Page 34 of The Stone Survival
His eyes flicker then blaze bright. “My heart is pounding,” he says. “It aches but the ache is good. Sweet.” He places his hand on my cheek. “Is this love?”
“I…I think it might be.”
His gaze drops to my mouth. “Please may I kiss you?”
I want nothing more. “Yes please.”
He presses his lips to mine, tentative and unsure at first. The contact sends a zing through me, and he gasps, mouth parting against mine. I echo him, sighing as he moans and slides a hand to the nape of my neck. He kisses me featherlight, brushing his mouth against mine, leaving me tingling and wanting.
“Derek…”
His grip tightens, and he sinks into me with tongue, teeth, and ravenous hunger that spikes my pulse and tears a growl from me. My beast rises, eager and starved for him, inhaling his sandalwood scent, marking him as ours as we topple onto the bed together.
His body shadows over mine, taut thigh slipped between mine, pressing at the sweet spot that leaves me liquid as the kiss deepens, unraveling all thought, all reason.
I need more than a kiss. I need all of him, but he tears his mouth from mine, his breath ragged and tormented as he looks down at me with an expression of horror.
“I’m sorry. I’m so sorry, Shar.” He vanishes and appears by the door, shoulders heaving, hands fisted at his side. “I lost control. I won’t touch you again. I swear it.”
“No…” I push up on my elbows to look at him properly. “I liked it. I wanted it. I want you, Derek. You don’t have to apologize.”
“This is new. These urges. These emotions.” He takes a step toward me then stops. “I want to be close to you, as close as I can get, but I’m…I’m afraid I might hurt you.”
I’m a goyle, and we’re made of hardy stuff, but maybe his reservations aren’t about being intimate because it’s clear that he wants to be; maybe he isn’t ready. Maybe he needs time to be comfortable with that step, and that’s fine with me.
I sit up with a smile. “You won’t hurt me, but I do think we should take it slow. I’ve never felt this way about anyone before, so this is new to me too.”
His shoulders drop in relief. “Yes. We go slow but…we don’t stop.”
“No.”
“We can kiss?”
I bite back a smile. “We can.”
His eyes brighten. “Can we kiss now?”
My body floods with heat as he moves closer, but as much as I want to lose myself in him, there’s something else that’s been bugging me since he returned that I feel we need to talk about.
“We can kiss as much as you like, but first…do you want to talk about what happened to you when you turned chimera?”He’d told us that he’d been in a place of nothingness. But I’d been in his arms when he’d said it. I’d felt the thundering of his heart. He’d lied. “Where did you go? Tell me the truth, please.”
He crosses to the bed and sits beside me. “It’s hazy, like a dream or…maybe a nightmare. All I remember is being afraid and…running. I remember running from something. But that’s all. It’s over now.”
But what if it happened again? What if he went chimera for Cameron and was pulled into this strange place again? “We can’t ignore this, Derek. We should tell Cameron and the others.”
“No.”
“Why not?”
“She’s happy, and after so much sadness. I don’t want to make her worry.”
Dammit. “Fine, then we’ll look into this ourselves. But you have to promise me something in the meantime.”
“What?”
“You won’t go chimera.”
“But if Cameron is in trouble, then?—”
