But I can't help it.
Because she's standing there—small and fierce and wearing another man's shirt while offering herself to me—and my brain is short-circuiting on the input.
The shirt hangs off one shoulder, exposing the curve of her collarbone and the beginning swell of her breast. Her pink hair is messy, clearly sex-tousled, falling around her face in disheveled waves. Her mismatched eyes are bright in the moonlight, watching me with an intensity that feels like being pinned to a specimen board.
Beautiful.
Deadly.
Mine.
"I'd rather you be out of that shirt."
The words escape before I can filter them.
Stupid.
Impulsive.
Completely unlike me.
Her smirk transforms into something else.
Delight.
Surprise.
The particular kind of satisfaction that comes from getting exactly what you wanted.
"Okay."
She says it simply.
Casually.
Like I've just asked her to pass the salt instead of strip naked in a garden full of dead bodies.
Then she sets her blades down on the grass—careful, deliberate, treating them with the reverence they deserve—and reaches for the hem of Sage's shirt.
"Wait—"
Too late.
The shirt comes off in one fluid motion, up and over her head, fabric pooling on the ground at her feet.
And she's naked.
Completely naked.
Standing in the moonlight surrounded by corpses, blood drying on her skin, absolutelybareexcept for the pendant at her throat and the confidence she wears like armor.
I stop breathing.
Literallystop breathing.
Because—
Fuck.
