Page 136 of Wolf Caged
It wasn’t a king standing before me. It was just a male. There were no adornments on his ears, no fine clothing or a crown to denote his rank. It was as if he had been stripped of those things to reveal the man beneath the kingly veneer—a man with the flame of joy born of passion in his eyes—a flicker of the boy in the painting.
He said something to the other male as he handed the worked strip of metal to him, barely paying him any attention, his striking silver eyes remaining fixed on me. He tugged the leather gauntlets he wore off and set them down on the anvil.
And then he was striding towards me.
My pulse picked up and I swallowed to wet my suddenly dry throat as Kaeleron prowled towards me, honed body streaked with soot and sweat, flooding my imagination with visions of him labouring over the fire, working up that sweat as he skilfully crafted weapons.
Damn.
If he had been born a blacksmith, I still would have found him irresistible. A crown hadn’t given him power. He had been born with it, with an allure that snared me and had me aching for him to come to me.
“I’m surprised to see you like getting your hands dirty with such manual labour.” My words wobbled, betraying my nerves, or perhaps that fluttering of desire that made me tremble as he continued to hold me immobile with nothing more than a look so intense it did indeed steal my breath.
He chuckled, the warmth of that sound heating my bones, my heart.
Another glimmer of the boy in that painting, one who had known how to smile, how to laugh.
Kaeleron didn’t help the flush of desire turning my blood to fire. Instead of giving me a moment to quell it, he stoked the flames by bending over one of the large wooden barrels outside the blacksmiths and splashing water over his face to wipe the soot and sweat away.
Water that dripped and rolled down his chest, cutting through the dirt as he straightened again and turned towards me.
My gaze tracked one of the droplets, mouth going drier as it rolled over the square slabs of his pecs, snaked towards his impressive abs and cascaded down the valley between them, heading for his navel.
And lower.
To that trail of dark hair that led my gaze to the low waist of his leathers.
That fire in my blood became an inferno.
His husky chuckle had my eyes leaping up to his face, my cheeks scalding as his lips curled into a wicked, knowing smile.
“Some manual labour is more than enjoyable. It is a pleasure, Saphira,” he purred, the way my name rolled off his tongue sending a shiver down my spine and making my eyes drift closed.
I snapped them open before they could shut fully, but the damage was done. His smile widened. He knew the power hehad over me, how close I was to tackling him right here in this courtyard, where anyone could see, because I hungered.
And I couldn’t blame my mating heat this time.
This need growing inside me, it was all because of him. He stoked the flames of my passion as expertly as he had stoked the flames of the forge, making me burn hot enough that I was in danger of melting, of begging him to mould me into that wild, wanton beast he had turned me into that night of Beltane—a woman who knew what she wanted and pursued it without reserve, without shame, taking the pleasure she needed and demanding more.
Uncaring of the consequences.
“Dinner was lovely, by the way,” I said, trying to cool my desire by driving a wedge between us.
Kaeleron’s dark eyebrows pitched low and he sighed, the hunger in his eyes replaced by what looked a lot like guilt. “I apologise for that. I was called away and barely had time to inform my sister. I asked her to explain my absence to you.”
“She did. This morning.” The bite to my words surprised me, and I fell silent as I contemplated the burning within me, the anger he had sparked by not telling me he had to leave, by letting me sit there like a fool at dinner, alone and forgotten.
Unimportant.
Because in the grand scheme of things, that’s what I was. Unimportant. A diversion. Entertainment.
And gods, I was a fool, but it hurt.
“You know what. It’s fine. I don’t care. I live to serve, like others in your castle. I’m sure the cooks and the servants who brought dinner to the table aren’t complaining, so I have no reason to either. I’m just like them. A servant. And you’re a king. You get to do what you want. I’m just the entertainment.” I turned to leave, my throat closing and chest tightening, andI hated myself for saying all that, for putting it all out there, because now I felt cold and vulnerable, open to attack.
And desperate to hear him correct me—to tell me I was something more than that to him.
Kaeleron captured my wrist, holding me in place, but I kept my face turned away from him, not wanting him to see the turmoil in my eyes, the tumultuous emotions that I couldn’t tame, that were too powerful to be crushed and cast aside. I hadn’t realised how much his absence had hurt me, or how much the fact he hadn’t taken a second to inform me had wounded me.
