“I guess that means I’m this one.”
Josie tentatively pushes open the second to last door lining the hall—each room sits to the left, while the right wall hosts a long windowpane overlooking the garden we came from.
Imogen’s arm sneaks around my waist.
“Leo’s being dramatic,” Imogen says. “We aren’t that loud.”
Josie snorts, but then quickly tries to cover it with a cough that is obviously fake. Imogen pales beside me.
“Sorry,” Josie says. “But that is decidedly false. You two are very loud.”
Imogen licks her lips nervously. “All the way in your rooms, at Nora’s place, you were able to hear us?”
“Mhm.”
“Don’t worry, we won’t subject Josie to anything traumatizing this time around.” I pull Imogen towards the closest door to the stairwell. “Come on, let’s get settled.”
“I’ll see you both in the morning,” Josie calls, and I hear the click of her door shutting.
Meanwhile, Imogen untangles herself from me and takes a sure step back, one arm extended in front of her as if she can keep me a safe distance away.
“Maybe we should take separate rooms?” she squeaks, a pink flush actively rising on her neck.
“Why so embarrassed,Lust?” I chide.
Her face sours at the use of her title rather than her name. “I’m not embarrassed. Maybe I need a break from the constant sex.”
I stalk towards her, and she takes measured steps back until I’ve got her crowded against the windows. She does have a good point. I’ve been crazed over her body as of late, wringing more orgasms from her in the past week than I have in the previous month.
“I’m pretty sure you enjoy my debauchery. Encourage it even,” I say.
She’d look delicious writhing under the stained-glass light, shards of color dancing over her smooth skin. I make a note to pull her into a side hall at some point.
Well, maybe after I kill Patience.
I wasn’t letting her fall into his wrinkly, evil hands. Not ever again.
I was half tempted to leave her in Anwynn, but I couldn’t stomach the thought of leaving her without my protection again.
I drop a kiss to her forehead. “Will you stay with Josie until I come back?”
“You’re not coming to bed?”
“I thought you said you needed a break? Did you change your mind?” I tease, but then I get serious. “Do you think I’d be able to sleep without doing a sweep of what parts of the castle I can reach? I don’t care about whatever wards Silas says are in place to keep the Seelie side sealed off.”
“I’d hope you would be able to take a break like the rest of us,” Imogen says. “But I know you can’t.”
“I promise to not cause trouble.”
“Uh-huh,” she says with a roll of her eyes. “Please be safe.”
“I promise,” I say. “I’ll come get you when I’m back.”
She kisses my cheek before quietly knocking on Josie’s door. They exchange a few quiet words before Josie lets her in, nodding my way before shutting the door.
The apple of my cheek tingles where Imogen’s lips left their mark as I veer onto the stairwell landing and climb the final steps up to the top floor.
The eighth landing is the same as the rest, though instead of a hall with multiple rooms, only a set of double doors stands beyond the archway. The dark wood still smells as if it was hewn and carved yesterday, the fresh musk of the wood filling the air. Golden handles line either side of the center and jut out from the wood, molded into an intricate design that resembles a tree.