Page 22 of A Queen and HER Bad Boy
She shoved at him, surprising them both when her hand met his warm chest. His eyes widened. Instead of diving back to her side of the bed in mortification, Bris tried to play it off. “Sorry, I just can’t resist touching my devilishly handsome husband.”
He reached over and squeezed her knee in response. Immediately, she jerked back. More than anyone, Achilles knew how ticklish she was. She scowled, pushing up on her elbows. “I’m not ticklish anymore,” she said. “I grew out of that!”
“Yeah?” He danced his fingers to her other knee to prove her wrong and seized it. She collapsed backwards, kicking this time. He let out a grunt, which meant she must’ve got him with her foot. Good! But she could do better. She snaked out her handand found his exposed armpit. His head slammed against the soft headboard when her fingers found his skin.
Ha! She wasn’t the only ticklish one here. She jumped over him, determined to win this fight. “Surrender!” She attacked both his armpits now—someone should’ve worn a shirt to bed!
He grabbed at her again but stiffened helplessly when she refused to release his arm’s most ticklish spot. Bris couldn’t remember how they’d discovered that in their tickle fights, but it was definitely when they were much younger.
She laughed “I’m your queen! Now… you have to do what I say.”
His lips tightened, and too late, she realized he already had a grip on her knee. He squeezed and sent her backwards with a shriek. He climbed over her, grabbing her arms before she could try to get to his armpits again, and then easily transferred both her wrists to one hand, making her shout in annoyance.
“Oh, not so full of yourself now,” he said, laughing down at her. His breath ran over hers—it was ragged while the velvety look in his eyes completely stole her breath away. He had one hand free, ready to play havoc on her knees again. “How the tables have turned,” he said. His expressive lips nearly touched hers. “Let’s see, what demands should I make of my Prissy?”
His Prissy? Well… that’s ridiculously adorable!
She laughed up at him, already planning her next move when she noticed how he studied her lips. Her heart knew what was happening before she did, the moment stretching between them like spun silk, tender and fragile. There was something achingly sweet in his expression, as if her soul was connecting with his across some invisible bridge.
Was he going to kiss her? Was she going to kiss him?
Her breath hitched, her lips parting of their own accord as she waited for the impossible to happen.
Achilles’s hand loosened over her wrists. “Briseis,” he muttered. A shadow passed over his expression like a cloud on a sunny afternoon, and he moved back. He let out a shaky breath and an even shakier laugh, pounding on his pillows as he inched even farther away. “I guess that means I won,” he said.
She shot up in bed, no longer caring that he’d messed up her hair. “No way! That’s a surrender if I ever saw one.”
“Okay, you’re right… I give! You’re tougher and bigger and stronger and I’m tuckered out. Goodnight!”
Lame! What happened to all that food he’d ordered? And she gave herself a mental shake. They weren’t arguing about bedtime here. He turned to face the wall, and she noticed the ant tattoos on his heel that showed he was a Myrdon rebel through and through. That was the true division between them—their loyalties.
Put him under your thumb.
Did Achilles suspect that was what she was doing? Maybe, but that couldn’t be further from the truth; even if she knew how, she’d never do that to him.
Bris leaned back against the headboard, looking down at her reddened knee. She could still feel everywhere he’d put his hands on her. Clutching at her pillow, she resisted smashing him with it and instead, shoved it under her head. What was wrong with her? Why did she care so much that Achilles would never be able to see her as a—a wife? She was supposed to be strong, cold, emotionless, the spoiled princess… no, the queen.
Achilles still wants to be friends, right?
No, no, no! Now she was hiding her reddened face in that pillow. She was hopelessly in love with her husband, wasn’t she?
Chapter Six
“AllIaskisyou protect my baby sister. Do you hear me, Achilles?”Venice’s condemning words burned through him:
He couldn’t even keep his hands off her for one night.
Achilles threw his pillow over his head, trying to forget the existence of his beautiful wife across from him or the way she’d looked over at him with those stunning eyes of hers; they’dalmost made him lose his resolve to cut short that dangerously intimate tickle fight.
Stop touching her.
Got it! That would be his number one rule. He listened to the soft rustle of sheets as she shifted restlessly, then made the mistake of glancing over at her bathed in the warm glow of the bedside lamp. His old Cambridge rugby shirt—navy blue with bold gold stripes—looked impossibly good against her olive skin. He had no idea that old t-shirt could do that. Was she really that much smaller than him? It was like a dress on her, the hem skimming those cute little knees.
Her manicured nails squeezed the pillow as she lay on her side, the shirt riding up slightly. She tossed the pillow from her head. For one horrible, treacherously pleasurable moment of weakness, he thought she’d start a pillow fight.
Instead, she threw an annoyed look at him, her hair a wild tangle of black silk around her face. “I’m hungry.”
He hid a smile… and certainly not well enough because she caught him and rolled her eyes. He shrugged. “What a surprise,” he murmured.
