Page 149 of What Lies Within Masks & Shadows

Instead, black, branch-like veins staggered from his tightly closed eyes. And only when Alora gently dropped to her knees, did he only half-open them, shuddering a breath before those veins receded to reveal incredibly pale skin.

She’d never seen that look on his face.

It terrified her more than anything Kaine could’ve ever done. Rattling a place deep inside she didn’t know, until now, existed.

Alora dropped her hand to his knee before she recognized her own touch. Garrik’s eyes widened and swirled with cascading oblivion.

Whatever was tormenting him, it was wholly evil. Somehow—she couldfeelit.

She couldn’t let him sit there like that any longer. No matter what happened in the tavern. No matter what that racingheartbeat inside her chest meant or the breath in her lungs that seemed to catch and refuse to break.

Standing, Alora leaned closer, drawing Garrik’s stare to follow her movement as he pushed from his elbows and fell back in the chair. Cautiously, she brushed a hand to his cheek, reveling in the incredible feeling of his cold skin against her warm hand, swirling her thumb idly when his hollow eyes half-lidded. The eyes that she’d do anything to see glowing and teeming with life again.

Then the warmth of her lips pressed against his silken hair. Andstars… his scent.

Garrik leaned into that gentle kiss, swallowing hard as his eyes closed again.

And she may have felt or heard or sensed something in the veil tearing. The veil that clouded over his being and left him holding it all inside. For a moment, she felt him. The strong shoulders of Elysian’s strongest warrior dropping as tension rolled out in one damning ripple. Like the weight of an entire world had simply dripped off him.

So Alora lifted her other hand and spread her fingers through his hair in one gentle stroke.

Something like a strangled groan vibrated from Garrik’s throat.

Stroke by gentle stroke, Garrik’s body loosened, and he groaned again. “Alora.”

The sound of him sent spikes of molten metal through her veins.

Alora.His voice echoed like a prayer. Like it was the most beautiful thing he’d ever spoken. A name to be worshiped on humble knees and whispered on tongues ready to serve.

Garrik’s head fell against the headrest, a quiet curse fell from his lips when his thighs flexed.

She wanted to know what her namefeltlike … breathing and groaning from his lips. So Alora braced the hand from his cheek on the headrest, brushing her quivering lips to the cold skin below his ear, feeling Garrik’s pulse sharply quicken. She didn’t stop, not when his breathing fell uneven, almost entirely null, and brushed her lips down his neck.

“Alora,” Garrik groaned in a desperate whimper.

Her knees threatened to buckle at the sound. And she swore she could’ve shattered just from his voice, knowing she would do anything—anythingto hear her name likethatagain.

“You”—his breath shattered—“don’t need to do this for me.” Garrik’s hand gripped into the armrest so tight, his knuckles whitened.

But I want too.Ifthisis what he needed, a distraction from whatever in Firekeeper-filled-hell was bothering him, she was willing. Because that devastated look in his eyes … sheneverwanted to see it again.

Alora took that hand braced on the headrest, cupped the back of his neck, and dared to trace her tongue in soft, teasing swirls on his skin. Licking up the taste of him.

“Why are you doing”—Garrik’s breath stilled when she grazed her teeth under his jaw—“this?”

She bit down. Enough to pull a hiss from his teeth. Enough to have him stretching his neck, begging for more.

And she said the only thing she could think before pressing a kiss to the brutal scar there, feeling his cold pulse as rapid as her own. “To show you that you’re not alone.”

Garrik shuddered, not from her lips but from the words.

His thighs flexed and her traitorous gaze raked down the fabric of his dark shirt, settling on the massive bulge straining against his pants. Her mouth went dry when he tightened his abdomen, watching that bulge twitch when his hand gripped herwaist, almost … almost as if he were holding her back. Holding himself back.

“Alora.” His voice sounded more like a question, more of a plea than anything.

“Yes,” she answered, breathing hot, soothing air against his icy skin. Trailing lower, finding the hardened muscle between his neck and shoulder, and bit there too. Trying but ruthlessly failing to distance the thoughts of Garrik’s hard cock feet from her hands. From her body.

Her mouth.

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