“No, but I’m a woman.”

“What difference does that make?”

She huffed, like the answer was obvious. When I didn’t stop looking disapproving she tipped her head. “Jann, you stood me in the forest after we’d gone looking for Gall and Istral and told me in no uncertain terms that our jobs were to put aside our feelings and do what needed to be done.”

“That was before—”

“It is how you think,” she said calmly. “You view emotions like gnats, buzzing around our head to be ignored and… I don’t.”

“I never said—”

“You never said anything except that you wanted me, and that I was the one God chose for you. That was… beautiful. But… neither of those things is about me.”

I let a low rumble of a growl putter in my chest. “How many times do I have to tell you that I see you? That I understand why you’re the one for me? How many times before you’ll believe me?”

She shook her head slowly, but her lips curled towards a smile. “One more, I suppose,” she said, then gave a quiet laugh when I grabbed her and marched her backwards towards the nearest tree.

“You, my dear, are infuriating,” I growled.

“That message is received loud and clear,” she said—but she was smiling, and for some reason that drove me insane.

“This isn’t a joke—you are my mate. My one. Yet you think I only care about taking your body? When I speak of your courage and your strength and your loyalty? When I commend your heart—you think all those words are just pretty flirtation? You think I speak to every woman that way, Dee?”

She seemed to actually consider the question. I couldn't decide if that made this better or worse.

“No,” she said finally. “I don’t think you speak to every woman that way. And I do… I do see how you’ve… softened since this began.”

She came up against the tree I’d been aiming for, and there was a flash of something in her eyes that reached me in the bond as well. I planted one hand on that trunk and leaned down over her, nose to nose.

“Trust me, softening has nothing in this for me,” I growled.

Diadre snorted, but I took her chin in my fingers and made her meet my eyes, waiting until her smile faded before continuing.

“Do you remember that last meeting with Melek and Yilan?” I asked quietly. She blinked and frowned, but she nodded. “Do you remember the instruction from Melek to me?”

Her frown lines deepened. “To get the information to him—”

“No. Matter. What,” I said darkly, pinning her to the tree with my gaze as surely as my body.

Diadre looked confused.

“You are my mate, Dee. No matter what. And…I lied to him, not you. Because it’s true that I will do everything in my power to make sure Melek gets the information he needs.

He will have me at his back. My spear at his call.

My body ready to bleed and die to put him on that throne.

I’ll face down Lucifer himself if that’s what it takes.

But you? Only you are my no matter what.

When I told Melek I agreed to that, it was the first time I lied to him. ”

Her eyes widened and she stopped breathing.

I nodded. “I half-suspect it’s why he seemed so stern—he understands the pull of a mate. He acknowledges the battle. Deep down… deep down I believe he knows only you are the other half of my soul.”

Her throat bobbed. “Of course, with the bond—"

“Stop insisting that my only interest in you comes from the bond—do you think I have no spine?”

“Of course not, but the bond is… powerful.”

“It is—you feel it, too?”

“Yes.”

“And is that the only reason we stand here together—from your heart and mind, Dee. Be honest with me. Is it only the bond that puts you at my side?”

Fear flashed in her eyes and her head eased back, but came up against the tree, and I never broke eye contact.

She cleared her throat. “No,” she said in a small voice.

Thank God. “Then why do you doubt me?”

That V between her brows pinched harder. “I don’t know.”

I sighed and took her hand, placing her open palm on my chest. “Feel me, Diadre. Feel me through the part of me that only you have. Feel me and tell me that is the heart of a man who is divided.”

*****

~ DIADRE ~

Jann’s gaze was so piercing, so penetrating, it seemed he looked inside me. He leaned over me, his nose almost brushing mine, and demanded the truth.

And my heart raced with as much fear as thrill.

I had to close my eyes, to break that gaze because I struggled to breathe through it. But I did as he asked. I let my head sink back and pressed my hand to his chest and felt him. Felt that glowing, gold cord thrumming, pulsing with light—and with something else.

Something that stopped my lungs. A wash of emotion that wanted to bring tears to my eyes.

And then, curse him, he remembered the vows to me—that hazy, frantic, terrifying run into the Shadows of Shade, and his courageous, infantile pursuit.

The way the Shadows punished him for me and his insistence that I was…

“Dee,” he breathed and tipped his forehead against mine, his breath washing over my lips, though he didn’t kiss me. Instead, he filled my mind with that moment he’d surrendered himself and vowed.

My mate.

My body for your protection.

My voice for your champion.

My blood runs for you, my soul.

My mate.

Behold, you are my joy. Behold you are my love.

Let me taste with my mouth because your kiss is richer than wine.

Let my body speak the words my tongue cannot form.

Set me as a seal upon your heart, as a seal upon your soul.

For my love is stronger than death, my jealousy fierce as the grave.

I burn for you with fire, the very flame of God.

I am your beloved. I am your mate.

My soul sings for you. My desire is for you.

I give myself in this world, and the next.

Before God… You. Are. Mine,

I sucked in a breath, my fingers digging into his shirt, gripping, because I was torn between the joy and relief of hearing those words cross his lips, and the utter fear that he didn’t know his own heart and was only driven to me like an animal to prey.

“Diadre… Diadre, look at me,” he whispered, his voice a jagged rasp. My eyes flew open of their own accord and he was right there. He gave me no space, no breath. He pierced me with that impossible, golden gaze and let his words fly as surely as arrows.

“No matter what we face, no matter how dark it might get, I will walk it for you. I will give my life to save yours. I will choose you, Diadre. Always.”

God, I wanted to cry. Those words, I will choose you, I clung to them like a branch in a roaring river.

“Do you believe me, Dee?”

“I do.”

“Thank God.” I opened my mouth to tell him I was sorry I’d doubted, when he finally brought his lips to mine and kissed me as deeply as he’d stared.

I fell into that kiss—relief wrestling with thrill that battled my delight.

He gathered me close and engulfed me. Held me, took me, worshipped. Left me no inch without him, no more room to question. And I rose to him, gasping, crying his name, clawing his back to bring him closer, because I needed more.

At some point he’d grabbed the furs and thrown them out for us. Now we clutched each other, our bodies trembling, skins sheened in sweat. When he collapsed over me and the weight of him pressed me down from head to toe… I had never felt more full.

Soon, we began to cool. But neither of us moved until the chill of being in the shadows forced him to reach for the second fur and drag it over us, curling me into his chest and holding me there, both of us spent.

Just like a man, he fell immediately into sleep. I was weary and drowsy and knew I’d follow soon. But I took a moment to stare at him, the sheer size and strength of him so softened in repose…

It was only as I drifted down that path between waking and sleeping myself that the thought echoed…

He still hadn’t said he loved me.

I tried to chase it away, to push the doubt from heart and mind. But it settled on my shoulders like a mantle.