Page 237 of Maksym

The comb moved through my hair in long, unhurried strokes. When he reached a knot, he stopped, held the section above it so my scalp would not pull, and worked it loose with almost insulting competence.

“You have done this before,” I said, my voice rough from crying.

His mouth curved faintly. “I have lived a long time.”

“That is not an answer.”

“It is the safest one.”

A small laugh escaped me.

His eyes lifted.

For a moment we simply looked at each other, and the bond warmed between us, pleased by the sound. My laugh had been rare enough lately that perhaps even old magic took notice.

He returned to my hair.

At my temples, his touch gentled further. He combed until my hair lay smooth and dark against my shoulders, until I no longer felt like a woman freshly dragged from grief, but one prepared, attended, seen.

Then he set the comb aside.

The towel loosened under his hands.

I did not clutch it closed.

That, too, was testimony.

Maksym watched my face as he drew it away, not my body first. Only when I held his gaze did his eyes lower. The look that moved over me was so intense my breath caught, but it did not make me feel inspected. It made me feel mourned and desired in the same breath. As if he saw every place I had been diminished and every inch that had returned, and his hunger existed not despite the history but in defiance of it.

He laid me back against the deep charcoal bedding.

The sheets were cool beneath my heated skin. My hair spread over the pillows. The fire painted him in gold as he braced one hand beside my hip and lowered his mouth to my collarbone.

The first kiss was soft. The second was not.

He moved along the delicate ridge of bone with lips, teeth, and tongue. Not biting hard enough to break the skin. Not yet. Just enough pressure to remind me that pleasure had edges, and that edges did not have to be harm. His mouth traveled to the hollow of my throat, then down over the upper curve of my breast.

I stopped breathing out of old habit.

His hand flattened over my ribs.

“Breathe, Grace.”

I did. The air shuddered in.

His mouth closed over my nipple.

Heat shot through me so sharply my fingers tangled in the bedding. He took his time there, laving, sucking, drawing the peak tight, then soothing it with his tongue before moving to the other breast. His hand followed his mouth, cupping the fullness, thumb brushing where his tongue had been. Maksym worshiped every restored curve like the Goddess had carved it for him personally, and he intended to write a prayer with his mouth.

He moved lower. Between my breasts. Over my sternum. Down my stomach.

He paused there.

His hands spread over the softness below my ribs, over the place that had once hollowed so badly I could count myself in bones.

He continued downward, over my hips, his palms shaping them with open appreciation. My body responded with a directness that embarrassed and thrilled me. Between my thighs, I was already wet. Not from shower water now. From him. From the care. From the bond, open and humming. From the devastating knowledge that I could want and be wanted without a bargain hidden inside the room.

Maksym kissed the crease of my hip.