Page 108 of To Scale the Emerald Mountain

My brows lift with bewilderment and I laugh. “Youcan be intense.”

Alec’s smile spreads, and he runs a hand through his hair. “Yes. I suppose I can.” He points towards my bags. “Did you find all that you need?” I nod with a soft smile that he returns. “I am glad. I have been meaning to do something about replacing everythingyou threw out, but I find the days getting away from me. Forgive me.”

Alec’s honesty takes me by surprise. I clear my throat and change the subject.

“You speak differently from your brother and sister,” I redirect, focusing on his significantly more formal dialect compared to his siblings. “Why?”

Alec smirks and pulls forward his case of cigarettes across the polished wood table, pausing briefly with a smile, waiting to see if I stop him again. When I don’t, he pulls one out and lights it, exhaling a thick plume of smoke that drifts lazily towards the ceiling.

“It was apparent from the start that my brothers and I could not be tutored together. The set of personal tutors I had was an elderly couple, their daughter, and her husband. All from the Gleisheon Territory of the Mother Continent.”

I raise a brow at him. “So, you had fancy tutors.”

Alec throws his head back and laughs, a sound as rich as chocolate. “Yes, I suppose even by royal standards, I had fancy tutors.” He gives me a knowing smile. “Just like you had fancy weapons training.”

I can’t help but grin right back at him.

Alec leans back, settling in further before he continues. “The Gleisheon Territory is well known for more than housing the willowbane tree, they have a unique dialect, not speaking in contractions. I spent so much of my time during my early years with those tutors that it bled over to me. It has remained all these years.” He pauses and then adds, “Your mother spoke very similarly to how I do, being from Gleisheon.”

“I like it,” my mouth admits eagerly. I clamp my tongue between my teeth.

Alec licks his full lips before giving me a confident smirk. “I know.”

“You do?”

“Yes. You have told me many times that you love the way I speak, as well as the sound of my voice. It is why you would beg me to continue reading to you late into the night. Why you were adamant I continue to teach you history even when you were well past being a girl.”

The admission sheds new light to his rapid spouting of ancient Rayveesh, practically admitting that he did it on purpose, knowing I would enjoy hearing it. And he was right.

I swallow thickly. “What are you reading now?”

Alec leans forward and picks up his discarded book off the table. He studies the cover intently, then runs two of his long, graceful fingers slowly down the spine with such loving concentration before cracking it.

The motion is so oddly sensual—an image pops into my head of him repeating the motion down my bare back with the same slow and careful precision, his warm breath brushing against my shoulder.

I shiver.

Alec moves his eyes to me. A slow, cocky smile graces his face.

Heat creeps up my neck, my blush spreading across my cheeks.

“Do not be embarrassed, Elly,” Alec says gently, heat dousing his stare. “We are made for each other.” He leans forward, that lock of hair dancing dangerously over his brow.

I imagine sauntering across the room, straddling his lap, his large hands bracketing my waist, and pushing it back before running my hands through his thick, silken hair.

“I bet you are wondering what it will be like when I run my fingers slowly down the skin of your back.” Alec’s lower lip indents, his teeth subtly pulling it in. “I am wondering how deliciously you will shiver for me when I trace your spine with my tongue,” he whispers, his molten eyes piercing through me.

I fight the urge to rub my thighs together, to give myself away to how deeply he affects me even more than I already have, feeling hot and dizzy.

Alec abruptly leans back to his original position, gracefully stretching his long leg back across the couch with lithe, feline movements. A predatory smile lives on in his eyes. “But I am reading about the boring history of notable trade deals with the Mother Continent.”

“Do you ever miss it there?” I find myself asking, slightly breathless.

He laughs and shakes his head. “No, I do not. I enjoyed my time there, but it was never my home. Quinndohs will always be my home. It is beautiful there, and interesting, but it can also be dangerous.”

“How so?”

An impossibly long ash falls to the floor from Alec’s forgotten cigarette. He brings his attention to it and takes a deep drag before putting it out and lighting another. “Our way of life here in the three Kingdoms is considered archaic to the people of the Mother Continent.”