40

Chaste

My mouth goes dry. “Um, don’t bondmates touch a lot?” That sounds problematic for a man who’s trying to contain a large amount of evil that seems to have a problem with me. I don’t even want to think about my own reaction to him right now.

I almost expect him to smile or tease me, but he’s not the Reven from earlier, from in that clearing. The mask that hides all his emotions is firmly back in place. “They do, but we don’t have to go far. Just enough that they believe us.”

Because if they don’t believe us, they won’t let us go. If neither of us can get us out… We need them to believe.

Ah hells.

“We’ll keep it chaste,” Reven says. “To be safe.”

So he doesn’t lose control of what’s inside him, he means. Got it.

My mind flashes back to the kiss on the rock, which is completely unhelpful. How am I supposed to hide the way my body lights up at his touch? And at the same time pretend to be a bondmate obsessed?

This is such a bad idea.

“Look at me,” he says.

I do, but his expression doesn’t reassure me. He’s calm. Deadly calm and grim with it.

“Chaste,” he repeats. “We can do this.”

Maybe he can. I’m already a mess.

His gaze flicks over my shoulder. “He’s watching.” He raises a hand to wrap a lock of my hair around one finger.

I try not to bite my lip because I like this simple touch. I like the way it makes me feel tethered to him.

“Ready?” he asks.

We have to put on this show now? “You tell me.”

Another glance over my shoulder, and he nods tightly.

I guess we’re doing this. My body feels like an awkward assortment of limbs and emotions as I try to figure out where to put my hands. His knees? His shoulders? Why am I so bad at this?

I tentatively wrap my fingers around his wrist. “Good?”

Light flares and dies in his eyes, like night devouring the stars. “Too good.”

I jerk my hand back like he’s on fire. Stars. If I can’t even touch his wrist, we’re in serious trouble. Needing a redirection, I blurt out, “Tell me something no one knows about you.”

His eyebrows wing up. “You want to know this right now?”

“Yes.”

Lips pursed, he twirls my hair around his finger again. “I don’t remember my family.”

His words hit me in the chest. I didn’t expect an answer like that. I was thinking he’d say he never learned to swim or something. I manage to rearrange myself against him so that we’re chest to chest, eye to eye. Close. Intimate. “That must be hard. The not knowing.”

He studies me for a long moment. Then, like at the ladder, his hand slides up under my hair, fingers splaying against the back of my neck. Is this still for show? “I’m not used to taking care of someone. Of wanting to.”

Goddess. My lungs feel like they can’t decide if they want to burst or stop working altogether. This feels like dangerous territory. Does he mean what I think he does? I clear my throat. “You want to take care of me?”

“Yes.”

When he slips his hands deeper into my hair, I sigh. And give in a little. “I think maybe I want to take care of you, too.”

He stills beneath me. “You’d be the first.”

I can relate. My life has only had a smattering of people who care. More often than not, I’m by myself. Time with Cain and Tabra is few and far between.

Reven traces a finger across my forehead, down my temple, along my cheek, and to my chin, which he tips up with the slightest pressure. All thoughts of life before Reven vanish. His touch is a whisper and yet leaves a trail of sensation along that path, awakening my body with effervescent bursts of sensation.

I shiver. Chaste can apparently be enticing. A whimper escapes me, and he stops.

“Maybe…” He swallows. I can feel his hands shake. “Maybe try to not make noises like that.”

“Maybe try to not make me want to.” The words are out before I can stop myself.

His eyes flare with heat…and darkness. “Princess, touching you is quickly becoming an addiction.”

I hide a shuddering breath.

He closes his eyes and clenches his jaw. “Damn it.”

A small sound of distress escapes me. The edge to his voice has my body tensing, ready to flee, but his hand tightens in my hair. To trap me?

His eyes snap open, and my gaze collides with his, expecting to see a shadow. He’s still himself, thank the goddesses, only this isn’t controlled or angry Reven. Or cold Reven. Or understanding Reven. The man who looks back at me is all blazing need, something he’s never let me see before. Not even in the clearing.

He’s letting me see now. Or maybe he can’t help it.

A muscle in his already-clenched jaw ticks, the strain of holding what’s inside him at bay visible. Shouldn’t these soldiers have known better than to cage a monster? How close to the edge of unleashing hell is he?

Before I can ask, Reven wraps both hands around my thighs and yanks me onto his lap, straddling him like I had on the rock.

Whoa. Okay. This is not chaste anymore. But he’s still Reven, so I wait, wide-eyed and wishing, to see what he does next. Because my own control is so tenuous, it might as well be nonexistent.

My stomach tightens as Reven moves his hands up my legs with excruciating slowness, his thumbs creeping ever closer to what is now my pulsing, heated center.

“I dream of this,” he rumbles. “Of being close to you.”

His words are a shock. He dreams about me? This man made of evil and shadows who keeps himself apart even as he saves others?

On a shuddering breath, he trails his hands over the flare of my hips, the dip of my waist, where his fingers curl possessively into my skin, his thumbs barely brushing the sensitive undersides of my breasts. “Tell me what you dream about.”

I lean into his touch, my head swimming. “I used to dream of finding a place where I can be me. Of having someone who sees me for who I am and not what others want me to be. Of being…loved.”

“And now?”

I lift a hand and run my fingertips across his cheekbone. “Your eyes. And I hear your voice in the shadows, whispering my name.” My face heats, and I duck my head.

“Goddess…” His growl is filled with frustration and longing. A reflection of my own turmoil, and I’m drowning in it. Drowning in him.

His hands spasm on my waist, and his body goes rigid. “Fuck. I can’t hold them.”

The violence in his voice freezes my muscles, even as my mind and emotions tumble. But then fight or flight kicks in with a painful burst of adrenaline, and I make to scramble off his lap.

“I see that your bondmate is awake,” an impatient voice says behind me.