Page 86 of Scorched Earth
She brushed her lips across his, her body heating as his fingers tightened against her back. “What is done cannot be undone, but our future is uncertain. The only control we have is the moment that is upon us, and it is in this moment where I want tolive.”
To prove her words, she kissed him. No soft brush of the lips, but with the ferocity of everything she felt for him. Not just love and lust, but anger and frustration and hurt. Everything that had been building up in her heart since that fateful night in Celendrial when he’d told her he loved her and then walked away.
And was met in kind.
She felt the remnants of the walls he’d built up fall away, unleashing him. His tongue parted her lips, and she tasted the wine he’d been drinking even as she felt his fingers trail down her spine to cup her hip, pulling her closer.
Except it wasn’t close enough.
She wanted his skin against hers.
Teriana pulled at his clothes. Felt him lift her, so she could drag his tunic over his head, the fabric joining her dress on the floor. Then her breasts were pressed against his naked chest, her fingers tracing over the black tattoos on his skin as he kissed her jaw, her neck, drawing moans from her throat.
Because heknewher.
Had mapped every curve of her body, memorized every place she liked to be kissed, to be touched.
Just as she knew him.
Her name was a growl on his lips as she moved her hand between them, taking hold of him even as she bit his bottom lip hard enough to taste blood. The Empire had not won. The moment was theirs. The future was theirs—she just needed to make him see it. Just needed to beat back his demons with the force of everything that she felt for him, and then—
Marcus abruptly broke away from her kiss, his cheek resting against hers.
Unease ate at her lust, growing to fear as she felt dampness where their faces touched.
Tears.
Oh gods.
“I need you to stop.” His voice was rough. Broken. “Please stop, Teriana.”
Her body started to shake, her stomach roiling with sudden nausea as he pulled back to meet her gaze. His eyes were liquid with grief.
“I can’t say no to you,” he said. “I won’t say no to you. Except if this happens, I won’t be able to live with myself. Do you understand?”
Teriana felt her heart seize in her chest at the horror of the unspoken promise, and she lurched to her feet.
Marcus scrubbed a hand across his face, then reached to the floor to retrieve her dress and handed it to her. Then he retrieved something from the box on the table and pressed it into her palm. “For all the hair ornaments you sold back east. We’re even.”
Teriana opened her palm and looked down. Her breath caught at the sight of the hair bead, which was an identical golden replica of theQuincense,complete with enameled blue sails. Miniature and perfect. “This is worth ten times what those beads were.”
He lifted one shoulder. “For your birthday, then.”
She stared at the tiny ship, every part of it perfect. Every part of it carving out her heart.
“You should go,” he said.
To respond was impossible because Teriana could barely breathe. Holding the hair ornament tightly in one hand, she pulled the dress over her head. Fastened it around her neck. Retrieved her shoes.
Marcus said nothing as she left the room.
If the men on duty outside the door acknowledged her, Teriana couldn’t have said, for her eyes were fixed blindly on the stone floor. Every part of her wanted to break into a run. To flee not just this cursed fortress, but the camp. To race as fast and far as she could despite knowing that the horror in her heart was not something she could outrun.
Humidity struck her in the face as the men guarding the exterior doors opened them for her to exit, rain misting down from the dark sky. Teriana saw none of it as she hesitated on the steps, the tiny ship clutched in her hand.
I don’t know what to do.
The thought threatened to turn into a scream, so Teriana forced herself to move. Her bare feet splashed in the little puddles accumulating on the boardwalk, the water warm against her chilled skin.
