“Funny,” I retorted dryly, then looked up to find his expression held not a trace of humor. He’d meant it. I rolled my lips between my teeth and refrained from moving over the twitching hardness snug against my core. “What gave me away?”

He blinked. “The easing of your features.” He didn’t stop there. Water splashed when he reached for my hand, his large one swallowing it as he brought my fingers to his lips. Gently, I traced their softness while he murmured, “The way your fingers and wrist move. The way the tempo of your heart slows.”

Said fingers and heart paused. “And how would you know of such subtle tells?”

“Mariana,” he said, the name jarring me. “She likes to draw and paint.”

I raised a brow, jealousy blooming like an unwanted visitor within my chest.

Before it could spread throughout my veins to stiffen my limbs, he smirked. “She’s somewhat of a mother to me, wildflower.”

Delighted by this information, I smiled. “More,” I whispered, afraid and desperate.

As though sensing that, he kissed each fingertip, then returned them to the glass of wine. He spoke while I continued to decorate his skin. “Mariana is Fang’s mother.”

“The wolf who came knocking the other morning?”

He hummed in confirmation. “The pest is like a brother in every sense of the word. Mariana and her husband, Berk, raised me.” He paused. I wondered if he was considering if he should say more, and then I pondered his hesitation. “They took me in when I was quite young.”

Looking at his missing eye, I tilted my head and watched his jaw firm. So this wasn’t something he shared with most, I surmised, not if his scars had anything to do with it.

And his silence made it clear that they certainly did.

Snatching my fingers, he brought them to his mouth again and rubbed. “Let me take you to bed and read to you.”

I smiled once more, even as something sorrowful still lingered from his words, and set the wine outside of the tub on the tiles. “Not yet. First”—I pulled my fingers free and shivered when his teeth gently nipped them—“I must clean you up.”

He cursed when I lowered my head to his torso and began to lick away every drop of wine.

My tongue roamed the delicious dips and deep crevices of his chest. His breath became a rumble that I felt in my core when I reached his abdominals. Before I could wrap my hand around his cock, Scythe cursed and ordered, “Lift your arms.”

Reluctantly, I straightened and did as I was told.

The wet tunic was pulled from my body. With a slap, it hit the floor beside the tub. For seconds that split each burning exhale, the wolf’s lone eye crawled over my breasts, his lip caught between his teeth.