“I am useless like this,” I protested.
She slipped a hand beneath my cloak. “Useless is not the right word.” I sucked in my breath as her fingertips made contact. “Irresistible. Delicious. Impressive.” The tip of her tongue extended to lick her lower lip, and a surge of pure lust swept through me. Then she tilted her head to regard me through lowered lids. “I cannot find the right word?—”
I silenced her with a kiss, which I managed to not screw up. Our tongues tangled deliciously just as Xandros and Rhodes returned with crates.
“Xandros convinced me we needed them,” Rhodes said.
“Elevation is always good,” Xandros added, setting his container down and arranging the second one beside it. As I set out to prove my tongue was a fast learner, I noticed they were two different levels.
“Not as important, though, as lighting.” Rhodes moved a couple of the lanterns.
My imagination tried to come up with possibilities for either—but I could not do anything more than stare into Jaz’s beautiful eyes.
Her fingers stroked something that wished, very badly, to be more than just stroked. I broke off the kiss and pushed my nose into where her neck joined her shoulder. I breathed her in.Ours. She was ours.
She must have caught my surge of possessiveness. Because she smiled, and ran fingers along my jaw, before theyclosed on it, ever so slightly.
“You. Are.Mine,” she stated.
I swallowed, and gave her the only answer I could.
“We are yours,” I whispered. And Xandros rumbled his agreement.
Jaz turned her head to capture Rhode’s gaze. “Repeat after me. You are mine.”
He snorted a laugh. “We belong to each other.”
“Say it,” she insisted.
I caught his eye, and lifted my chin. He pulled a lip back from a canine, and his eyes flashed garnet at me.
Then, he said, “We belong to her.”
31
Jaz
The erotic power of inhalation was something lost on me until I’d met these Drakes.
When Zyair pushed his nose into my neck and breathed me in, every inch of my body came to full, electric awareness. His own scent swept over me—it touched something so deep inside that I couldn’t describe it. Like it hooked into my soul. Maybe it was just that it was so amazing, but likely it had more to do with who he was.
Who they were…
Mymates.The power behind the word hit me full force, as the link between us ignited. Through it, I sensed Zyair’s own arousal ratchet up an agonizing notch.
He pulsed with a twisted mess of pain and lust, and Xandros rumbled a growl as it flooded through all four of us. That venom was coursing through him, and it was meant to torment. It brought Brentoq into a place where she most definitely did not belong.
Denying it would solve nothing.
I set out to own it instead.
I was Zyair’s mate. Nothing Brentoq had done to him could compare to the power I possessed. She’d wanted to take him fromme. But he was a part of my soul, and I wouldn’t let what she’d done steal him away.
Zyair pulled back and reached trembling fingers to my face. Hot, his fingertips blazed with heat, and they traced fiery trails down my throat…
Xandros moved up behind me. He lifted my hair and kissed the nape of my neck as he bent to slide the cloak up over my head. As soon as it was free, I did the same for Zyair.
I’d seen Senaik through his eyes, and I held my breath as I did so. But other than a few livid punctures where she’d injected him, and the scars the Taziers had left on him, his skin was unmarred. Unmarred by teeth, and perfect.
