Forbidden Honor (Dragon Royals #1)(74)
“Jealous?” He and Jaik had shared a girl in the library. I hadn’t thought he would be capable of much jealousy before I saw that look cross his face.
“It’s not a trait I normally embody. But you bring out all kinds of different things for me, things that I’ve never felt before.”
Maybe I shouldn’t have sex with my dragon royal crush in a bookstore, but maybe I shouldn’t do a lot of things.
Maybe I shouldn’t pretend to be nothing but a servant when I was a dragon shifter.
Maybe as long as people made me do things I shouldn’t, I could do other things that I shouldn’t for my own sake.
I grabbed his lapel, wrenched him down to me, and kissed him hard.
Was I getting revenge?
Was I getting what I wanted?
Was I totally lost?
His hands slid up my sides, tugging up my dress, and when his fingers brushed my bare skin, I swayed forward. My chin tilted up treacherously, inviting him closer, as his lips plundered my throat.
I didn’t have answers to any of my questions.
But Talisyn’s body was against mine, and I didn’t care.
Talisyn
I wanted to fix whatever was bothering Honor, but I could tell she didn’t want to open up to me. Honestly, we didn’t even know each other that well. I didn’t know why I felt the magnetic pull to her that I did, but I wasn’t going to pretend I didn’t feel it. I felt as comfortable with her as I did with my brothers, but there was something new.
And it wasn’t just lust. It was an edge of excitement, a thrill of hope for the future—even though I knew that hope was ridiculous. The two of us didn’t have a chance at a life together.
When she seared her lips to mine, my heart beat too quickly, in a way it never had before. I kissed her back, losing myself in her in the feeling of her warm body as my hands traced the satin lines of her dress.
“You’re a dangerous man for me, aren’t you?” she said softly.
I pulled back to regard her, wondering what she was thinking, but that lovely face never gave much away. “Not dangerous to you. Definitely a bad idea though.”
We’d be fools to invite her into our world. Our world was dangerous, and ugly, and we had the fight coming with the Olds that we all knew that we’d face sooner or later. No one knew it better than me. I had no intention of letting Jaik’s father rule with my own at his side much longer. Not when I knew how little they cared about our people.
But I didn’t want to deny her, or deny myself, completely. We’d protect her from the Olds. We had more secrets than they would ever see coming.
I could indulge myself a little. I could have a few precious nights, a past to give me strength as I faced our future.
“Aren’t I a bad idea? Arren made that very clear.”
Arren was right when he said she probably didn’t have honest reasons for wanting to be close to us. “I don’t want to talk about Arren right now.”
She let out a lovely little peal of a laugh that seemed to strike straight to my soul. “I don’t want to talk about him either. I can imagine him glaring at us from the shadows.”
She glanced toward one corner, and I couldn’t help but follow her gaze, even though I knew she was playing.
“Let me see if I can distract you from worrying about my surly friend.”
As I kissed her long and slow, her body relaxed against mine. The tension in her muscles that she’d carried all night softened. I loved that I had that effect on her, that I could ease her burden, if only for a night.
And even if we both knew it was a bad idea, we couldn’t stop touching each other.
She yanked my shirt loose from my waistband, then ran her hands up over my skin. She reached one of my nipples and tweaked it playfully.
I pulled back, mock affronted. The mischievous way her lips curved up made me want to kiss her again, though, so I forgot to tease her and pressed my lips against hers. Her lips parted, the two of us trading kisses until I murmured, “I have a funny feeling if you did that to me, then you want me to do it to you.”
I wrapped my hands around her thighs and hoisted her up. Her legs wrapped around my waist and she let out another bubbly laugh. I carried her across the room and laid her on her back on a table in the corner. We were surrounded by the sparkling lights that hung along the ceiling and from the wrought iron of the second story balcony.
For anyone who loved books—and I did—this place was truly magical. I was glad I got to share it with her. When I was a child, I used to take refuge in the shop. The grumpy shopkeeper wasn’t just someone I was paying to humor me, but someone who had humored me since I was a little boy. And while that might have begun because he enjoyed taking my allowance money from my pocket, over time, Wil and I had developed a surprisingly cordial relationship.
I all but tore Honor’s dress off her body. She lay back, her smile self-satisfied.
“I want to do something for you.” Her voice was a husky whisper. She teased her fingers along my belt, until she reached the buckle. She began to work it with a surprising degree of incompetence, given that I’d seen this girl be capable of almost anything she set her mind to. But now, the look on her face was eager, and she seemed to fumble with the belt until I finally took over from her, my fingers brushing hers as I released the buckle. Then the two of us were trading quick desperate kisses and she rolled off the table to her knees.