Page 31 of Court of Bone and Amethyst

But for once, he says nothing, doesn’t try to correct me. He just looks at me a moment, then turns his back to me, pulling the furs up around his shoulders. I go back to reading, but after a few minutes, he growls and rolls over.

“You’re shivering. You need to move closer.”

I put my book down. I’d been so distracted, I’d half-forgotten the cold. But as soon as I quit reading, I realize he’s right. I’m shaking, even with two cloaks and my boots on, and beneath two layers of furs. “We’re already sharing the same blanket. I don’t think we can get much closer together.”

“Quit being stubborn, or you’re going to freeze to death,” he growls.

He reaches out and tugs the furs on the ground toward him until I’m pressed right up against his chest. I glare at him a moment, then lean over and carefully place my book back in my bag. Just that small movement out from under the furs sends a spike of icy unpleasantness along my spine. I quickly curl back under the top layer of blankets. I hate to admit it, but he’s right. Up against his body, it’s much warmer.

“Are you satisfied now?” I ask.

He stares at me a moment, something moving quickly over his face, too quick to read, but he says nothing.

“Is it going to get even colder than this? Further north?”

“Yes,” he says, his voice a low rumble.

“So, I’m basically going to die from frost, and we won’t have to worry about Avonia’s army or the ancient nightmare that’s hunting me.”

“It’ll be a more pleasant death, if so,” he says, a twinge of dry humor in his voice.

“I hardly think that’s funny.”

“No, Your Highness, of course not.”

“Stop calling me that,” I growl. “You know I don’t like it.” My heated words are punctuated by another whole-body shiver, strong enough that my teeth chatter.

“I know,” he responds.

Then he reaches out with one arm and flips me over, pulling me tight against the length of his body. His chest presses into my shoulders, and his torso against my back, and… something else presses into the curve of my ass. His arms are wrapped so tightly around me, I can barely move.

It’s delightfully warm.

Nonetheless, I wiggle against him, feeling the need to protest his commandeering of my body. “You are so…” I trail off, unable to find the right word.

“Helpful against the cold?”

“No.” Another wiggle.

“No? You want to sleep on the other side of the tent, then?”

I don’t respond, and he chuckles, a rumble that moves through my entire body. I shimmy once more, a final protest.

And in response, the part of him pressing into my ass grows harder than the icy ground beneath us.

I go very still. It astonishes me that he can be thinking aboutthatafter we’ve done nothing but argue since the night before. But as I feel the hard length of him pressed up against me, I realize that despite that very same reason, I’m imagining several things right now myself. My heart pounds in my chest, my breathing shallow and quick.

I’m not really sure if the next wiggle is intentional, or my body acting entirely of its own accord.

Another rumble moves through Zyren’s chest, but this time there’s nothing humorous about it. His hand that’s wrapped over the top of my shoulders moves slightly, his fingers sliding up to my heart. He no doubt can feel how rapidly it’s racing, eventhrough my layers of clothing. Slowly, his fingers slide upward from my heart, over the curve of one breast, until they find the diamond-hard tip of my nipple. He circles his thumb over the top of it and I let out a small gasp which sends a white puff into the air around us.

This time, when I move against him, it’s slow and deliberate. A slow, circular movement of my round cheeks over his bulging flesh, once, twice, a third time. Zyren lets out a low moan, his hot breath vibrating into my ear. He grows even harder, which hardly seems possible. My ability to get this reaction out of him sends a spike of power and pleasure through my core, a ripple through the most delicate part of me. I arch against him, and one of my hands drifts down to hover over the source of the sweet sensation.

Zyren switches hands, continuing to tease my nipple with one as his other hand slides down my body to hover over my own. He lets out a low growl in my ear, flicking my earlobe with his tongue and then nibbling the edge of it with his teeth. Then he lays his hand down over mine, and he guides my fingers to the spark of pleasure between my legs. He begins to swirl them over the tiny dot of ecstasy there, which quickly becomes a burning star of sensation.

I moan, shuddering and sliding myself back into the hard length still pressing into me. We undulate together beneath the furs, the slowest burn of building pleasure through our clothes. Somehow, the fact that we can’t be skin to skin makes the bliss unfold even more exquisitely, a gauntlet thrown and a challenge accepted. The cold air sliding in at the edges of the furs makes everything burn brighter, pain mixing with pleasure.

When Zyren increases the speed of his movements, the night spins as he works both areas of my body. A storm of bliss begins to break over me. I manage to keep just enough focus to continue gyrating against him, and I feel him shudder against me, anotherhot moan sounding in my ear. “You are more than a queen,” he growls. “You are a goddess, Sarielle.”

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