Page 113 of Faerie Hunted

We were flawed creatures. Flawed and broken and I wondered if we would ever find a way to be together that actually worked.

Until Mike lifted his hand and brushed his fingers against my cheek and breathing became impossible. “You’re everything to me,” he whispered.

“I never wanted to be someone else's everything before. But with you…please.” He knew I was in love with him. I’d told him.

He’d laughed, confused by his own feelings and incredulous over mine. But my feelings for him hadn’t changed. They’d only grown, and if I allowed myself, I’d drown in them.

Staring at Mike, I saw emotion shift across his face and I knew he understood. He remembered the moment as well as I did in every lurid detail.

“We said we would give this a shot, right?” He cupped my face in his hands and kissed the tip of my nose, still holding my gaze.

He pressed another kiss to the space between my eyes and my chest constricted. He trailed kisses down the plane of my cheek and my jaw, staying just shy of my lips.

“Yes,” I whispered.

“Tavi, I love you. There’s only you. There will only ever be you.”

Goosebumps lifted on every part of my skin. I lost it entirely, grabbing Mike’s shoulders and lifting onto the tips of my toes to kiss him.

Despite the fear churning my stomach, fear of this moment ending, we had another shot to be together. I broke away from the kiss to tell Mike exactly that but he shot out his hand and grabbed the back of my neck to keep me in place.

He pressed his body to mine and I felt every long lean angle of him. Every hard muscle. I felt the way his breath rushed out of his lungs and caressed my lips.

Mike pried his lips away from mine and rested his forehead to mine. Our eyes met as his arms banded around my waist to keep me in place.

“Maybe one day I’ll be strong enough to deserve you,” he whispered.

“I’ll be the judge of what I deserve,” I whispered back.

I was on fire, burning from the inside with his touch. No one else did those things to me. No one else impacted me the way he did, and always had, from the first moment I met him on that stretch of deserted road.

He was everything I wanted and more. It didn’t matter how his magic needed a boost sometimes.

“Please, Mike.”

I wasn’t sure what I had to say to him or what I was begging for. The power dynamic between us had shifted and it wasn't about the crown on his head, whether he wore it or not. It was about what lurked in my blood and my bones. I couldn't stand it if Mike began to hate me for the disparity.

We’d already been through so much with the secrets I kept.

Reaching up, Mike took a lock of my hair between his thumb and forefinger and rubbed the strands together. He held my gaze when he brought the hair to his nose, inhaling deeply.

We moved together in desperation and Mike dipped his head to the side to draw the tip of his chin and nose up to my hairline. He kissed down my cheekbone, up across my brow, and the electric current between us sharpened.

I drew my fingers through his hair as my skin tightened. My eyes closed and I moved by feel alone, finding his lips, kissing him senseless.

He reached out to draw me even closer and my mouth fell open to allow him entry. His teeth scraped against my lip before he pressed himself to me. My breath came harder, my skin tight, nipples pebbled.

“I don’t know what I’d do without you,” he murmured.

“You never have to find out.”

His chuckle flickered through me like the first shadow of a candle in the dark. “Don’t make promises you’re not able to keep.”

“Never,” I said. “It’s a gift. I never say what I don’t mean.”

“I thought your gift was finding dead bodies?”

I chuckled. “That, too.”

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