Page 131 of Rift
His eyes flickered with a single flame as he leaned over the desk, hands planted on either side of her. He dropped that terrible wall within him, releasing the flood of blacks and maroons and blues and golds he’d kept at bay for months.
Lux spilled out the anger, the guilt, the loathing all over the desk, racing toward her fingertips.
He poured so much of it out before her, she finally saw what lived beneath it, cowering in the corner of his soul.
The ache for her. For them.
She drew in a stilted breath, unable to get enough air between them.
His voice was chillingly strained against the current of emotions. “Is this what you want? To drown in all my misery?”
She shook her head in disbelief, rounding the edge of the desk to stand before him. Her eyes drank him in, every frown line carved into his face, every twitch of his jaw as she let him rot in his confession.
“Is misery what you think I feel?”
He whispered, “Isn’t it?”
Astra reached for him but stopped herself, still unsure where his iron will and scarlet desire intersected.
“All that hurt within you, it’s there. Of course, it’s there, I won’t deny it. But it only lasts for a moment. Do you not recognize what’s living just under that black blanket you cling to?”
A well of confusion opened up in the center of his chest, pinks and reds and oranges swirling beneath the stormy sea he couldn’t see beyond. She lifted a finger, running it over his heart to his stomach. “Here.”
His chest expanded with a breath he’d been holding for thirty years, covering her hand and resting it against the edge of his lungs. Lux’s eyes closed as he dropped within himself, further than he’d ever ventured. His eyes flashed open, fixing on her.
“None of this was supposed to happen.”
“Do you think you’re the first man in all the courts, shit,” Astra laughed. “The first man in these very palace walls this week, to say that?”
He laughed, but it didn’t touch his eyes. “What makes you think we’ll be any different from Solan and Leona?”
The image of them kneeling across from one another flashed in her mind, sending a shiver down her spine. Yes, they’d destroyed each other. But Selenia had made sure of that and her mother allowed it. Her muscles pushed her into his arms. Nothing inside of her fought anything about him.
Her trust in her intuition may have been foreign to him, but it was all she needed. “I’m not afraid of you. I’d take you out before you could kill me, anyway. I’m much more powerful,” she chuckled.
“Fuck you, Fire Queen.” But he gifted her a real laugh this time, creating just enough space within his chest for something else.
“You know, some men woo ladies with poetry.” She slipped her hand against his chest as it filled with another low rumble of laughter in response. She was hooked, desperate to replicate the sound as often as possible, to let it cleanse the sorrow that clung to his bones.
Lux pursed his lips. “I’ve read the poetry you like. I’m afraid I’ll disappoint you terribly.”
“You’ve never worried about disappointing me before.” Astra glanced up at him, his face stoic as always, but he’d left the wall in his chest open. A flurry of colors raced over his lungs, a thousand shades at once.
He caught her chin in the rough grip of his thumb and forefinger.
“I’ve only ever worried about disappointing you. Every single time I hurt your feelings, or distanced myself, or lied to you, it was not without great personal cost. I felt it in my soul, a thousand weeping wounds, I swear it. I’d rather never take another full breath again than hurt you any more than I already have.”
“But you’re no poet,” she whispered, her heart pounding.
He tilted forward, and it was over.
Kissing Lux was like touching a star. Whispers of molten light slipped under her fingertips as his arms contracted around her waist, pressing her into him where she belonged. She let her hands drift, slipping under his linen shirt, the skin beneath toasted and rippled with soft hair. She had to focus acutely to prevent a flicker of light from breaking through her hands. Everything in her was on fire in a new, thrilling way, equally uncontrollable. Lux broke from their kiss, hissing in pleasure as her fingers crawled further over his hips.
“Astra,” he groaned. She wasn’t sure if it was a plea to stop or a desperate cry for more.
“Don’t stop me,” she begged, dragging her fingers down again and hooking them along the top of his pants, the leather smoldering to the touch. She moved her lips to his neck, his arms squeezing tighter around her as she tasted every available expanse of him.
“I’ve never once been successful at stopping you, Sol’ah. Why start now?” He pulled at her skirts, his fingers clawing at the soft fabric as he backed her onto the desk. He settled between her legs, her soft skin bare as he shoved her skirts toward her waist, and she felt just how much he wouldn’t stop her straining against his pants, the rush of riling the commander beyond anything she’d ever experienced.
