I pulled at my other hand, but she still held my fingers entwined with hers. With a strength I hadn’t known it possible for a woman to possess, she kept her hold on mine. She shook her head and, with eyes still closed, raised our joined hands to rest against her cheek. Her dark lashes lay flat against cheeks that were as pale and smooth as porcelain. Her lips were full and swollen from the harshness of our kiss.
She reached up with a slender hand, pressing mine against those lips, but not before I saw them turn upward into a smile. Her eyes opened, an amber so bright against the darkness of the night they reminded me of a stalking cat. She smiled, and the illusion was broken. She was again Bristol, bright and beautiful.
His.
Even when I'd had my hands all over her, she was not mine. But the sweet and seductive taste that was uniquely her still lingered in my mouth. It was something I would cherish until the end of time.
"So that's what it feels like," she said softly, and the look she shot me was purely feminine. The innate confidence of a woman who knew and exploited the power she had over the male caught in her web. It took everything in me not to worship at her feet and beg her to cloud my mind, until the only thing that remained was the essence of us crashing together like two waves in the ocean.
I pulled again, and this time her fingers let mine go easily. I knew the smooth and delicate feel of them would not be easily erased from my mind. I cleared my throat and tried not to dwell too much on the way her hair was mussed from my fingers and the catch of my ring in the strands, or the heat that flushed her cheeks from our passion. "That shouldn't have happened."
She laughed, light and carefree as she flung her arms out and twirled. Against the moonlight, it looked like she had the wings of an angel. Ethereal and delicate, and just as untouchable as the sky. "And yet it did. I didn't know that just a kiss could be that.”
She looked back at me over her shoulder, and my hands bunched into fists as I fought to gain back the restraint she had ruthlessly severed, without thought of the consequences. "And it shouldn't have happened," I repeated, biting out the words one by one. With each word, it was a lock closing over my control, snapping back into place. It took all my years of training to claim that personal victory. All the moments I had sworn I would do better than the people who had made me.
She spun back around, arms crossed over her chest, eyes burning as hot as molten lava. "You can't deny that you wanted that kiss as much as I did. I may be inexperienced, but I’m not an idiot.”
My shoulders tensed, my body straining against my mind when all I wanted to do was show her everything I wanted. "I don't deny that when I had you in my arms I couldn't think, Bristol. You're a beautiful woman. It's not hard to desire you. But you, yourself said that you’ve heard stories about Lantis. You can’t claim to know nothing about what my father was like. About the sort of man who married my mother and made her queen of my country."
Sympathy flashed across her face and she stepped forward, no doubt with a comforting word. Even though I yearned to have her wrap her arms around me, to soothe all the heartache I had growing up in the shadow of a royal family born out of scandal, I took a step back. “Aric, you aren’t your father. From what I know, he never would have worked half as hard as you have to recover Lantis’s reputation.”
It was a shock to be understood so easily by a woman I’d really just met. But as much as I felt like I’d known her for centuries, it seemed the same could be said of her. It only made it harder to do what I knew I needed to do and push her away when all I wanted was to ask her to stay. “I will always do what is right for Lantis. I don’t deny that I want you, more than you could imagine. But to act on that would be selfish. I’ll not risk my hard work for a tryst with a stranger.”
Pain crossed her face before her rising temper clouded her features. "And that's all it was. Is that it, Aric? Just another stranger to throw herself at you. Name and face nothing but a technicality you’ll forget by morning?” Pushing her away grew increasingly difficult as I wanted to soothe the hurt I’d caused. The sight of it sparking in the amber depths of her eyes was enough to drive me to my knees. Next to Lantis and Alina, she was all that mattered. And she was the one person I could never let know. But for one moment I’d allowed myself the luxury of thinking I could tell her just how much she meant to me.
Then that moment had ended.
"What I say stands, regardless. You're one formal announcement away from being engaged to Holden, or have you forgotten him?”
As harsh as my words may have seemed, the reality was I had forgotten him. When she'd been in my arms, I’d forgotten everything but her sweetness wrapped around me. As if I had the right to be happy with Bristol of Theodosia by letting my desires control me, when what I'd done was no better than my parents before me. I could have further destroyed the Atwater reputation, buried us in the grave others had dug before me.
Bristol scoffed, studying me with disgust in her amber eyes. I'd never thought to have her focus so intently fixated on me, but now that I had it?
I never wanted to see that expression in those stunning eyes. I never wanted to feel the rejection that came with her glare and condemnation.
“And what of you? Holden loves you as he would a brother if he had one. I can’t imagine you don’t feel the same way about him, but somehow you forgot, too. I take part of the blame, Aric of Lantis, but do not for a moment try to lay all of it on me,” she snarled, her gaze turning cold before my eyes as regret slammed into me. “It takes two to kiss.” She drilled a finger to my chest, and I allowed it. If she wanted to inflict even more grief onto me, I was happy to let her when I saw pain settle in her eyes.
I rubbed a hand over where her finger had been, feeling a distinct pang in my chest when I had no choice but to push away what could have been the best thing to happen in my life. “Forgotten or not, we had no right. Not when I’m not the King of Mitnar, and you have no chance of being my Queen.”
"For just a minute, I thought maybe you were different from all the rest," she said with her voice deadly quiet. Still, the fury in it rang through the clear night, echoing off the sounds of the ocean waves in the distance as they echoed that fury.
A siren. A goddess who commanded the sea. The goddess who would grab me by the balls and command me if I ever let her so close.
"But you aren't, are you?" she asked, her face twisting with a shock of grief that took my breath away. It hinted at a reserve of agony I'd never have expected from Bristol. From the glimpses into her life I’d had, she always wore a smile on her face and warmth in her eyes. She always loved openly and without reserve. I opened my mouth to speak but she plowed through, "You're just like all the rest. Seeing only the alliance I'm to form and never bothering to acknowledge that I'm a fucking person too."
"That's not true," I warned, my fury rising with her accusations.
"No? Then why am I not free to explore my passion before I’m married? You’re his friend, so you know better than anyone that Holden is no virgin. No Prince or King goes into their marriage inexperienced, and I would have to be an idiot to think he was. Yet you stand there and condemn me for wanting to feel something. For just one goddamn minute in my life, I want to feel desired before I throw my life away to a marriage filled with only duty." Her hand that had only moments ago rubbed my back gripped my wrist like a vise.