Page 52 of Surfaces
The smirk that erupted on Valdez’s face was worth it, crinkles near the edges of his eyes were playful and another jolt of that floral scent of his swept over me, almost as if he was scent-marking me as his.
“Never enough.” He leaned in again for a kiss but I was ready this time.
If he was going to deprive me then I was very well going to deprive him. I leaned back away from his tempting lips and the amazing sensations I knew lay in that direction. “Well, now, that’s not very fair to the others though, is it?” I pretended to reprimand him, but Valdez’s fingers just dug into my ass and pulled me tighter against him, so that I could physically feel just how much he liked this little game.
“I’ve already told you pirates cheat.”
“Yes, well I’ve already told you I wanted an answer to my question. How about this? When you’re ready to answer, you can come cut into our dance.” A pout erupted on Valdez’s face and the thrill of victory dipped down into my low belly at the downward curve of those lips which was adorable and made me want to kiss him all the more.
It was difficult to wrest myself away, but I did it anyway.
With great strength of will, I untangled myself from the tempting pink dolphin shifter and used my fins to swim over to Watkins, where I immediately grew more clear-headed, no longer surrounded by Valdez’s seductive presence.
Damned floral pink dolphin magical bullshite,I grumbled internally, wondering if I could ever counteract Valdez’s magic long enough to see if we shared a true connection. But that wasn’t going to happen tonight. I focused instead on my target, another competitor who was twice as confusing as the pirate: the rebel.
“I hope you’re up for the challenge of an eighty-pound dress,” I stated wryly as I wrapped my arms around Watkins’s neck and drifted slowly into his torso, glad not to have to bear the weight of the material alone for more than a minute.
While Gita was a genius, she hadn’t counted on me dancing in this outfit. To be honest, after the last flubbed ball, neither had I—though I did quite enjoy this change in circumstance.
Dancing with my competitors was preferable to jawing endlessly with inventors below, pretending I understood all the nuances of their technical conversations while trying to ensure I didn’t financially commit the crown to anything. What an utter headache.
Julian’s place amongst my husbands was almost assured based on all those conversations.
But what about these two men?I pondered as Watkins wrapped his arms around me in a willing fashion for the first time, his fingers leaving a scalding trail as our kiss blazed through my memory.
The shark shifter held me formally, unlike Valdez, who’d tried to wrap me around himself—pressing us close together.
In contrast, the rebel was respectful, one hand on my waist while the other clasped my fingers delicately while managing to still somehow relieve me of the weight of my dress. Watkins was completely in control of himself, restrained in a way I hadn’t seen—the polar opposite of how he’d been when he’d kissed me.
He was a contradiction and a puzzle all wrapped into one I thought as I studied him a moment, trying to discern his end game as my arm brushed over the jagged scar on his bicep.
“Good evening, Watkins.”
“Majesty,” he replied.
“You don’t have to call me that when we’re alone,” I clarified.
“We aren’t alone. We’re in a room full of people.” He pointedly stared around the ballroom and turned us in a slow circle, my train spiraling beneath us.
I rolled my eyes and pinched his shoulder lightly in warning, admiring the strong curve and the solid mass there. “Don’t be difficult on purpose, otherwise dancing with you is no better than dancing with Valdez.”
He grimaced. “I just…I don’t know how to do this.”
“Not hate me?” I asked, my tone light but my eyes grim. Based on his tone, he was serious about wanting to start over, which made me both relieved and annoyed because it extinguished that fire in him that I’d come to crave.
“Pretty much,” he confessed. “I just…I don’t know.”
“Well, I don’t know either, if it makes you feel any better. And, for all we know, there’s a chance you could be right about me. One day I could turn into that monster that my birth mother was.”
Watkins’s black eyes snapped to mine at that declaration.
“We can’t predict the future, and as much as we think we know how we’ll react when hatred is flung our way…we don’t. I never thought I’d make a snap judgment to invite a rebel to join the tournament and yet here we are.” I trailed off as I considered him.
“Perhaps what we need isn’t to start over,” I said as I leaned closer. “Perhaps we just need to finish what you already started.”
His hands tightened slightly on my fingertips and I watched him battle temptation—it was the closest I’d seen to the Watkins that I’d come to know since we’d started dancing. That burning ember inside of him wasn’t fully extinguished then. Good.
“If you make it to the end of this tournament and I choose to keep you, Watkins, it’s not because I want a nice man,” I whispered, watching the current swirl over his ear and rustle his black locks. “It’s because I want a man who won’t back down just because I’m queen.”
