She eyes us warily, but I can see she’s already lost this battle.

“Fine,” she says, holding up a finger. “But don’t cause any trouble.”

“We would never,” he says with a wink that almost elicits a smile. How could anyone resist the Aurora Prince when he turns on the charm?

She hands him a key from behind the bar. “Second floor. Last door on the left.”

“Thank you,” he says, keeping his head high, and like water isn’t literally puddling under his feet.

“Also, could we get some hot food, clean clothes, and about twelve bottles of wine?”

CHAPTER 30

After the innkeeper graces us with another scathing look, she nods a quick, gruff yes, and then we scramble upstairs. A fire is already crackling in the hearth, and I make my way over, holding my freezing hands to the heat, my fingers aching from the thaw. I start to peel apart my clothes, struggling to extricate myself. They’re heavy and crusted with blood and sand and dirt, sticking to every crevice of my body.

The sound of running water comes from the bathroom, and I grab a blanket and wrap it around myself. I enter to find Nadir already stripped down to nothing, facing the tub with his hands on his hips. I lean against the door, taking a moment to admire every inch. The carved ripples in his back and his hair swooping over the curve of his shoulder. Those two divots in his lower back that bracket the entry to the round firmness of his ass. My gaze travels lower, sloping over his thighs, noting the way the candlelight glints off the arch of his calf. Even his ankle bone manages to stun me.

“I feel you ogling me, Lightning Bug,” he says, peering over his shoulder and flashing me a smile that both breaks and stitches up the pieces of my heart.

“Can you blame me?” I ask, moving closer, wrapping an arm around his waist, and pressing myself against his back. My nose buries into his skin, and I inhale deeply, drinking in the scent of cold winter nights and the wind cutting off snowy peaks. The scent that has become my safety and my home. The soothing call in the dark when I’m stumbling blindly through shadows.

My hand spreads over his stomach as my fingers forage along the ridges slicing over his torso. The lines of muscle and the hard angles of bone and sinew. I slide my hand higher, caressing the lines of his sculpted chest, circling a finger over a nipple, making his breath hitch.

I open my mouth and gently sink my teeth into the curve of his shoulder, wishing I could consume him. Keep him. Never let him go.

“You’re killing me,” he says, his voice soft.

“Not this time,” I reply. “This time I’m here to save you.”