Page 101 of Children of Fallen Gods

His entire expression changed. A wrinkle wrenched between his brows, a downward twist forming at the corner of his perfect mouth. His eyes drank in the sight of my bare body, starting at my hips and dragging up, but there was something darker than desire that doused his gaze.

“It is fine,” I echoed. “I’m fine.”

And I didn’t give him time to respond before I yanked him to me, gave him one long kiss, then pushed him to the bed and climbed over him, my thighs on either side of his hips, his hands at my waist, my breasts, the curve of my hipbone, as if memorizing my form.

“Where did this come from?” he murmured, brushing an angry circle of purple beneath my left breast.

I raised an eyebrow.

“Me? Look atyou.” I leaned down and kissed his shoulder, at a red welt there. “How did this happen, hm?”

I lowered myself over him, savoring the warmth of him against me. I took a moment to appreciate the exquisite shape of him, the topography of his muscles beneath his skin. Moved down, down to what looked like a halfway-healed scrape over his ribs. I ran my lips over it, smiling against his skin when I felt him twitch, clearly biting back a laugh. “Or this?” I murmured.

Lower. Down to a mark on his hip, partly obscured beneath the waistband of his trousers. Slowly, I unbuttoned them, peeling them off to reveal the full injury. Among other things.

“Or this?” I whispered, pressing my lips to the bruise.

“I told you, it’s—fuck.”

The word was so ragged it was barely more than a mangled moan, spat between his teeth as I ran my mouth up his length. Tasted the tip, lips and tongue soft, my movements slow and languid. Relishing the taste of him. Relishing the sound of his quickening breaths. Relishing the way that I could tell, even without looking, that every muscle in his body was tensed.

Then he was pulling me back up to him, pressing his mouth against mine in a long, desperate kiss as he rolled over me and pushed me to the bed.

“Why do I always get the interrogation?” he muttered. “From the minute you showed up at my doorstep, it’s alwaysme. What aboutyou?”

He broke away, and ran an analytical eye over my body. “Where’d this come from?”

He pressed a kiss to the two-week-old slice over my shoulder — a gift from Nura’s rapier in sparring practice.

“Or… this?”

His lips moved lower, to a large purple welt across my ribs.

“Looks like you’ve beenbusy.”

My abs were tight, core burning with desire, breathing quick. But I said, as casually as I could manage, “I had things to do.”

“Things, hm?” He reached the burn at the outside of my left hip, still tender enough to make me suck in air through my teeth when his mouth brushed it, pleasure mingling with pain.

“I like to lead an exciting life,” I choked out.

“Right.” I felt a silent chuckle against a bruise on my leg. “Part of your charm.”

“You cannot deny it.”

His breath came next against the inside of my thigh. Higher.

Oh, gods.Gods.

Time suspended, need pounding in my veins.

I craned my neck to look down, and Max met my gaze. His hair was messy, falling over his forehead. A smirk twisted one side of his mouth — the left, as always. From this angle, I could see the cut of his shoulders, the muscled definition of his arms, the way the light fell across his silhouette. He was beautiful. But the thing that took my breath away wasn’t that. It was the sheer, all-consuming affection in how he looked at me.

“You’re right,” he said. “I can’t.”

And then he lowered his mouth to me, and pleasure suffused me all at once, so intense that I couldn’t breathe. My back arched, my fists clenching handfuls of the bedspread. A helpless moan escaped me, one that I didn’t even realize I had made until Max’s lips stopped just long enough to let out a groan.

“Tisaanah, make that sound again.”

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