Page 62 of Once Charmed, Twice Cursed
“You?” I sound dreamy and sated.
“I feel like...I should probably let you rest. After these last few days...” His voice catches, loaded with feeling.
I reach up to caress his face. The wonder of it nearly undoes me. I’mtouchinghim. Like it’s nothing. Like it’s normal. Joy rises in me, so thick and wild it nearly stops my heart. “You’ll stay with me tonight? On this side?”
“Do you want me to?”
“Of course.”
He smiles, if a little reluctantly. He eases out of me and stands.
My brow wrinkles. “Wait, where’re you going?”
“Not far. I’ll be right back.”
I blink as he moves toward the door, then give up and slump into the pillows. Exhaustion drags at me, crowding to fill the spaces his absence leaves behind. The door opens and shuts. My eyes flutter.
I even sleep for a moment, I think. Then Weston is back, setting something down on the pinewood stand beside the bed. I open my eyes.
Tenderness catches in my throat. A glass of milk.
He helps me into a sit. I drink. And drink, and Fortuna, simple milk has never nourished a person more. It slides down my still-raw throat like a balm. Even my belly relaxes, gifted, at last, with something to digest.
“Thank you,” I tell him again.
He flashes a fleeting smile. “Do you need anything else?”
“Just you.”
He studies me, and I don’t think I’m imagining the beat ofhesitation, even though it’s done. It’s over. Nothing separates us any longer.
I open my mouth to ask what’s wrong, but he settles beside me, gathering me close, and the question slips out of my head. I’m so tired. I tuck my face beneath his chin, marveling that we can finally hold each other. No fabric, no barriers, no magic keeping us apart. Just Weston and me, as we always should have been.
I take a moment to savor the steady rhythm of his heartbeat against my cheek, the weight of his arm around my waist. For so long, I’ve dreamed that we would share a bed like this. That I would drift off enfolded in his warmth, lulled by the gentle rise and fall of his chest.
“Sleep,” he murmurs, his lips brushing my hair. “You’re safe.”
With those words wrapped around my heart, I let my eyes drift closed.
Idoneed rest, I know. Because tomorrow, or the next day, Ramses and the duke will come for me.
Only this time, they won’t find what they’re looking for.
Chapter Twenty-One
When I wake, I reach for Weston.
My arm encounters a gulf of cold, empty sheets. I sit up, my heartbeat knotted with panic. Where is he? He wouldn’t have left, would he? What if Alverton came and took him? What if?—
A glance across the room soothes the discordant chaos within me. Weston stands before the pump-handled sink, his hands braced on the counter, the musculature of his back standing at attention. He’s stark naked. My eyes slide down over his backside, lingering on the divots at the base of his spine. “What’re you doing?”
He doesn’t answer. He doesn’t even move. It’s like he hasn’t heard me at all.
A frown drags at my mouth. “Weston?”
Nothing.
I slide from bed and pad toward him, the chilled floorboards sucking warmth from my soles. When I get close, I see he’s staring in the mirror, his eyes fixed low on the glass. As if?—
