Page 83 of For Love and Blood and Fury

“Why did you get jealous earlier? When Lois was talking to me,” she clarified as if Elena might have already forgotten. Attention darting to Zuri and back at Elena, she paused before adding, “I thought this was just sex and you two had slept with a ton of other partners together.”

“We’re not together,” Zuri corrected. Even without the barb of conviction in her tone, the words still stung.

“Oh, you’re not going to get pedantic about labels are you?” Elena rolled her eyes, wanting the conversation to veer in a different direction. If Marisol was looking to define things, she was going to scare Zuri away, and Elena wasn’t ready to let her go yet. Either of them.

“Well, it’s kind of important to know what we’re doing?—”

Zuri didn’t let Marisol finish. “I’m absolutely not in a relationship?—”

“You’re mine. Both of you. That’s all there is to know.” Elena launched into the caveman routine that Zuri could hide behind. Gave her the plausible deniability she needed to stay…even when they both knew full well that their hearts had never stopped beating for each other. That they could never bejust sex.

“Your delusion is so reliable that it’s actually comforting,” Zuri said with a laugh, fingertips tracing meaningless shapes over Elena’s sternum. “I’m no one’s?—”

“What if you’re wrong?” Marisol’s hazel eyes were bright and brimming with mischief.

“Wrong?” Elena tipped her head to the side. “About what?”

Marisol moistened her lips, the ones Elena had only just had her way with. Attention on Zuri while she straddled Elena’s bare hips, Marisol grinned. Reflexively, Elena slid her palms over Marisol’s legs, her strong quads a harmonious complement to Zuri’s thick thighs.

Instead of responding, Marisol leaned down to capture a craning Zuri’s mouth in a kiss. Slow and deep, their kiss was a rush of new desire awakening Elena’s barely slumbering body. Digging her fingers into Marisol’s hips, she urged her to grind against her.

Marisol complied, but not without pulling Zuri up to her while maintaining their kiss. On her knees at Marisol’s side, Zuri ran her hands through Marisol’s mussed hair and held her close.

Of all the ways they’d touched each other so far, the easy tenderness Zuri showed Marisol was her favorite. Despite her bravado, Elena felt Zuri’s growing affection for her in her own body. Knew that Zuri had no way to guard herself against Marisol’s earnestness. Her apparently limitless wholeheartedness. Although, frankly, she wasn’t sure how anyone resisted it.

After lifetimes of seeing humanity at its worst, of violence and betrayal and manipulation and the kind of selfishness that led to atrocity, Marisol was the embodiment of kindness and compassion and bleeding empathy. Elena didn’t need to knowshe was allergic to fucking peanuts to know who she was at her core. To know that she was a person to fiercely protect. To love.

When Marisol eased out of Zuri’s kiss and looked at Elena again, eyelids heavy and lips swollen, she held her breath.

“Figure it out yet?” Marisol teased, voice husky and dripping with new lust. “What you’re oh so very wrong about?”

Elena raised both brows and waited for Marisol to reveal her game.

“What if…” She bent over her, mouth hovering inches from Elena’s lips. “We’re not yours,” she whispered, bottom lip grazing hers before pulling away. “What if it’syouwho belongs to us?”

With a grin, Elena’s attention darted between Marisol and Zuri and then dropped to the place where Zuri’s arm was wrapped around Marisol’s waist. Where her fingers hung carelessly over her hip bone.

Would she give these women her power? Elena’s chest tightened of its own accord. The better question might be… What did she have the power to deny?

Chapter Forty-Seven

The shadesin Elena’s extravagant condo had closed on their own at some point before sunrise so Marisol had missed when night eased into day. The room was pitch black and disorienting. She couldn’t tell if she’d slept, if vivid dreams had bled into her reality, or if fragments of reality had seeped into her subconscious.

She hadn’t been totally awake when Elena stirred at her side. At some point in the night, Marisol had ended up in the middle spot. She should probably feel claustrophobic with two bodies pressing into her, but she’d never enjoyed body heat more in her life. Sticky sweat and all.

When Elena slipped out of her arms, Marisol nearly groaned her displeasure.

“Where are you going?” Marisol asked, prompting Zuri to shift behind her. They’d been sleeping back-to-back and the completeness of the contact was almost as good as being held close.

The light from the spa bathroom was blinding until her eyes adjusted. Adjusted just in time to see Elena’s nude form—a body sculpted by some ancient gods whose names were lost to time—saunter away.

“Do you miss me already?” Elena, wavy hair voluminous and wild, asked when she peeked back into the bedroom. “And here I thought I’d sated your hunger.”

Zuri’s arm hooked around her waist made Marisol relax—even though she hadn’t noticed the tension building in her muscles.

“She’s never met a direct question she didn’t ignore,” Zuri whispered over Marisol’s shoulder, lips pressed so gently to the back of her neck that it forced every coherent thought out of Marisol’s skull.

With a throaty chuckle, Elena tipped her head to the side. “Anyone want to join me in the shower?”

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