Page 103 of Beyond the Faerie Gate

Rhoswyn

My heart thunders in my chest as I freeze like a deer staring down the end of a hunter’s arrow. Facing death, yet unable to look away. I’m closer to him now than I’ve ever been. If I reached out, I could trace the hard line of his jaw or the pale white scars across his torso.

Every part of me is viscerally aware that I’m prey compared to this lethal creature.

Please, don’t kill me again. Not now. Not after all I’ve been through today.

I don’t have the strength to face being reincarnated if he kills me.

How did I not notice him getting closer through our bond? Oh right, because I was too distracted by the parade and my own drama to even think about checking. Lesson learned.

“What’s a pretty little queen like you doing so far away from your safe little palace?”

Goddess, his voice is like a purr, husky, dark, and demanding all at once. The voice of someone who’s used to being obeyed and expects it.

This is going to hurt. He talks like someone who could make your death hurt.

His eyes trace the line of my body, going flint hard when they notice the blood all over me.

“Why the fuck are you bleeding so much, female?” he demands. “Who did this?”

I shake my head, mutely. Can’t he tell it isn’t mine? I suppose… when her head exploded, it did go everywhere. My face and most of my beautiful dress are covered.

His free hand comes up, tracing a line down my cheek. “You’ve been crying,” he notes. “I’m going to remove my hand, and you’re going to tell me who put you in this state. Understand? No screaming.”

I nod, still silent and trembling beneath his hold.

But the moment he moves his hand away, an immense furry body barrels into him.

Jaro.

Thank the Goddess.

The shifter is in his wolf form, and he uses all of his mass to tackle Caed. The two of them roll away just as Lore blinks to my side.

“Shall we watch or leave them to it?” he asks, nonchalantly reaching up to take off his hat—which transforms on contact into a soft, cotton cap—and rub it against my cheek.

It’s the weirdest sensation. Like being kissed everywhere it touches. Lore ignores the sounds of Jaro and Drystan fighting with Caed, and keeps running it over my cheekbones, along my neck and up to my ears. When he reaches the pointed tips, it triggers muscles low in my body to clench. Hard.

Goddess, when did my ears get so sensitive?

Lore gives me a knowing look as he pulls the hat away. It’s a darker shade of red than it was before, and I belatedly realise that he was feeding it with the blood on my skin.

He’s not done. His red eyes meet mine, and he gives me a lazy, seductive grin.

“Want me to clean your dress too?”

I look down and my cheeks flush with heat. Due to the angle at which I was holding the fae I… exploded, the blood is mostly splattered across the upper slopes of my breasts, with only a few drops having fallen onto my skirts.

Just looking at it disturbs me enough that I forget all notions of modesty and nod until I think my head might fall off.

“Time for my kiss.”

That’s all the warning I get before his lips are on mine. Soft, yet demanding. Caressing my mouth with an ardour that makes me gasp. He doesn’t press the advantage I’ve just handed him, but his tongue sweeps out to caress my lower lip at the same time that his clenched fist rubs the fabric of his cap across my collarbone.

Tiny fluttering, sucking kisses light up my skin with goosebumps. My moan is embarrassingly loud as his next pass travels lower. My nipples harden almost to the point of pain, silently begging for him to go lower still. I’ve never been so aware of my breasts as I am now. They feel swollen, and every touch tempts me to thrust them out and demand more.

On his third pass, I give in. My back arcs and the movement disrupts his careful path until his cap slides just over the pebbled tips. This time, Lore captures my moan with his mouth. His tongue, which had retreated, returns, stroking my own just as he gives my breasts a final stroke.

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