Page 20 of The Queen's Line

If Owen hadn't been blushing before, he certainly was now, cheeks rosy and hair rumpled, his shirt half undone to reveal those appealing dark curls on his chest. "I'm not a very good reader."

"You have a nice voice. And I'm so tired, I think my eyes would cross if I tried to read so much as a sentence. Just until I fall asleep? It won't take long, I promise," I said, and I leaned into Owen's side, cuddling to his shoulder and resting my chin there to gaze up at him with a coaxing smile.

His throat cleared as his eyes scanned my face, that lovely color growing even deeper by the candlelight. "All right, Your Highness."

I pinched his side and caught his eye before it turned to the page. "Bryony. Please."

"Bryony," he said with a nod, and I almost shivered with the sound of my name on his tongue.

Very few people had the right to call me by my name, and mostly I'd heard it from my Grandmother. It sounded much sweeter on Owen's tongue, all low and a little gravelly and clumsy with his shyness.

"His hand on her waist was feather light, no more than a graze. But Amelia felt the touch as if it were a brand against her skin," Owen read, his words slow but very careful. He didn't read with a great deal offeeling, but he took care with the words and there was a kind of melody to his rhythm that was soothing as he continued.

It was one of my favorite scenes in the book, full of the kind of romantic tension that made my chest ache and my sex throb. Even with Owen's almost clumsy delivery, the words raised heat under my skin. I untied my robe, distracting Owen from the page momentarily as I slid out of the silk and then under the sheets on the bed, nestling into the pillows at my back and smiling at him. He wasverypretty, coarse stubble on his jaw and full lips, a brow that furrowed as he troubled over a word. His Adam's apple bobbed in his throat, and my hand raised of its own accord as if I'd been about to reach out and touch the spot. I curled onto my side and rested my hand on his chest, closing my eyes to enjoy the vibration of his voice in his chest, pretending I didn't feel the echo of it between my thighs.

This was just…this wasnormaldesire, wasn't it? A young woman's crush, and not the Hunger? I wished briefly that it'd made itself known the night of my choosing, instead of waiting until I was hundreds of miles away from home.

"Her lips tingled with the imagined kiss, and the back of her hand burned where his lips had rested."

My own lips were tingling, and I tried to imagine kissing Owen. It came easily. I knew how he kissed, except instead of the anxiety I'd felt at that moment, I now had an aching throb in my core. If I'd been alone, I would've reached down between my legs to dull the ache. But I'd brought these men with me under the assumption that theywouldn'tbe playing a real role as my Chosen. And anyway, I wasn't even sure things had changed so much. Maybe this was only a reaction to Owen reading to me, some mix of my feelings for the hero in the book and the availability of the man at my side.

The pulsing heat grew steady and lulling, my hands fisting in the fabric of Owen's shirt and breaths puffing a little more intensely than normal, as his sweet and droning voice coaxed me into a hazy kind of drowse. At some point, when I was too deep at the edge of sleep, Cosmo returned and the men traded places, Owen untangling my fingers from his shirt and passing the book to Cosmo.

The artist was a better reader, and after his bath he smelled salty and clean. I blinked once, my eyelids as heavy and dry as bricks, but it was enough to see his bare chest in the bed next to me. I rolled in his direction, and he tucked me against his side, continuing to read until I was fast asleep.

* * *

I wokeup on rougher sheets than home, feeling hotter and more stifled than usual. But it only took a moment. One soft puff of breath against the back of my neck and a nudge of a stiff length against the bottom of my ass, and I remembered where I was and who I was with.

Cosmo was absent from the bed, and it was undeniably Owen's massive arm that was wrapped around my waist, holding me against his chest as he ground himself against my bottom. He groaned into my hair and began to work himself a little faster, breaths panting on the back of my neck. All at once, his arm tightened, his pants halted with a gasp, and his grinding froze.

"Fuck," he muttered, hips slowly pulling away from mine.

I tried to contain the giggle building in my chest as Owen wiggled away from me, carefully loosening his arm from around my waist, but with a ticklish brush of his fingers against my side, the sound broke free and I rolled to face him.

"I'm sorry," we both said in a rush.

"I don't mean to laugh at you," I said quickly.

Owen was rumpled and his face was flushed, throat bobbing and chest still heaving. I tried very very hard not to look down—or at least I told myself I tried—and then bit my lip at the bulge of his arousal tenting the sheet.

"I didn't mean to…" He cleared his throat and leaned toward the bed, trying to hide the outline of his cock. "I'm sorry. I—"

"You were asleep, Owen. It's all right," I said.

He was shirtless now too, like Cosmo had been when he'd come to bed. For never sharing my bed with anyone before, I'd found it no trouble at all to sleep through the night. The curtains to the room were still pulled shut, but I could see bright sunlight trying to make its way through little tears in the old velvet. Owen was rumpled and warm, and he was studying me with the same interest I had while gazing back at him.

"I should—" He made to move out of the bed, and an impulse struck me.

My hand reached his chest before he could escape, his heartbeat just barely detectable against my palm through the thick planes of muscle. I stretched up from the pillows, Owen held in place by just the pressure of my palm pausing him. I craned my neck, watching his eyes as my mouth lifted to brush against his. Owen had nibbled at my lips when he'd kissed me on my orders, and I did the same to him now, sucking softly on his bottom lip.

There was a taste to him, not sweet but not unpleasant either, just the unfamiliar flavor of another person, and I hummed as he pressed back, both our eyes falling shut. My fingers curled into Owen's chest hair as he leaned into me, and then further, pushing me back into the pillows. The kiss was slow and exploratory and cautious, Owen taking frequent pauses to wait and see if I would come back for more. When our tongues flicked together and a lick of heat flashed against my sex, I gasped and he pulled away, waiting and watching me.

I swallowed hard, staring up at the shadow of Owen and wondering what I wanted next. More kisses? Yes. Morethankisses?

Not…not quite yet.

"I was just curious," I said, my cheeks echoing Owen's growing smile.