Page 41 of Eternal Devotion

I snorted, unable to contain my laughter. It earned me a look of petulance.

“Oh, stop,” he continued. “It’s me who should be laughing. Seriously. Do you see yourselves? You fight with dice and pencils. Not a single one of you would survive a real battle. If there was a troll under this bridge, you’d wet your pants.”

I laughed harder as he doubled down, crossing his arms and glaring along his nose.

“Are you quite finished?”

“Yes.” I pinched my lips under my teeth and hummed as the urge passed, but it was no use. I howled. “No.”

Mordecai scoffed and turned back to the water. “To think I felt bad for misguiding you.”

“I’m sorry. I’m done.” But it took a second longer to regain my composure. “Oh god. I hate it when my mother’s right. We won’t tell her. That secret goes to the grave. She harasses me enough about my gaming.”

“As she should. What nonsense.”

I snorted and earned another glare, but Mordecai’s lips twitched, and before long he laughed with me.

The rain petered off, but Mordecai’s hair dripped into his face. I wiped at a stray drop as it rolled down his cheek, catching it before it vanished in his trim facial hair. Taking the opportunity, I cradled his cold jaw.

“So you hate my games?”

“I don’t understand their necessity.”

I shrugged. “It’s entertainment. Nothing more. Did you pretend to like them because you thought I wouldn’t notice you otherwise?”

“No.”

“Liar.” I leaned in and stole a kiss. He didn’t resist. Like always, Mordecai’s lips were much colder than mine and addictive in a way I couldn’t describe.

He tasted like fall rain and morning dew. The seductive combination was a heady rush that turned the sidewalk soft beneath my feet. I balanced on a dreamlike cloud. Every time we connected, my world spun in dizzying circles, but instead of nausea, it stirred lust and desire and need.

We came apart, and I leaned heavily against him from the unexpected vertigo. I momentarily forgot what we were talking about and recalled the abrupt end to our night the previous day and my confusion.

“Did I upset you last night?”

Mordecai frowned. “Not at all. Why do you ask?”

The memory was right there. I could almost grasp it. “No reason.”

Mordecai touched my arm, popping the bubble of recall as it was about to surface. “Ensley, I need your help.”

“Okay. Of course. Anything.”

And I meant it. We hadn’t known each other for long, but Mordecai had done something to me. For all my past relationships, this was the first time I felt so utterly incapacitated in the presence of another man. I wanted to be near him all the time, touching him, kissing him, listening to him laugh, and stealing glimpses of his peekaboo eyetooth.

I brushed our mouths together teasingly as a more primal desire surfaced. Mordecai didn’t object, glancing his tongue with mine. A vision of his bare chest appeared inside my mind. Mapping his smooth, pale skin. Kissing his collarbones. Removing my shirt. Laying him out on the settee. Leaning over him.

A horn honked, and the spell broke. The haze that had nearly cleared descended on my memories once again.

I glanced at the passing Ford as the driver yelled out the window, “Get a room.”

A moment later, they were gone. Mordecai and I were alone on the bridge in the rain.

I glanced at the man in question, trying to retrieve those lost moments, but they were gone.

Mordecai studied me with such seriousness and concern that I refocused on what he asked a moment ago. “Help? What kind of help?”

His Bordeaux colored eyes shifted from side to side as he studied my face. He seemed to be seeking the right words or searching for answers. I wasn’t sure which.