Page 45 of Thief of Souls
I want to drown myself in that heat. I want to lick it from his skin and taste it on his mouth. I want it inside me. I wouldkillto get those hands on my skin.
A soft gasp escapes me.
His hands still.
He knows.
It’s like all my shame pools within my abdomen, leaving me slick and molten.
“I shouldn’t have let you enter the maze with her.” His fingers fumble with my gown.
“You’re not ‘letting’ me do anything,” I point out. “This is what I do, Keir. This is how I’m going to find your horn for you.”
I catch a glimpse of his jaw as I turn. The look on his face says, “fuck the horn.” But I can’t be reading that right, because the only reason we’re here is to get our hands on it.
Goddess, he’s getting to me even now, because I want him to care more about me than the horn, and now I’m conjuring it in every interaction.
Taking a piece of fabric in each hand, I part the gown until I’m barely shielding my breasts. The curse is written large against my skin. It looks almost black now. A tangled knot twined around my heart.
Keir doesn’t look down. Instead, he peers straight into my eyes, almost as if he can see right through me.
“The curse,” I growl.
I can’t read the expression on his face as he glances down. He splays featherlight fingertips against my skin, as if he’s trying to untangle the knot of it. Heat shivers through me. It’s a honey-slide of sensation, and it warms me from within.
His magic is a dangerous drug.
Then his gaze shutters. “I can’t undo it. She’s set it to activate the second anyone tries.”
Instantly, the heat is gone. A sick feeling pervades me. “I didn’t expect you to.”Cauldron’s piss. I am bound to the princess’s will.
Killing Mistmark is no answer—even if I had the instincts for it, which I never did. If I harm a single hair on his head, I’m dealing with Malechus—the Prince of Knives himself—who is infinitely more dangerous than both Belladonna and Mistmark combined.
How do I get myself into these messes?
“Well,” I manage to drawl as I retie the dress behind my neck. “At least you’re going to be free of your betrothal if this all goes wrong.”
It’s the wrong thing to say.
Keir is a dragon. A protective dragon. I’m still thinking of him as a fae prince, callous and toying with the whims of others, but I know the deaths of Narcissa and Lady Altrea affected him. They were under his demesne when they were murdered. And now he thinks I’m part of his party.
Snapping his fingers causes his cloak to fly across the room and alight on his shoulders. “Let me deal with the so-called Princess of the Blood.”
Alarm floods through me. I Sift into shadows and reappear in front of the door just as he reaches for the handle. Our bodies collide, but I manage to get a fistful of his cloak. “Don’t youdare. If you go down there and drag the bride out of her rooms for daring to curse me, you’ll ruin our little ruse! They’ll know we’re working together!”
Hard hands clamp around my waist, and Keir shoves me back against the door. “Let them,” he breathes, but some part of his power must catch on the words, because I shiver as they etch themselves in my ears. “I can tear this fucking court apart stone by stone if I will it.”
“Because she threatened me? Believe it or not, my prince, it’s not the first time I’ve had my back against the wall. It won’t be the last.”
“Because she dared curse you,” he spits. “You. My bride. Undermyprotection. It’s a threat against you, it’s a mockery of me, and itwill notbe tolerated.”
Ah, now I understand.
A male’s oath of protection is like his cock. You do not mock the size of it, you do not suggest it can’t handle itself, and you certainly don’t laugh in the face of it.
Belladonna just did all three, metaphorically. By cursing me, she’s suggesting she doesn’t find Keir’s power and status threatening.
Which is possibly a huge mistake, I note, as the muscles in his forearms flex.
