Page 98 of A Land So Wide
She loved Ellis. She loved their life and the dreams they’d planned with all her heart.
She was not a queen.
These thoughts, these desires, were nothing more than passing fancies, bits of an overheated imagination. They were an uncontrollable wisp of wondering, a chance for her mind to sort through all the things it couldn’t in the harsh light of day.
She was not the Greer from that dream. The one who’d impassively watched the Bright-Eyeds destroy her town, her family, her friends. If that was happening here and now, she’d do anything in her power to stop it, to stop them.
Wouldn’t I?
She felt her stomach squirm uncomfortably, painfully aware of how many seconds it took to answer herself.
Of course I would.
So it did not matter that she still felt the sensation of Finn running his hand down her side, grasping the curve of her hip as he filled her. It did not matter that the memory of his eyes smoldering into hers aroused her even now. That was a dream. Not real life.
Finn was not Ellis.
Finn was not hers.
Finn did not matter.
The only thing that did was getting to Ellis.
Greer would do whatever it took—push through untold miles of wilderness, climb a mountain, face Elowen and a court of her creatures—to save him. She would even travel with Noah Finn, ignoring the way his presence churned up everything she thought she knew and understood about her life. She needed his help, needed his knowledge. She needed his—
A cry echoed in her mind, a heady rush of insistent needs being fulfilled. She remembered, too, how he’d cried out, giving in to his desires, seizing hold of hers. She shook her head, casting away the unwanted remnant.
“You’re awake.”
Finn’s words startled her. Greer hadn’t realized he was up, staring at her through the haze of heat waves.
“Good morning,” she began, uncertain of where they stood after his abrupt departure, after his potent admission.
He made a sound of reciprocation and stretched. Greer wasdetermined not to notice the way the hem of his flannel shirt rose, revealing a stretch of taut, tanned skin. She glanced away, to make sure of it.
“How are you feeling?”
She felt along her scalp. There was no bump, no bleeding. It didn’t even feel tender. “Better.”
“You look it,” he observed. “Slept well? Pleasant dreams and all?”
Their eyes met, and Greer was overcome by the uncanny knowledge that Noah Finn knew exactly what she’d dreamed.
“I…” She blinked. “I don’t remember.”
“Pity.” He shoved himself from the ground with a groan that so perfectly echoed the sound of his release that she flushed. “You sure you’re feeling better? You look…piqued.”
In a skittering instant, he was beside her, his wrist on her forehead, the back of his hand testing the heat of her cheeks. He was close, too close, close enough that she was overcome by his scent, that wild blend of green growing things and musky warmth. It was all Greer could do to stop herself from grabbing his shoulders and pressing her mouth to his. How quickly she could pull him atop her. How quickly she could let him sink within.
What are you thinking?she wondered, wholly bewildered, horrified beyond measure.
What set her thoughts to such passion? Why was her blood so quick to race?
Blood,she realized, and wanted to laugh. It wasn’t her blood but his. His blood, inside her, turning her wild and wanton. He’d done this. Beguiled and bewitched her. All with that damned blood.
Her fingers clenched, and she had the terrible urge to scratch at her skin, slice it open, cut across veins, and let his blood pour free of her. She could feel its otherness pulsing through her, seizing hold of her impulses, tempting her to ruin.
“Sunrise is coming,” she said instead, nodding toward the faint lightening of the sky. “We should get going.”
