The Darkest Wolves - A.K. Koonce Page 0,33

my lips, and I breathe him in like all I want is a single taste. Our gazes lock. Our lips nearly brush. Our hearts pound as one.

And then he pauses.

He’s going to back away.

He’s going to run out of this room and away from me like they do time and time again.

Then he closes his eyes. And he presses his lips to mine with the sweetness he instills with every word he ever speaks. It’s a gentle caress of his mouth along mine. A fleeting soft kiss with more emotion than I’ve felt in all my life pressed into a span of less than a single minute.

He pulls away from me, but the space he allows between us is very little. His gaze lingers along my lips even though he cannot see them. And it’s then that his palm lifts, his fingertips skim the edge of my jaw, and he touches my features for the very first time.

I close my eyes just as I had when he kissed me. Somehow this feels wildly more intimate. It’s the lightest touch along my neck, my jaw, my lower lip and the bow just above. As if I’m a fragile, delicate flower, he brushes over the lines of my face. My lashes flutter as he takes me in little by little with a caress that makes me weak in the knees.

When he reaches my hair and his fingers slide in, he stops there.

He doesn’t look back up at me. He blinks over and over again as he looks down at the small space between us.

“The most beautifully pained woman in all the realms,” he whispers like an echo.

My heart pounds for more. I don’t know why.

I know I’m pretty.

But I need his response to that beauty. Did it live up? Were my looks something that was talked too highly of, and now after all this time, does it live up to the name of most beautiful woman in all the realms?

I cling to his silence.

His head lifts slowly. His lips hover over mine. And then he finally speaks. “The Goddess did bless you. With a beautiful, resilient soul that shines through without even looking at you, Cersia.”

My heart. My poor, poor stupid heart. It skips and flops and falls right out of my chest, I swear it.

When his lips find mine once more, it’s a demanding passion. His tongue slides over mine before our lips ever fully seal. He devours me, and the hold he has on my hair tightens just as the hold Roman has against my torso pulls harder against himself. The press of their bodies against mine drills untamed desire all through me.

And it seems I’m not the only one.

Fingers grip my chin harshly, and I’m pulled away from that addicting kiss with a gasp slipping from my lungs. But I never catch that breath.

Because Roman pulls my mouth right to his, and he tastes me slowly. He runs the tip of his tongue over my damp lower lips, and I can’t decide if he wants my kiss…or Avian’s. It doesn’t matter, and he doesn’t seem to let the thought linger. His dominance is all he shows me as he thrusts his tongue into my mouth and gives me the slowest, deepest exploration. He takes every part of me, and the slower he moves his mouth against mine, the slower he starts to thrust his hips against the curve of my ass.

And that’s what sets us all off. Avian grips my thighs and hoists me higher until I’m lined up with the hardest part of him. I’m twisted one way to kiss Roman while Avian controls my sex against his cock with hard grinding thrusts that just distract me from that delicious thing Roman keeps doing with his tongue.

It isn’t competitive. Jealousy doesn’t exist here. It’s the sharing of emotions. We all want the same thing. They prove that even more when I pull back from Roman’s mouth, and he doesn’t pause for a second as Avian slams his lips against his friend’s.

Their kiss is harsher. It’s like seeing an ember burn for so long that the heat is unbearable when it finally ignites. There’s a desperateness in the flick of their tongues, the biting of lips, the growling of pleasure.

And I feel every bit of that desperation as each of them slides their hands down the front of my pants at the same time, snapping the button right off the front as they both push their fingers over every