Reign of Ice (Forever Fae #4)(30)
“Can we talk?” he asked.
His hands moved from my neck down to my shoulders, kneading and rubbing. “I don’t think I can talk with you touching me like that?” I moaned.
“You just did, Ariella,” he murmured, a deep chuckle vibrating in his chest.
I groaned and lazily tilted my head to the side. If he kept it up, I was going to fall asleep. However, all thoughts of sleep were erased from my mind as I felt his firm, wet lips placed against my bare neck.
“What are you doing?” I whispered, tilting my head further to the side. The stubble on his chin tickled my neck and sent chills down my body, making me shudder.
Taking my hand, he pulled me off of the chair and leaned down to my ear. “Come with me,” he commanded huskily.
With my hand in his, I followed him up the stairs to the room I had placed my bags in earlier. I needed to get out of my armor and into something more comfortable, and possibly sexier. Brayden shut the door behind us and leaned against it. “What are we doing in here?” I asked, lifting a curious brow. “You’re not planning on seducing me, are you?”
He smiled and shook his head. “Not yet, angel. I thought you might like to change clothes and have dinner with me. We need to talk.”
“About?” I inquired, even though I already knew.
My bags had all been moved, so I walked over to the closet to see if they were in there. When I opened the door my clothes had all been hung and placed neatly on one side, but the other side …
“Why are your clothes in here, too?” I asked. “I didn’t know I was going to have to share.”
Brayden chuckled and joined me. “You have it all wrong, angel. I didn’t know I was going to have to share. You seem to have picked my room as yours.”
What? There was no way the room could be his. “That’s not possible,” I shrieked. “How could someone like you have a room like this? It doesn’t match your personality at all, and what’s even weirder is that it’s exactly like mine in the Summer Court.”
“I know,” he agreed. “I guess you and I have more things in common than you realized. Now get dressed and I’ll have some food brought to us.” He licked his lips while staring at mine, but he didn’t follow through. Instead, he turned on his heel and looked back at me once before opening the bedroom door and leaving me to get dressed. Were we going to share this room together? I wondered.
Quickly, I picked out a dress, laid it on the bed, and rushed into the bathroom to take a hasty shower. By the time I got out, I used my wind magic to blow through my hair to make it dry and wrapped a towel around my body. I rushed into the bedroom to change, only to find Brayden standing in front of the open French style doors that led onto the balcony, staring out at the snowy night. There was a table out there with lit candles and two covered dishes that had steam billowing out into the cold air.
Brayden turned around and his eyes blazed with fire as he peered up and down my body. “I don’t think I’ll ever get over how beautiful you are,” he murmured in my mind. “I’m really sorry with the way I acted earlier.”
“It’s okay,” I said with a smile. “I understand that guys don’t think before they speak. I’m perfectly used to it.” My gaze drifted over to my dress on the bed and back down to my body wrapped in the towel.
Brayden narrowed his eyes playfully and said, “Do you need help getting dressed, angel? I’ll be glad to help.”
Biting my lip, I shook my head and dropped the towel to the floor. “I think I can handle it,” I muttered softly. He watched me from the doors as I carefully lifted the dress over my head and slowly lowered it down over my body. From the bulge in Brayden’s jeans I could tell he wanted to do more than watch, but he kept his distance much to my dismay.
“I told you I was going to wait until you begged for it, didn’t I?” he remarked, with a glint in his eye.
“That you did.” There happened to be a problem with that scenario, though; I was never one to beg.
We ate dinner in silence and when we were done we stood on the balcony, side by side, and gazed out across the snowy landscape of the Winter Court. The sky was completely dark, but the snowflakes cascading down gave off its own light. The stark whiteness of it lit up the land so vibrantly that you would still be able to see your way through the dark. It was amazing.
Brayden broke the silence. “When I was out looking for you earlier I ran into my mother. She heard word from Durin that it’ll be about three weeks before he can bring us the dagger.”
“That long?” I gasped. “So much can happen in three weeks. If the sorcerer steals my power somehow there will be no way to stop him.” I knew Durin couldn’t make the dagger overnight, but I secretly hoped it wouldn’t take that long. It felt like we were sitting on a ticking time bomb waiting to explode. The longer the dark sorcerer had, the more time he had to figure things out.
Brayden turned to me and took my hands, pulling me closer. “He’s not going to get your power, angel,” he murmured softly. “I know you want us to keep our distance when we are around the others, and now that I’ve thought about it I can live with that. I don’t want to put you in harm’s way. Therefore, all I’m asking is that when we are together away from the prying eyes of others that you open yourself up to me. You’ve seen and felt what I feel for you and you gave me a glimpse into what you feel for me. I want to go deeper, Ariella.”