Page 38 of Phoenix Falling
“Being with you. Going slow. I’m nearly 2000 years old, and I can’t figure out what’s okay to say and what’s not. What might scare you off; what might make you happy.”
I swore I saw the spark of tears in her eyes. “Do you want to make me happy?”
“I want it more than I can say.”
“Then stop worrying.” Crossing the room, each step threatening to stop my breath, Imogen approached slowly, then sat on the couch again, her knees touching mine. When her hands came up to cup my face, to hold me still for her stare, I swear I lost my heart all over again. “You make me happy. You have from the moment you first spoke to me, when I thought nothing could make me happy ever again. I don’t want you to walk on tiptoes. Just be you, and I’ll be me.”
She leaned over, and her lips met mine, soft and seeking and so damn wonderful. I couldn’t help but open my mouth, inviting her in, desperate for the intimacy of her kiss. Her tongue slid along my lips and inside, and I thought for a moment I would pass out with the rush of pleasure that hit my body. It was so good, so right. So much so that it made me dizzy. Then my hands were in her hair and I was taking her kiss instead of receiving it, desperate for every last touch and taste I could get. After nearly two thousand years, the dream I hadn’t dared to dream for so long had come true. She was here, in my arms.
And I was never letting her go.
ChapterSixteen
SUN
“Demetri did what?”
My words were more roar than question. Grim sighed where he stood across from my father’s desk. My desk now, but I still hadn’t quite wrapped my head around that yet. “I knew you were going to react like this.”
“Of course I’m going to react like this!” I stood, rounded the desk, and began to pace. “You know how careful we have to be with these women, with the whole situation here. Why is it that when I need things to be quiet and calm, you let them go and blow up in my face?”
“This is not going to blow up in your face.”
I scoffed at the blatant lie. “You know it sure as hell is.”
“Sun—”
“Grim!”
I stopped, forced myself back under control. The pressure cooker I’d been in for the past three days was threatening to explode, and I couldn’t afford that, not as king. Taking a deep breath, I let it out and turned to face my Aomai.
Giving him a steely glance, I waved toward the door. “Just go get James and Nala.”
Grim snarled in my direction, his animal—or whatever it was the male had hidden inside him; none of us knew, not even me—flashing in his eyes. “Are you commanding me?”
Because no one would dare command him, even the king. This time I was the one who snarled. “I am sending you out of my sight before I strangle you.”
Grim considered that for a moment, then seemed to accept it. No commands, but wanting to murder him was fine. Figure the hell out of that one. He turned with a flourish of that damn cape, pulling the hood over his head as he walked through the door.
Jesus. One of my warriors dating a new female. I was never going to hear the end of this shit.
Needing something, anything to calm me, I jerked my phone out of my back pocket and sent a quick text to the only lifeline outside of this total craziness.
Sun: Hey, what’s going on?
Keep it casual. Keep it casual.
Rissa: Nothing much. Hanging out with a friend.
Fuck. My grip tightened on the phone till it creaked.Definitely keep it casual, dickhead. No unleashing your green-eyed phoenix to devour said friend, and no, you can’t ask if the friend is male or female.
Too bad. I really wanted to know, and I was king, after all. I was entitled, even if she didn’t know it.
Sun: Hanging out with who? Doing what?
That didn’t sound like interrogating, did it?
Rissa: Watching a movie with a girlfriend.
