The Knight and the Moth (The Stonewater Kingdom, #1)(96)

The backs of my legs hit the mattress. I sat, and Rory’s eyelids grew heavy. “Arms up.”

He grasped my chainmail at my ribs, the web of iron hissing as he pulled it. By slow measures, it shifted. When it finally surrendered and fell to the floor, Rory and I were both breathing hard.

My armor lay like a vanquished enemy at our feet. Just like in the Fervent Peaks when I’d moved through the hot spring’s feverish water, I felt weightless.

I rose to my feet. “All of it.”

Rory’s gaze trailed up the buttons of my under armor, his brow knitting as he searched for more armor that wasn’t there. I took his hand and brought it up my body. Over my stomach, my ribs, up my throat and onto my cheek until his fingers, rough and calloused, caught on my shroud.

“This too,” I whispered.

His muscles tensed, Rory’s entire body suddenly called to attention. “Sybil.”

“I’ll wear it publicly, like Benji wants. Prove that I’m influential. Mythical. Fearsome. Only—”

He kept still. Waiting for me to finish.

“Only I don’t think those things matter to me anymore.” I stepped closer, our faces inches apart. “Please, Rory. Take it off. I want someone to see me.” I whispered against his lips. “I want it to be you.”

Rory’s touch was slow. Gentle. He slid his pointer finger under my shroud, grazing my cheekbone—the delicate line of my lower lashes.

We both let out a shaking breath.

I guided his hand over my cheek, behind my ear, to the knot at the back of my head. Rory worked it, keeping his eyes on my face the entire time. The candle’s meager light cast shadows over him, his dark eyes two pools of ink. They trailed over my cheeks, my nose. Over my lips once—twice—

The knot loosened. I reached out of instinct, pinning my shroud to my cheek before it could fall.

Rory’s hand went still. “You can change your mind.”

I let go. “I haven’t.”

Rory’s lips parted, but he didn’t say anything. His fingers got back to work on the knot. It loosened, loosened—

And then my shroud was falling, silent, onto the pile of armor.

I didn’t watch it drop. My eyes remained lifted, fixed in the darkness of Rory’s.

His inhale was sharp. For an excruciating moment, I couldn’t read his face—couldn’t decipher his eyes. “What?”

“I just…” His breaths came faster. “I don’t think I have the words.”

“Am I that unsightly?”

His thumb found my chin—lifted it. He looked so exquisite to me. My shroud had never hidden any of his beauty, nor was I surprised to see it so close. Rodrick Myndacious was exquisite—

But it wasn’t that. It was the newness of his expression. There was wonder in his gaze I’d never glimpsed before, as if seeing my eyes for the first time had profoundly altered his.

He said it intently. Like he was imploring every part of me to take heed. “You’re the most beautiful woman I’ve ever seen, Sybil Delling.”

The air tasted of him. Of musk and idleweed and the distinct smell of his sweat. I breathed it in too fast—filled my mouth and lungs with it—but it wasn’t enough.

The darkness in Rory’s gaze blew wide. There was no kneeling, no wearing armor. We stood nigh eye to eye, perfectly balanced, he naked in his wonder, me in my defenselessness—and both of us in our desire.

“Don’t tell me what they look like.” I pressed onto my toes. Swallowed his shaking breath with my own. “Don’t say anything at all.”

Rory’s smeared his thumb across my lips. “I’ll do anything you ask of me.”

And then his mouth was on mine.





CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE


UNRAVELING




He gave me thirty seconds. A heady half minute where I was certain I was the master of Rodrick Myndacious.

No sooner had our mouths collided than a moan, deep and tortured, resonated up Rory’s throat. His fingers were in my shirt, catching in the fabric, pulling it until my front was flush with his. Heat emanated from his body like he was the sun—I wanted to run my mouth up his stomach. See if he’d burn my tongue. But for now, my focus was on his lips. On dragging my own against them. On the taste.

On the dance of tongues.

The sounds coming out of him—gods. Ragged breaths that rasped louder when I pressed my teeth into his bottom lip. I kissed Rory madly, drove my hands through his hair, slammed my body against his until there was nothing but the fabric of our shirts between us.

It wasn’t enough.

I threw my leg over his hip, letting out a surprised noise of pleasure to feel the hardness of him. Rory seemed to remember himself then, his hands—the earthly plane he was tethered to.

And suddenly it became abundantly clear, for all the times I’d thrown him down, just how badly he wanted to return the favor.

He caught me beneath the thighs, fingertips pressing into my bottom like he wanted to brand himself there. He broke our kiss to look me in the eyes—to smirk—and then he was lifting me off my feet like I weighed nothing. Walking us back.

And throwing me down onto his bed.

The momentum sent the weary candle flickering, then snuffed it out altogether, leaving nothing but a trail of smoke. The only light in the room now was the quarter moon, hovering in the window.