The Fortunates (Unfortunate #2) - Skyla Madi Page 0,36

as mine? I was exhausted, but I couldn’t fall asleep until the sun was up. I feel safe when the sun is up.

I walk on the tips of my toes, careful not to make any noise as I step around the lounge and slip by the cylinder table. He inhales through his nose and his eyes flutter open. His black irises glue to me. They glue to my body, to the black, silky fabric that caresses it. I’ve never worn anything so comfortable. I glance at his throat as he swallows hard and lifts his head. He straightens his spine and leans off the back of the couch, holding himself so…formally…in his seated position.

Kaden’s dark stare sweeps down the length of my body and back up again. I wonder what he sees. I’m still malnourished, still beaten and bruised, but he doesn’t look at me like I’m sick. He looks at me like…like I’m flawless. Like I’m someone worth being looked at so deeply, so intensely.

Unexpectedly, his dark gaze locks with mine and it conjures tingles along my skin.

“Take it off,” he orders in his husky voice. “All of it.”

I frown. Take them off?

“But I like them. They’re beautiful.”

Kaden shakes his head as he pushes himself to his feet “You’re beautiful. You make them look beautiful.”

He slips his hands against my shoulders and turns me around. I gulp as he curls his finger around the strap, brushing my spine with the tips of his fingers. I cup my breasts as he unhooks the clasp and the fabric sags.

“Without your body underneath, it’s only a scrap of fabric,” he says, flicking the straps down my arms.

Swallowing, I glance over my shoulder. Kade doesn’t say a word, he doesn’t have to. Following the order in his eyes, I turn around and drop my stare to the second button on his crisp, clean shirt.

“You’re nervous?” he murmurs, brushing his thumb along my forearm. Subtly, I inhale through my nose and fill my lungs to capacity. I exhale.

“You always make me nervous…” I whisper, lifting my gaze.

The brush of his finger against my forearm turns into a full palm stroke as he curls his hand around my wrist and pulls it away from my breast. I swallow again, uncomfortable with how my muscles are clenching. How long has it been? I can’t remember. It feels like a lifetime ago.

I lower one hand to my side and it exposes my right breast. Warm air exudes from Kade and wraps around me, comforting me like a soft, heated blanket. He doesn’t look at my bare breast. He keeps his attention on my face, savouring the way my jaw clenches and my eyelids flutter whenever a bout of uncertainty slams into me.

“You don’t want a war, Nine,” he mutters, grabbing my other wrist in his large hand.

He lowers it to my side and releases me. The bra falls from my breasts and slips down my arms. My heart pounds relentlessly in my chest as the bra lands at our feet and rests against my toes.

“I don’t?”

He shakes his head, the corner of his lips twitching in amusement. “You want me. You want to take care of my house…to be my wife…to raise my children.”

My lips part as Kade lowers himself to his knees and plants a kiss against my hip bone. Sparks ignite, forcing me to suck in a sharp breath between my teeth. I see what he’s doing…but it’s not going to work.

Kade grips the hem of my underwear in his hands, planting another kiss on my hip, and slides them down my thighs. The lower they fall, the higher my pulse climbs. Until I’m naked…

…and exposed…

…completely and utterly vulnerable.

“Marrying an Unfortunate isn’t noble.”

“And you expect to change the world with that attitude?”

I smile, despite the sombre feeling floating around my chest. “You truly want all of that? With me?”

He plants another kiss on my skin and my kneecaps waver. “Absolutely.”

I clench my teeth, uneasy. A little while ago he couldn’t bring himself to say he loves me and now I’m the girl he wants to marry? To have children with? Boy, did that escalate quickly.

“I know what you’re trying to do,” I say, keeping my stare on the painting ahead of me. It’s easy to defy him when I’m not looking directly into those Fortunate eyes. “And it won’t work.”

Exhaling, Kade pushes himself to his feet and impatiently drops his head back. My heart races and my lungs squeeze, forcing me to take subtle, shallow