Page 73 of Bloodguard

We’re near the top, and I can see a spattering of stars overhead through gaps in the chimney’s cap. I debate knocking the cap off and getting us both to the roof, but I don’t think we can risk the noise with Soro’s militia so close.

In this position, Maeve’s arms are on either side of my face. My arms brace beneath hers. And her legs…sweet baby phoenix, her legs are on the outside of mine, so she’s sitting on top of me. And that yellow dress—it’s bunched around her waist.

She starts to slip, and I reflexively grab her by the hip.

Big mistake. Her thigh is toned, and she curls her leg around my waist, anchoring us together more tightly.

“I was hoping it’d be bigger,” she rasps.

I don’t think she means me, because, yeah… “The chimney?” I ask in a strangled voice.

“Yes. Let me try something,” Maeve says, moving around on top of me for a different angle.

She’s trying to help.

She is positively no help.

Her front is now getting better acquainted with my front. And the tightened tips of her breasts are now pushing into my chest.

It has a very immediate effect.

“Uh,” Maeve whispers. “Leith?”

I don’t mean to rub against her. She’s the one moving against me. She spreads her hands against the wall, shuddering. “I’m sorry,” she breathes. “I don’t mean to, to…”

My chin falls to rest against her shoulder, and my lips graze her ear. “You don’t mean to what?” I whisper, clinging to the last shred of my honor.

Maeve swallows hard. She groans.

It’s not her fault we’re in this tight space—figuratively or literally. And as for my body’s reaction… Well, I guess my body could give a damn that there are a dozen guards stomping up the stairs. Danger isn’t doing a thing to dampen this woman’s effect on me.

Maeve squirms and makes a small sound that causes a big reaction. I grit my teeth.

“I’m not trying to p-play games,” she whispers.

“I didn’t take it that way,” I whisper back. I’m glad it’s dark in here, because I swear on my life I might actually be blushing right now. She seems nervous—possibly more about sitting on top of me in a chimney than about the guards searching the house. I’m making her anxious, and that doesn’t sit well with me.

I try to lean away, but I don’t get far. There’s nowhere to go.

The door to this room slams open, and we both freeze. The other doors are opened and closed. The table is flipped on its side. Glass shatters, and it sounds like shelves are broken.

I lean forward until my lips brush her ear, and in the softest voice I say, “If they find us, I’ll drop down and distract them. You climb up to the roof. Hit the cap as hard as you can manage and run—”

She shakes her head. Her lips brush my neck. “No.” Her arms and legs tighten around me. “Together.”

Well, that’s not happening. Only one of us can drop out of this cramped space and hope to draw a weapon, let alone fight off enough of Soro’s guards for the other to escape.

“I saw them, Lord Soro,” one of the female guards says. “I swear to you, they came in through the balcony.”

That we did. More doors slam as the rest of the guards are likely sweeping through the rest of this home.

“I’m not your lord,” Soro says. “What I am is the future king who will cut out your tongue if I find out you have misguided me.”

There’s a chance we’ll still be discovered, and I change the position of my hands so that if I must drop, I can pry Maeve off me.

The guards’ yells echo through the chimney as they continue to ransack this place. I’m grateful that whoever lives here, if they even still do, doesn’t seem to be home. I don’t imagine this search would have ended well for them. Soro is known to keep dogs, although mercifully they don’t appear to be with him tonight.

As it is, I hope there are no shifters among his guards. Their sense of smell is above all others.

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