Page 99 of A Reign of Roses
I crawled into the tufted green bed and it sighed under my weight. Fluffy soft sheets enveloped me like the petals of a rose. Griffin pulled his shirt overhead, revealing a broad swath of hefty, chiseled muscle. Swiping a pillow from the bed across from us, he lay down on the floor.
Kane pulled his shirt off, too, and I watched through red-hued lamplight as he traded his dark trousers for thin cotton pants that hung low on his hips. The significant V where his waist cut down to his groin was highlighted by sharp shadows.
My toes curled under the sheets.
That body…That beautiful face…That even more beautiful soul—
Mari’s intrusion was for the best. Letting things go further with Kane, while they had been right above us…completely inappropriate. I had no idea when I’d become so lust-addled—I’d been driven half-insane.
Kane’s body compressed the bed beside me, shifting the sheets and sending a woodsy warmth across my skin. I tried not to hum when his large hands slid over to me and pulled me into his chest, one flattening down my back and drawing easy, slow circles there. My stomach pressed against the hard planes of his side, his neck onlyinches from my lips. He looped one leg across both of mine, the pressure soothing aches in my calves I didn’t even know I had, and I inhaled masculine mint and cedar.
The washroom door opened with a noise that told me its hinges were in desperate need of oil, and Mari slipped out in her own dark cotton nightgown and matching robe.
She had to step over Griffin to crawl into her bed.
“Where is your shirt?” she whispered at him loudly, defeating the purpose of the whisper.
Kane, who had been stroking my back as we snuggled, snickered into my hair.
“I’m sleeping,” Griffin said calmly.
“Without a shirt?”
“Yes.”
Mari huffed, her body’s plunge into the bed sending the sound of creaking coils and rustling linens through the room. She leaned over to extinguish the oil lamp and drowned all four of us in darkness.
I turned over, pressing my bottom into Kane and wrapping his broad hand tightly around my middle. Sleep was what I needed. Sleep to quell the frenzied way Kane was making me feel. He slid his other hand under my neck, tugged me closer to his chest, and nuzzled me from behind with his nose.
Arching into him a bit, my legs tangled with his. Our bodies, separated only by silk—
“You don’t have to sleep on the floor,” Mari muttered quietly.
Kane exhaled into my shoulder, the noise edged with frustration.
Across the room, Griffin sighed, too. “It’s fine.”
“I’m serious,” Mari continued. “This is silly. What if I have to use the washroom in the middle of the night?”
“Then you’ll get up and do so.”
“It’s too dark. What if I step on your face?”
“I’ll live.”
“Well, it can’t be comfortable down there. And to be honest, I know this is selfish, but I feel a lot of pressure to offer you this blanket, because I know you’re going to be cold.”
“Keep it. I don’t—”
“No, I knew you were going to say that, but now I’m supposed to say,No, you have it, Commander, I insist.But the thing is, there’s only the one. And without it I willfreeze.I’m not Fae like you three, so I really don’t want to give it up, but I also don’t want to be—”
“Go to sleep, witch. Please.”
The silence that followed was a mercy.
For Griffin. For Kane and me. For Mari, who I feared would wring herself out completely if she spoke anymore.
Kane squeezed my thigh once. Just high enough that what was meant to be a playful gesture, poking fun at our friends, sent a shiver across my skin.
