into me, filling me with a deep need. My thighs clenched.
Honestly. Who said saving the country had to be unpleasant? There was no reason I couldn’t enjoy my patriotic duty a little.
I met his gaze, the flames growing dangerously bright in his irises. For a moment, I nearly forgot how high we were in the air.
He swept over the parapet, and we landed on the top of a castle walk. Here, the walls rose high on either side, but the wide sky twinkled above us.
I slowly slid down his body. He looked perplexed again. In fact, he was staring at me like I was a book he was trying to read, in a language he couldn’t decipher.
I took a shaky breath, feeling dizzyingly close to the divine. Samael seemed like a force of nature caught between Heaven and Hell, and something in my brain couldn’t stop trying to work out which it was.
His wings were still out, sweeping down behind him. He brushed his finger down the side of my face, and his touch sent ripples of pleasure over me.
“You lie to me.” His voice was rich, silky, and I nearly missed that it was basically a threat. “That is a problem.”
I reached up and touched his perfect face, those sharp cheekbones. “But your dream says I’m important. Maybe I’m supposed to lie.”
My gaze slid down his body, and I took in the river-soaked shirt clinging to his powerful muscles. Holy hell. Everything about him was dangerous.
He closed his eyes, and I saw his jaw clench, like he was trying to master control of himself. Then he turned, and started to walk away. Oddly, I felt his departure like a pain in my chest.
I found my hand shooting out, and I grabbed him by the bicep. When he turned to look at me, his expression was scorching.
I breathed unsteadily. “I liked our kiss earlier.”
Maybe I lied to him a lot, but that wasn’t a lie. It should be, but it wasn’t.
Kissing him was pure sinful pleasure, and pretending otherwise was lying to myself. Maybe I had to make him vulnerable, yes, but I also wanted to feel his mouth on my skin. As luck would have it, these two goals seemed to be entwined.
His jaw clenched, fiery eyes piercing me. “You ran from me, terrified.”
“Yeah. But I liked the kiss. You’re …” I cleared my throat, completely unsure of what to say. “Confusing.”
He frowned at me, his body completely still. I realized I was still gripping his bicep, and he was staring at me with his head cocked. “When we were on the ship, there was an aphrodisiac in the air. Perhaps that affected us both.”
“Oh.” I let go of his arm. Was that all it was for him?
As he walked away, he said over his shoulder. “Return to my room at once.”
I walked in heavy silence behind him.
35
Lila
As we walked through the hallways, no longer speaking, my chest tensed. His words echoed in my mind. Only the lust bloom.
If I couldn’t actually seduce him, maybe this wasn’t my destiny, like I’d thought.
It hurt more than it should have. I supposed no one liked to be rejected—even if your worst enemy was rejecting you.
But as we entered the ivory hall, with the moonlight spilling in through stained glass windows, I felt something tingle over my skin. The Raven King’s spirit? Samael stalked ahead of me like he owned the place, his enormous body silvered in the moonlight.
My beautiful, powerful enemy, striding through the halls of a castle that should belong to my people.
Watching him move, my heart started beating like a war drum. I wondered if the Raven King had built this hall, and maybe that was what was snaking up my thighs and into my belly. Telling me not to give up. It felt like a call to battle.
My gaze flicked up to the beautiful vaulted ceiling, the ornate bony carvings.
I was going to do everything I could to seduce Samael and to make him weak. I was here as a soldier of Albia, and a little rejection didn’t matter.
Going into battle meant you risked getting hurt, taking the blows. But in this battle, instead of armor, I’d be marching wearing nothing at all.
I could do this. I could seduce the Angel of Death.
Goosebumps rose over my arms as we walked under the impossibly high arches of the hallway.
Samael opened the door to his room and marched inside, cowl still shielding his face.