Page 83 of Carnal: The Beast Who Loved Me

Carnal nodded. “I get it. It’d be hard to be you. To know you could do stuff like that and not do it. I think I feel better knowing you feel that way though.”

“Really?”

“Yeah. And it’s also comforting. In a way.”

“It is.”

He nodded. “I don’t want to live in fear of making you mad and being turned into a toadstool.” She laughed. “Give me tomorrow afternoon.”

She slanted a look sideways. “Okay.”

He got to his feet grinning and reached out to help her up.

When she took his hand, she said, “Oops. You touched. Deal’s off.”

Even in the failing light Rosie could see that Carnal’s face had fallen. “You joke.”

“Yes,” she said softly. “I joke. I can’t get down this hill without leaning on you. Only cats can see in the dark.”

He swooped her up into his arms and ran down the hill so fast that she alternated between shrieking and giggling. She buried her nose in his neck and breathed in, loving the scent of leather, musk, and Carnal. Feeling the way her body reacted to him, she was thinking that making touch off limits was arguably the stupidest condition she’d ever put on a deal.

He carried her all the way to the porch of the Extant’s house ignoring the double takes, stares, whoops, and hollers they got along the way. By the time he set her down in front of the door, she was very much into the idea of being persuaded. A little delicious anticipation never hurt anyone.

“I’ve decided I’m amending the terms of our deal. No touchingwithout permission.”

A slow and cocky smile began to lift his beautiful mouth. “Permission to touch, ma’am?”

Rosie blushed. She hadn’t realized how titillating potential requests to touch could be. She nodded, but didn’t wait for him to make a move. She took two fistfuls of rough-woven Henley shirt and pulled him down so she could have another sample of Carnal’s kissing mastery along with more of his smell, his taste, his warmth, and the spikes of desire that made her body tingle stem to stern.

At dinner Carnal sat directly across from Rosie and never looked away. The twinkle in his gaze was so compelling she could barely remember that she was supposed to be eating. She was beginning to wonder just which of them had been bewitched.

“Serene,” Free said, “I’d like you to go into the city with Carnal tomorrow. Red has some options for housing. I told him it’s up to you.”

“Yes,” she said. “I’d like that. When can you go, Carnal?”

“Has to be in the morning.” Looking back at Rosie, he said, “My afternoon is taken.”

Serene looked at Rosie and back at Carnal. “I see.” She looked concerned by what she saw pass between them, but said nothing about it. “Morning is fine.”

“I talked to some humans today,” Charming said, sounding mildly excited about it.

Free looked at his youngest. “And?”

“They were alright. Not that different.” He shrugged. “Slower, I guess.”

“Yes. They’re slower and more fragile. We have to be careful around them,” cautioned Free.

“I’d hate to think what would happen if one of them was injured by one of us,” Serene said.

“We just have to make sure that Exiled understand the stakes of contact,” Free offered and Serene nodded that she agreed.

“Of course Carnal knows all there is to know about humans.” Charming laughed. “Humanfemales, I mean.”

Carnal kicked his brother under the table and gave him a warning glare.

“Ow. What’s that about? Like there’s somebody here who doesn’t already know that you’ve…”

“Enough!” Free interrupted Charming’s train of thought. Carnal wasn’t usually pleased about paternal intervention in sibling disputes, but flaunting his history in front of Rosie was an exception to the rule.

“Whatever,” Charming grumbled under his breath.

Carnal looked at Free. “I think it’s time for me to set up my own household.”

Serene couldn’t have looked more shocked if he’d said he was giving up war and going into show business. “You’re settling down? With a female?”

He glanced at Rosie before smiling at his mother. “Hope to.”

Serene looked at Rosie, then Free, who smiled reassuringly. Rosie wondered if Carnal was suggesting what she thought he might be suggesting. She really hadn’t planned for an innocent flirtation to blaze into a wildfire, but she could pinpoint the moment when she’d made a decision to see where things would go with Carnal. It was when she’d blurted out to Carnal that she wouldn’t share.

Apparently, her heart could override her brain when there was a conflict about what would and would not be said.

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