Page 118 of Of Blood and Banes
“Per our agreement, tell me about the King. Why does he want both rings?”
His eyebrow raises. “Per our agreement, you were to owe me whiskey before our little scuffles.”
I lean forward, inches from his face as I grit out, “What does the King want?”
“The same thing I do.”
“And what’s that?” I hiss.
“You,” he breathes, then leans forward despite the blade slicing into his skin and kisses me.
Gasping, I shove his chest back so it breaks our kiss. He leans his head back against the wall, a stupid, lazy smile on his face. A small trickle of blood races down the column of his throat to the top of his shirt. He’s fucking toying with me, and I’m not in the godsdamned mood.
“Here’s the thing…” he whispers, then wraps his hand around my right wrist, the hand holding the sword to his throat. “You’ve been wrong all along. This?”
He peels my fingers off one at a time from the hilt, never breaking eye contact. And for some fucking reason, I don’t fight him—I’m just stuck in his sea of green.
He takes my left hand off his chest, then places the sword in it. “Is the reason you’re so shitty at weapons. Because you’re actually not right-handed…”
I tear my gaze away and look down at my left hand as he squeezes and lets go, the weight of the sword heavy and oddly comforting. I’ve never been the most impressive with weaponry, and my experience has been less than stellar. But the longer I sit with the familiarity of the sword in my left hand, the more I believe his theory. How easy it is to balance the weight in my palm.
“I should have noticed it sooner,” he mutters.
I look up at him, flexing my hand around the sword’s hilt. “How? What makes you think I’m left-handed?”
He taps the blade low, down and away from his direction. “You grab door handles with your left hand.”
“So?”
“So, you grab with your left hand. You always put your right foot first when you start to walk. When you get heated in conversations, you use your left hand to gesture. And whenever you pet your oversized flying lizard?—”
I narrow my eyes.
“—you always touch her with your left.”
He’s been watching me. Even in all the times I didn’t even realize he was around. A small warmth creeps to my cheeks, spreading across my face and down to my chest.
“Wipe that smile off your face,” he growls. “The only reason I’ve noticed it is because if you die, the King dies. And then I have no chance at saving my sister.”
“I’m not sure if I believe you,” I murmur, a swell of hope rising within me.
“Then trust me.”
I snort. “I don’t trust you, either.”
He sighs, then slides with his back down the wall to sit and look up at me. “You’re impossibly difficult. Especially so when you’re pissed off.”
“Sounds like your problem, not mine.”
He smirks. “Funny, I tend to fuck my problems. Or, I guess, they fuck me.”
Crouching down to his level, I place the sword behind me out of reach and snatch the front of his shirt in my fist. “Listen. If you so much as hint about our little mishap outside of these four walls one more time?—”
“Mishap?” His eyebrows shoot up his forehead before he shakes his head with that agitating bravado. “I’d prefer the term‘stroke of luck.’Or I suppose if we’re getting technical, many,manystrokes of luck. And I wouldn’t call my study of your pleasure luck. I work damn hard to figure out what makes you quiver and come?—”
“Stop talking before I fucking kill you,” I growl.
“Then I suppose you won’t get those answers you need, will you?”
