Page 93 of Poison Sun

When he turns his eyes to mine, there’s a fire in them that mirrors the hungry way he looked at me last night. “They’re enchanting,” he confirms. “Designed to elicit... excitement.”

Excitement.

The kind that consumed us in the tent last night.

“Is it working?” The question is out before I can stop it.

“What do you think?”

We’ve stopped walking now, and the foot or so of distance between us is electric, the air charged with something wild and uncontrollable.

I should move away.

I shouldn’t let what happened last night happen again. Especially not like this, when his—when our—reactions aren’t our own.

Except that they are our own. Beneath the secrets and lies, the attraction between us has been real ever since he appeared in front of me in that hostel and plopped the book down onto the table.

And so, it feels inevitable when he reaches for me, his hands framing my face, our lips meeting with a fiery passion that’s both fierce and desperate. As wild as a turbulent sea crashing against the rocks in a dangerous storm.

Before long, his touch is everywhere, insistent and searching.

I answer with equal fervor, my own hands roaming across the hard planes of his body.

In less than a minute, the anger and tension between us transforms into a different kind of battle—one of need against need, desire against desire.

One impossible to resist.

One we’re not trying to resist.

Time loses meaning. The rest of the world falls away, leaving only the urgency of our joined breaths, the heat of our bodies, and the beating of our hearts.

I want to remember this moment. Always.

So, as he lowers me to the ground, I reach for one of the roses. A pink one in perfect bloom—they’re all in perfect bloom—that calls to me more than the others.

The closer I get to it, the more I want it.

But Blaze’s hand shoots out, catching my wrist in an iron grip. “Don’t,” he snaps, the intensity in his voice startling me into stillness.

“Why not?”

“Because I just remembered a legend about these roses. The Alpine King guards them fiercely. It’s said he’ll chop off the hands and feet of anyone who tries to take one.”

My gaze remains locked on the rose as it continues to tempt me.

But the hand I’m using to try to pluck it?

I’d rather have that than the flower.

Still, Blaze’s grip on my wrist is unyielding, and when I look up into his eyes, the sunbursts in them swirl with fervent urgency.

A need.

For me.

Every bone in my body wants to lean forward and kiss him again.

“Morgan,” he says, his voice strained. “We can’t. This isn’t real.”

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