Page 9 of A Clash of Embers

His hands grazed my skin to grab the ends of the string. “I’m sorry, I just... was curious,” I said.

He aggressively tightened the dress, causing me to gasp a little. “I thought I’d like to see you without this dress on again.”

My eyes widened, and I felt the blush spread across my cheeks at his candor, but he continued. “Then I thought how much of an asshole I am for thinking of you in that way when you are obviously still in love with your mate.”

He tapped my shoulders to signal that he had finished tying my dress, and I turned to face him. He towered over me in height, standing at least six and a half feet tall. In his presence I felt puny.

“We need to head to the dining room. They will be serving dinner shortly,” he said softly, and I nodded in agreement, reaching to grab my hair, which was still wet.

“Will you need a brush for your hair? I can find you one,” he asked me.

I nodded, unmoving.

I watched as he walked to the bathroom, opening and closing the drawers before he sauntered back into the room. He’d found one, handing it to me as I used the towel to dry off my wild hair the best I could before brushing it. I slipped on some shoes the innkeeper gave me and turned to face Leo.

“You look great. Comfortable?”

I nodded and followed him to the door. This man hadsilencedme. I realized I had spoken hardly any words since he walked in on me. I couldn’t process things fast enough to establish words. Similar to how I felt when I was younger in the woods with Madok. Words fled my brain the moment I locked in on him.

As we entered the dining room, our entire group sat at the long wooden table with a few vases of baby’s breath. As I approached a vacant seat, Fae eyes turned to look at me. I sat near Callan because part of me felt relaxed with him, at ease.

“Clara, you look well. What did you do to Leo? It looks like he is in so much pain,” Callan said with a satisfactory smile.

I laughed and looked around at all the men had returned to deep conversation, Leo included. So, I turned and whispered to Callan the truth. “Well, he might have seen me naked— by accident.”

His hazel eyes went wild, and a smirk crept up on his face.

“Well, that’s one way to cause a man pain.” Then, he bit into a dinner roll. We ate and drank wine together as if we were all old friends. When the innkeeper came by to pick up our plates, she smiled at me and nodded her head in approval at the dress I was wearing.

I felt the eyes on me before I turned to meet Leo’s gaze. He no longer looked in pain. No, it was something else entirely. I could sense it. An overwhelming desire that I knew all too well. With my powers flourishing, I could pick up on emotions much quicker than before.

His glass of wine was nearly empty, and I watched him press the edge of the glass to his wine-stained plush lips and swallow the remaining drops. I watched his throat bob up and down with the last sip and instantly saw his shoulders relax as he placed the glass on the table.

Chills spread over my body when I realized he had locked his eyes on me the entire time he sipped the wine. I heard a chucklefrom my right as I turned to see Callan smiling savagely and glancing between Leo and me.

He leaned into me and whispered, “Well. It’s a shame you have to share a room, isn’t it?”

I turned, narrowing my eyes at Callan. “Why is it ashame?”

He leaned back in his chair and placed his hands on his stomach, patting it before sitting up like before. He leaned in close to my face, and I met him halfway, anticipating what he would say and raising my brows in expectation with a smile on my face.

“Leo knows you have a mate and he also knows you still love that mate. So, there’s no way he will do anything to jeopardize that, but I sense his attraction to you. It’sintense. Makes me sick at how attracted he is to you because I only sense his arousal when you are around. Because of you, I forget what his normal, revolting self-smells like.” He paused and turned his head back to Leo, and my eyes followed. I saw Leo fix his eyes on Callan with anger.

“This is gonna be fun.” He leaned over and kissed my cheek, smirking as he stood to leave the table. When I looked around the room, only Leo and I were left.

Leo stood, his chair causing a loud scraping sound as the wood dragged the concrete floor. He straightened and walked toward me, stopping directly behind me. He extended his hand for me to grab it and I did. His hand enclosed my own, resting his thumb on the back of mine.

When I stood, he gently tugged me towards him. We were so close that I could smell the wine on his breath.

“We need to get some sleep. We have to be up early for our departure.”

Instead of dropping my hand, he held it tightly as we walked up the stairs to our room. He only dropped it once we got to the door.

The air inside the room thickened when the door closed behind us. It wasn’t because of air circulation—no, this was completelyphysical. I knew I was attracted to Leo, but there was no way that I would do anything. He was handsome, but he wasn’t Evander.

I walked towards the bed I had claimed as mine and saw soft, white, silk pajamas folded neatly on the pillow with a note.

Clara, please take these pajamas as a gift from me. It isn’t every day that a goddess graces us with her presence. —Susan Ann Lockley

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