Page 43 of Cosmic Soul

“You have scent glands,” I said, trying to continue the conversation. I was far more interested in him than Lucy. I ran my finger over the side of his neck, and he trembled.

“On my forehead, neck, and sides. I like you touching me there.” His eyes were wide as his breath rushed out. I couldn’t be giving him much feeling, but he was enjoying whatever I did to him.

“Me? Or anyone?”

“Just you.”

Fuck me. Fyn knew exactly what to say. “Why?” I asked, sliding down his side. When I hit the right place, I knew it from his sharp inhale.

“Instinct demands I scent mark you.”

I paused. He couldn’t, though. Not really. I bit my lip, staring down at the blanket. “Are you sure?”

“About what?”

“Me.”

“Look at me, Caleb Smith,” he ordered. I did and Fyn bent toward me, leaving almost no space between us. “I am sure. I have never been more sure about anything in my life. You make complete and utter sense to me. We make sense.”

“You are so romantic.”

He grunted. “Only with you.”

“Well, that’s good because if you were like this with someone else, I would haunt them until I figured out how to do bad things to them. Like mess up their hair, or delete important information.” I told him one hundred percent serious, “I would make their life a living nightmare if they tried to take you from me.”

“That will never come to pass.”

I glanced out the window at the moons. “You should go to bed. It’s late.”

“Will you stay with me?”

“I can’t fall asleep, but if you don’t care about me staring at you all night, then sure.” I had zero problems watching him. With Fyn, it didn’t feel voyeuristic. Well, it did, a tiny bit, but I liked him enough to ignore it.

“I don’t in the slightest. I don’t like the thought of you wandering around all night alone.”

I laughed. “You know nothing can happen to me, right?”

“You can leave, obviously, but I’d like it if you stayed with me. Though that might be boring. You don’t have to stay. I cannot make you.”

His voice was so hesitant like he expected me to leave. I rested my hand on his thigh, sinking through his scales. I wished his body pressed back against me, but it didn’t work that way.

“I won’t be bored.”

Fyn climbed under the silky white sheets and purple blanket, stiff and his expression distant. It didn’t bother me. I knew he was embarrassed. I lay next to him on my side.

“Sleep,” I whispered.

“I’m oddly excited.”

“You mean you’re horny.”

“I don’t have a horn.”

Sometimes when I tried to say the same word in Drakconese in English, they didn’t have the same meaning. “Aroused,” I reiterated.

“Yes.”

“It’s not gonna happen tonight.”

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