Page 97 of The Cost of Blood and Bonds

He groans, low and deep, like I’m the best thing he’s ever tasted. His tongue drags across each finger, savoring every trace of me, and I can’t look away. I can’t breathe, can’t do anything except watch him consume me.

“Fuck, Gemma.” His voice is wrecked and reverent. “The way you felt around my fingers. The way you clenched when you came.” His voice drops lower. “The way you taste.”

His forehead drops to mine. Every word lands like a kiss, like a brand, like a promise. I’m still shaking. Still trying to remember how to form words. And somehow, impossibly, I’m turned on again.

“I’m yours,” he says it simply, like it’s a fact, like it’s always been true.

The words wrap around my heart and squeeze. I open my mouth to respond, to say what, I don’t know, when his gaze shifts. Locks onto something over my shoulder.

His expression changes, just slightly, the heat banking into something more controlled.

“We have company.”

My stomach drops, and I don’t have to turn around to know who it is. I hear Finn’s laugh, Rosie’s giggle, and the low rumble of Grier’s voice.

Fuck. Fuck. Fuck.

“I look like you just⁠—”

“You look perfect,” he says, tucking a loose strand of hair behind my ear, his eyes soft and tender. “A little flushed. But that could be the whiskey.” The tenderness gives way to that infuriating smirk. “But we both know it was my fingers.”

I smack his chest. He catches my hand and presses a kiss to my knuckles, with his eyes dancing.

“There you are!”

Finn’s voice cuts through the moment. I yank my hand back and force my expression into something innocent. Ryewood steps back, not far, but far enough to look casual.

I paste on a smile and try to act like nothing happened. Like my legs aren’t still trembling. Like I can’t still feel his fingers inside me. Like his words didn’t just set me on fire all over again.

“How was the meeting?” Ryewood asks, smooth as ever.

“Productive,” Grier says.

Finn’s eyes narrow, sliding between us. “What have you two been up to?”

“Darts.” I gesture vaguely toward the board in the shadows.

“Who won?” Finn asks.

Ryewood’s eyes find mine, dark and glittering. His mouth curves like we’re sharing a secret no one else will ever know.

“She did. But she cheated.”

This man. This infuriating, devastating man who just wrecked me and is now standing there looking smug about it. I want revenge. Sweet, devastating revenge that brings this man to ruin.

“I did not.”

“You absolutely did,” Ryewood adds, and I have to dig my nails into my palm to keep from reacting.

Finn snorts. “Sounds about right.” He waves down the bartender who’s returning with our whiskeys. “Another round for the table. And stews—I’m starving,” Finn tells him.

We migrate to the corner booth. Ryewood’s hand brushes the small of my back as we walk, innocent to anyone watching, but I feel it everywhere.

We settle in. Finn and Rosie on one side, Grier pulling up a chair at the end, and Ryewood next to me. His thigh presses against mine under the table.

The conversation flows easily, Rosie talking about the cold, Finn cracking jokes, Grier offering dry comments. Except Ryewood’s hand finds my thigh under the table. And every time he laughs, I feel it vibrate through me. And I keep catching him looking at me with that dark, knowing look.

This is far from over, and we both know it.