In response, and defiance, to the thought, her cheeks heated.
Mak paused at the end of the hall, in front of closed double doors. “This is it.”
He didn’t make a move to open the doors, and she wondered why. Not because she needed him to open the doors, just because he usually displayed impeccable chivalry, deference to her position as a member of the royal family.
Or maybe it was a matter of the power shift that had happened the moment they’d left Kyonosian soil. She’d certainly felt it. There was no way he was oblivious to it.
She reached out and put her hand on the doorknob. It put her very near Mak and her breath caught in her throat. It was hard to breath with him so close, and even when she did manage to take in a short burst of air it flooded her with the scent of him. So familiar. So uniquely Mak.
She pushed the handle down and the door opened. “So I’ll … go. Can you have my bags brought up?”
He nodded once, his eyes intent on hers, his face still inscrutable. She hated that. Hated that he could remain a complete mystery to her while she had the feeling that, to him, she was an open book. She wondered just how much he read with each glance. If he knew why her cheeks got pink when he was so close. Why she struggled to breathe.
“Of course,” he said.
“I’ll …” She fought to finish the thought and failed.
“Go?”
“Yes.” She stepped into the room, expansive and warm, a lit fireplace similar to the one downstairs on the back wall, across from a large four-poster bed with a plush quilt draped over the foot.
“I’m tired. It’s … I’ll probably lie down for a while. But if you want to have my … my bags …”
“You want your bags,” he said, finishing her thought again. Her stupid, repetitious, rambly thought that was betraying just how scrambled her brain was.
“Yes. That would be … great.”
He looked at her for a moment, his expression hardening, a strange glint in his gray eyes. She was tempted to touch his face, then trace the faint scar that ran along his cheek. Tempted to touch the heavy, dark shadow that covered his jaw.
“I’ll have them sent up.” He turned sharply and walked back down the hall, down the stairs.
She stood in the doorway, watching. She still couldn’t breathe.
It was foolishness to bring Eva’s suitcases to her. Foolish to desire temptation as he did. To long for that touch of illicit thrill, that siren’s call to sin. To invite forbidden fruit to come near his lips, to smell it, allow his mouth water with the desire to have it, with no real intention of taking a taste. It was some new form of masochism he’d discovered since meeting Eva.
He found himself continually chasing it. The jolt of desire he felt when he was near her. The electric rush of blood through his veins, south of his belt, that made him feel alive. Made him feel like a man.
He put one of the large cream-colored suitcases down and knocked on the door to Eva’s room.
There was no response, and the silence brought to mind the mental image of Eva rappelling out the second-floor window and dashing through the deep snow in those ridiculous boots of hers.
He pushed the door open and stopped when he saw her, lying flat on her back on the bed, her arm thrown over her face, her dark curls tumbled around her head in a wild, glossy mass. She was still wearing her boots.
There was nothing suggestive about her pose, and yet, she stopped him cold, his heart thundering heavily. The dull throb of arousal working its way through his veins.
Her boots looked like an uncomfortable addition to her nap. Without thinking, he reached out and placed his hand on her leather-covered calf. He swallowed hard, his mouth dry, his body aching instantly at the feel of her warmth beneath his palm. He let his fingertips drift upward, stopping at the edge of the boot.
He pulled his hand back. He had no right to touch her.
Unzipping the boots and pulling them off would be too close to a taste. Much too close.
He curled his hand into a fist and tried to ignore the burning in his chest that was reminding him to breathe. Breathing was a risk. Her scent only pushed the level of temptation up higher, only made it more difficult to stop himself from getting closer, from touching.