Page 52 of Mark of Love (Love Mark 3)

“I’m here,” I sighed. “From now on out, no matter what nightmare you go through, I’ll be here with you for all of them.”

“I know that song,” a sleepy voice murmured from across the way.

I jumped, not having realized Melaina was awake. Pulling my hand back to my side and away from her niece, I frowned when I realized what she’d just said.

“Do you?” I asked cryptically, because it didn’t seem possible that she should know it. The song wasn’t of this world. I’d learned it from Grandpa Atchison, whose mother had sung it to him when he was little.

“But where did you learn it?” Melaina asked.

I shrugged off the question. “Just heard it around somewhere, I think.”

“Hmm.” She sounded suspicious, but she didn’t question me further. “If you want to pull her into your arms and grope her in her sleep, I wouldn’t mind, you know. It’d do her good to get a little sexual experience. I keep telling her that if she’d just get laid, it’d remove that stick from her ass. But she never does. So, feel free to get a little physical if you like.”

Which meant that was exactly what I wouldn’t do.

“Thanks for your permission,” I muttered dryly.

“Anytime. You’re really taking it slow and not rushing anything in this wooing-her business, aren’t you?” she added, sounding irritated by that.

“Didn’t realize I was on a deadline.”

“Life is a deadline, boy,” she warned. “From the moment we’re born, everything is already moving toward our death. Tomorrow is guaranteed to no one. So I suggest you nip it in the bud and get your seduction underway already.”

“Yeah, thanks for the advice…” That I wouldn’t be taking.

“You’re most welcome,” she answered sweetly.

I rolled my eyes toward the stars, then returned my attention to Quilla, who was sleeping peacefully. I could probably return to my bedroll now, but I kind of didn’t want to leave her. Besides, there was a good three feet of space between us. Perfectly respectable. And yet close enough to appease the ache inside me that always wanted to be closer to her.

Smiling contentedly, I rolled onto my back, sighed up at the stars above us, then rested my manacled hands behind my head and eventually fell asleep that way.

Only to wake at the crack of dawn to something slamming viciously into my gut.

“Mother of God!” I gasped, curling in around my stomach and clutching it as I tried to breathe through the pain. “What the hell?”

“What the fuck are you doing over here, sleeping beside me?” a voice ordered from above. Rage flared through my mark.

My true love was pissed.

Shit.

Blinking up at Quilla, I offered her an innocent but pain-filled smile. “You had a nightmare.”

“That doesn’t answer my question,” she ground out as she set a booted foot down on my ankle and pressed in until it began to strain uncomfortably. “What the fuck are you doing next to me and not all the way over on your side of the damn camp?”

“I just wanted to soothe you through the nightmare,” I said, gritting my teeth against the pain. Jesus, but the woman had no mercy. She was going to break my ankle if she kept it up. “And I did,” I swore. “I came over and sang to you, and you stopped thrashing. I soothed you.”

The pressure eased from my ankle. “If you ever do that again,” she swore, “I will break something on you that can’t be unbroken. Do I make myself clear? I don’t want you sleeping by me, or touching me, or even breathing—”

“I didn’t touch you,” I promised quickly.

“Liar,” Melaina’s pleasantly vindictive voice called from the other side of the camp. “I saw him, dear heart. He touched your hand and a lock of hair while you slept and couldn’t protest.”

Quilla kicked me in the arm.

“Oww!” I clutched the battered appendage to my side and glowered at Melaina. “Thanks a lot, traitor.”

I wondered what the fiery redhead would’ve told Quilla if I’d taken her permission last night to heart and had fondled her niece in her sleep.

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