Page 34 of Captive

The thought sizzles up my spine and makes my stomach tremble. Heat gathers between my thighs, and the muscles in my legs tighten.

I glance away from him, desperate to escape the spell he has woven with just one look.

This isn’t right. It can’t be right.

He deceived me, hurt me, and keeps me tied up, yet I still desire him.

“I have no wish to talk,” he says in a gruff voice that sounds as shattered as I feel.

“Then what do you want? Tell me?” A part of me still longs to understand him.

He grabs my hips and pulls me against his body. I try to ignore his warmth invading every inch of my skin. “I want you beneath me, Sol. And since I cannot have you where you belong, I will not talk. I will not share your tent.” He releases me and steps back.

“Hector.” I cannot reciprocate his words, not when he planted the seeds of anger deep when he killed Malachi.

“You don’t need to say anything,” he says, his tone empty. “I know how you feel.”

A dull ache twists in my gut. I press my bound hands against the pain. He doesn’t know how my body wars with my mind. A part of me hates him for killing Malachi. The other part longs for him.

Hector steps away from me, opening the space between us like an abyss. I wish he could understand why I can’t bring myself to lie beneath him. Not now, not after what he did.

“Good night, Sol.” He shackles my leg to the post and leaves the tent, abandoning me to the stillness, the ache stabbing me in the center of my chest.

His words echo in my ears.“I want you beneath me, Sol.”

The gods help me. I want him more now than ever before. I shove my thighs together. That ache remains. That need. That urge to have him consummate our marriage.

It’s the damn tattoo.

It must be.

ChapterFourteen

At dawn, we resume our trek. The day passes without incident and since few people talk to me, I spend most of the time—too much time—thinking about how Hector and I got to this point.

The question I asked him last night burns inside me. What would have happened if we hadn’t kept secrets from each other?

That trail leads to other what ifs. What if Gabriel wasn’t Hector? What if I hadn’t thrown that knife? What if Hector didn’t want to use me to get Bloodstone magic back?

But I cannot dwell on what could have been. There is no future in what could have been. There is only what is.

When we stop for the night, and I’m alone in my tent, I long for a distraction from my thoughts. My wish is granted when a gust of wind sweeps into the tent as the flap lifts, and Quinn steps in holding a torch. It bathes her petite figure in a warm glow and turns her hair a fiery red.

She smiles as she sets the torch in an iron bracket. “I have come bearing gifts,” she says. “Do you like wine, Sol?”

I nod as she disappears through the opening and reappears a moment later with a terracotta jar and two goblets.

As she settles near me, I shift to sitting on my mattress. “Why are you being kind to me?”

Quinn pours wine into a goblet and offers it to me. “Because I know what it’s like to be a prisoner, and you looked like you could use cheering up.”

“Will Hector be angry?” I ask as I think of my husband.

“Maybe.” She pours a second goblet and takes a long drink.

The ripe and heady wine fills my senses as I swirl the ruby liquid, then take a sip. “Thank you for the boots.”

“Of course.”

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