CHAPTER FIFTEEN
As the excitement of Mika’s pregnancy ramped up and Bruin was even more insistent on Jade’s visit, I slipped away to bed. Too much joy for one day. Mika was loved beyond all sense, adored by her male and carrying her mate’s young, so too was Jade. Though I loved them both, their happily-ever-afters struck a chord too close to the ache in my heart.
Having endured Samuel’s disappointment and anger for days, I had no interest in either seeing or smelling his affection for my brother’s wife when she arrived.
“Ughhhh.” I pulled the tie from my braid and shook my hair out. Was it so wrong to want love? I waited six decades for my age of eligibility and since its coming, the only males to show interest in me were a dying demon I forced myself upon and a psychotic monster who wanted my body to house his even more monstrous queen.
Abaddon’s claim filled me with such an overwhelming sense of shame and dread I could not breathe. The Fates could call us before them at any time and once again the course of my life would be decided by someone else.
Mika was right. I needed to get angry. I needed to get involved in my own life. But how?
Mayhap Samuel had an idea. He had been studying realm and Highborne laws for days. Deciding I’d sleep better with answers, I headed through my suite toward his.
Turning the door handle of our shared bathing room and the sputter of falling water registered. An unobstructed view of Samuel’s profile in the mirror stopped me mid-step, my intake of breath lost in the sounds of his shower.
Well-toned, his musculature shifted and shone as water cascaded over his body and he laved soap into his palms.
After replacing the frothy bar to its ledge, he skimmed his hands over the dusting of dark hair covering his chest and down the trail which led to his navel
And down farther still . . .
My breath caught. Samuel naked was a magnificent decadence. Standing out from his abdomen, his sex rose thick and proud. When his hands skimmed over his length, his head dropped back and his eyes closed. A moan rumbled out of his chest as his erection kicked in his hand. As he focused on his ministrations, his hips rolled forward and a spicy cinnamon scent filled the air. He licked his lips and swallowed hard.
What was he thinking about?
A low groan escaped my chest as he swept beneath his staff and palmed his sac.
“Lia?” Samuel’s eyes flew wide and his feet squeaked on the tile floor of the shower.
I started to retreat but what was the sense? He caught me staring. His anger had become such a constant between us I knew this would only add to my offenses. “Apologies, I . . . uh, forgive the intrusion.”
I dropped my gaze to the floor as he shut off the water and watched the last of the soapy froth gather and swirl by his feet. My ears burned. I wished I could back away and return his privacy to him. My limbs ignored my request.
“Is there something you wanted?” He grabbed a towel and wrapped the square of fabric tight around his hips. The thick quality of the textile did nothing to hide the jutting out of his erection. It simply pushed the fabric away from his body and highlighted his graceful lines. Sweet Shalana he was a beautiful male. Broad in the shoulders, slim in the hips with thick muscular thighs—
“Lia, eyes up here, please. What did you want?”
I raised my gaze. “I wondered about your research and came to ask.” I swallowed as tears burned my eyes. “I failed to notice you were bathing until I stepped into the room. Please, finish your shower . . . forgive me.”
“Nothing to forgive. Is everything all right?”
“Yes. I . . . uh, am embarrassed.”
He shifted his feet, reaching for a second towel. He made as if to dry himself off, but stopped once his body was shielded from my view.
My tears brimmed and warmed my cheeks. “Verily, I angered you yet again. That was not my intention.”
I strode back into my chamber. The room we had shared every night for the past weeks, large enough for the both of us minutes ago, suddenly felt far too confining.
“Lia, dinnae cry. Ye did nothing wrong.” He moved before me and took my hand. “I may have been a little embarrassed myself but not angry.”
I swiped at the moisture on my cheeks. “Mayhap not about this but you are most definitely angry with me. You have been for days.”
He rubbed his hand over the scruff on his jaw and cursed.
“Fash not.” I said. “You are free to feel however you feel. I simply wish things would return to the way they were.”
He cupped my jaw and raised his fingers to smooth the lines of my brow. “We’re good. Everything is fine.”
I swallowed as a drop of water trickled a path from his collarbone down his chest to the tiny pink nipple of his breast. It rolled down his body, a marvelous sight as it kissed all his sharp angles and smooth lines.
“You lie to spare my feelings.” My ears flamed hotter. Gods, his naked body destroyed my focus. Mika’s words rang in my head and caught in my throat.
Take control. What do you want?
“I want to invite you to my bed.” Both of us froze. It took me a moment to realize I voiced my thoughts. My first instinct was to cover up. To apologize and say something to ease the awkwardness but the intensity in his gaze gave me hope.
“Studying Highborne laws as you have, you are surely aware that I am within my rights to invite you to enjoy sexual pleasures and a degree of intimacy with—”
There was a hard edge to his face as he touched a fingertip to the burn in my cheek. “No. I, uh . . . just no. I’m sorry.”
His words stung. I could not breathe. It was as if my heart was being squeezed by my lungs. I turned toward my bed chamber. “No. I apologize. You made yourself clear. I . . . let my imagination hope for more. We are friends.”
Head high, I strode back to my room. Moments away from falling apart, I needed to gain some distance.
“Friends,” he repeated, following me. “Aye, that’s what we said but it hasna felt like that the past few days.”
“Then tell me what I did.”
“Ye healed Kobi.” His jaw clenched, his fist gripping his towel. “I held back, ye see, thought I was doing what’s best for ye, considering. To know he . . . that the two of you . . .”
He placed a wet hand over his heart. “I want to kill the bastard for laying hands on ye. I want to scream for ye letting him. I have no right to either reaction.”
“But he is your friend.”
He shook his damp hair. “Kobi may be a fellow Talon and a warrior I respect, but the demon is no one’s friend. That goateed pincushion is as dangerous as they come and feeds off pain and suffering. Remember that.”
“He saved my life.”
He turned and braced his palms against the surface of the dresser. After exhaling a long, uneven breath he nodded. “Aye. When I did nothing but watch ye writhe in the dirt, he saved yer life. He excised that evil bitch. That’s why he’s here and the only reason he’s still breathing. It’s selfish and verra unkind, but the fact ye returned the favor and saved him boils my blood.”
“How could I not? He bled for me.”
“Aye, he did. I’ve thought of nothing else since, and nothing—no weapons, no acts, no words have cut me so deep in a long while. So, I ask ye . . . do ye feel something more for the demon? Now that ye’ve lain with him?”
There was a horrible silence, during which Samuel stared determinedly at the sand-colored stone wall behind me.
“You think I joined with him?” I raised my hand.
“Are ye tellin’ me otherwise?”
“I certainly am. Kobi and I shared nothing but a few playful pleasures to right his health. We were not intimate.”
His opal gaze met mine as if gauging my sincerity.
“Nothing passed between us beyond stolen kisses to aid in his recovery.”
“So ye didn’t . . . I mean, I know how Incubi heal . . . and I know Kobi. The man is . . . Christ, and I have no say in the matter if ye had—”
I lifted my chin and clenched my fists. “No. You do not. By your own declaration, you hold no interest in being intimate with me, yet you judge with the same assumption Galan did when he thought the worst of me. What is it about my moral character which has the males in my life expecting me to mount any male who stumbles into my path?”
“I never meant—”
I grabbed the fabric of my skirt and held it out to my sides. “Is my dress not tasteful, with all my provocative private parts covered?”
“Yer a vision, as always—”
“My intellect then. You think me simple or compromised mentally. Unable to control my base female urges.”
“Of course not—”
I threw my hands in the air, my body humming with fury and hurt in equal measure. “I must have done something to warrant not only Galan’s censure but yours as well.”
“I’m an arse. I’m sorry—”
“And for you to judge me is worse. You know how Galan hurt me. You wiped my tears and I confided my heart to you. He at least was governed by his prejudice of you and his rage. And yet still you repeated his mistake.”
Samuel rubbed his bare chest and winced. “Lia, duck—”
I thrust my hand in the air. “I am not your duck, I am not your . . . anything. If I were yours in any fashion, you would come to me as an equal and voice your concerns. You would show me the respect I deserve. Instead, you treat me the same way Galan did . . . as a naïve child.”
As he started toward me, I braced my hands on his chest. “You are not the male I thought you to be, Samuel Murray. Please, I want you to leave.”
“Lia no, don’t—”
“Get out.” I choked on the words and shoved him toward the bathing room door. “Sleep in your own room. I refuse to place my heart in the hands of males who hold me in such low esteem. I shall manage on my own from now on.”