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Assassin's Kiss - Excerpt

The glittering wonder in her gaze stopped him and sanity returned like a blast of cold water from the Jaguar spout. He should never have touched her. He’d told himself that this was for her. He’d never lied to himself before and it pissed him off that he’d done it now.

He wanted to push her away. He never wanted to let her go. It made him angry and she could see it all—the instant of self-loathing and the regret. She unlocked her legs from around his hips. Sliding away from him, she stumbled to the stream of cold water and ducked under it.

“I don’t want to want you either,” she rasped, shivering and closing her eyes before turning away. She scrubbed her skin as if she could wash away what had just happened.

He stepped behind her and the curved, puckered scar beneath her shoulder blade drew him like a beacon. He traced it with one calloused fingertip and she shivered beneath his touch. He cursed the Brotherhood for marking her, the Council for viewing halflings as a threat to be disposed of and himself for being too weak not to inevitably add to her pain.

But he couldn’t make himself stop touching her. He placed his hands over hers as she scrubbed, memorizing her slim arms and small, rounded breasts with their tight dark nipples, the curve of her belly, her hips. She sighed and leaned back while he traced the inside of her leg where his essence mingled with cold water.

She stiffened. “I didn’t think about using protection. You strike me as the careful type.” Her harsh remark turned into a sad sigh and he bit off a curse.

He slid his hand up over her ribs and cupped one soft, plump breast. “There was no need. Halflings don’t—can’t—not with humans or us.” Too late, he remembered the small straw doll tucked away in her belongings. “There was probably a better way to start Jaguar 101.”

She turned slowly, her gaze deliberate and hard. “I’m the one who came looking for the truth. There’s nothing to be gained by blaming the messenger because I don’t like it.”

The defiant tilt of her chin and the shuttering of her water-spiked lashes told him otherwise. He picked up the lantern, bent and swept an arm under her knees, holding her tight against his chest. When she made a feeble attempt to free herself, he gripped her tighter and snugged her head under his chin.

She kept it there while he carried her back to the sleeping chamber, until he opened his sleeping bag and tucked her inside. He turned down the lamp, slid in behind her and zipped them in, spooning around her, cradling her head in the crook of his arm.

“Are you afraid I’m going to escape?” she mumbled, squirming against him.

“There is no escape.”