A Promise of Fire (Kingmaker Chronicles, #1)(128)

I wince. Oh, Carver.

Kato drops his hands from my arms. “Don’t worry. I’ve been in the back room of a tavern or two. I know what to do.”

I don’t doubt that. “You don’t have to. We’ll find another way.”

“This was written, Cat. You know that as well as I do.” Kato steps away from me. “Find me in the second cave.”

My heart launches itself violently into my throat. “What if I can’t?”

“You can.”

I grab his wrist. “Have you seen me try to read a map? It’s pathetic, and I don’t say that lightly.”

“You don’t have a map.”

“Well, that’s even worse!”

Atalanta drops from her perch, landing lightly on the balls of her feet despite the impact fracturing the frost in a wide circle all around her. She strides toward us, tall, confident, and poised, possessing an animal’s natural grace. Her arms are loose. Her hips sway. Her hair swoops. Gods, it’s annoying.

I’ve got animal grace. I’ve got plenty. Definitely enough to claw her eyes out.

With a last look at me, Kato steps out from behind the stalagmite.

I jump after him, trying to pull him back. “What about the three-headed beast?”

He rubs the back of his neck, his blue eyes swimming with shadows. “I don’t know, but I don’t think she’ll wait.”

Atalanta’s avid gaze is already bright with lust. She’s practically foaming at the mouth. “Strip!” she commands, not bothering with a rhyme.

My jaw drops. Kato looks rather shocked himself.

“Now?” he asks, for some reason directing the question at me.

I shrug helplessly. “I guess.”

Atalanta slings her bow over one shoulder and raps her fingernails against her armor. The impatient tip-tapping grates on my nerves. Everything about her grates on my nerves—the rhyming, her agility, the way she caught my knife, and how she intends to use Kato, although he doesn’t seem to mind.

Kato strips, handing each item of clothing to me. He starts shivering almost immediately. “The temperature won’t exactly enhance my performance,” he mutters.

I take his pants, trying not to glimpse what they used to be covering. “I have a feeling she’ll keep you warm,” I say sourly.

Atalanta claps, apparently delighted with what she sees. I don’t look. I refuse to look.

“The treasure you need, you’ll receive after the deed. As you depart, it will”—she looks Kato up and down with unabashed libidinous craving, her tongue sliding along her lower lip—“warm your manly parts.”

I glare at her. “That does not rhyme!”

She unslings her bow, nocks an arrow, and shoots me. Sort of. If she’d meant to kill me, I’d be dead. I think I lose some hair, though. In any case, Kato is faster than I am. He spins me out of the archer’s path again and deposits me back behind our stalagmite. In the time before he lets me go, my face is buried in his chest. Crisp, golden hair tickles my nose and brushes my lips. His skin is still warm, and smells of man, and frost, and leather. He turns almost as fast, leaving my face against his back. I exhale, and goose bumps spread across his skin.

“I go with you now,” he tells Atalanta, “and you leave her alone. You will not harm her. Ever.”

Atalanta makes no response that I can hear. Maybe she nods. I don’t know. I can’t see around Kato and about a mile of naked back.

He seems satisfied, but then adds, “I’m keeping my boots.”

I can’t help it. I look down. Before I get to his boots, though, my eyes snag on a very fine backside. I’ve only ever seen one naked male bottom. I tilt my head to the side. There’s no real harm in seeing two.

Kato half turns, looking at me over his shoulder. My eyes jerk back up, a ridiculous blush hitting my cheeks like a thunderclap.

“Griffin will kill me for leaving you alone in here,” he says.

“Griffin will kill you for being naked in the same room with me,” I answer.

He grunts. “Believe me, I’d rather be dressed. It’s bloody cold in here.”

“Go, then,” I reluctantly urge. “Atalanta will warm you up.” The words almost stick in my throat. It’s hard not to choke on them.

The muscles in Kato’s bare arms ripple as he clenches his hands into fists. “There’s still the lyre, and the monster.”

I push on the middle of his back with the flat of my hand. He needs to go before he freezes to death. The warmth is already seeping from his skin. “That’s my part, I guess. You just heed the Goddess’s needs when you see Artemis. Needs,” I remind him. “Not wants.”

“Heed the need,” he echoes, looking less enthusiastic now that he’s freezing cold and actually parting from me.

Kato suddenly turns and grabs my wrist, crushing Ariadne’s Thread into my skin. “Keep the string tied. No matter what, you find your way out.”

Does he really think I’d leave him in here? “I find you, and then we both find our way out.”

He looks ready to argue. He looks ready to turn this whole plan on its ear.

“Go.” I give him the hard look Griffin is always giving me. “Go before I give in to my base feminine curiosity and look at your ‘manly parts.’”