Page 76 of Beautiful Prey

“No?” He nods towards the glass. “None of it?”

I don’t answer, glaring at the table until the food comes.

A server sets a covered plate in front of me. “Braised venison, sir. Root vegetables and red-wine reduction.”

He lifts the cover. Steam rises, carrying a smell that makes my mouth flood. I’ve spent my whole life eating to keep working. I’ve never once eaten something built to be tasted, and certainly never somewhere like this.

Asher stretches one arm along the back of his chair, looking smug. “After you.”

Taking a careful bite, I make it halfway through chewing before a hum escapes me.

“Just eat, Jade.” Asher smiles. “Nobody’s counting it against you. There’ll always be more of everything from now on.”

Ignoring him, I take another bite, then another, until my plate is almost empty.

He leans closer and drags his thumb along my bottom lip, catching a crumb. He looks at his thumb, then puts it in his mouth, watching me watch him.

“I didn’t know you were that hungry,” he murmurs against my ragged breath. “Should’ve been better prepared.”

Heat crawls up my neck. I catch the meaning underneath the words and glare at him. “Don’t get used to it. I’m not usually this easy to feed.”

A low chuckle slips from him. “No, stormbird. I’ve noticed. Usually I have to chase you first.”

“Fuck you.”

“Careful.” His eyes drop to my mouth, his thumb dragging slowly across his own lower lip. “You’re already taking treats from my hand.”

I clench my jaw, refusing to give him the answer he’s waiting for. Looking past him instead, I find Onyx tucking into the pastry thing with both hands, telling Ryven a story that has him tipping his head back with a bark of laughter.

The server returns, clearing the first course and setting another plate in front of me. I don’t even ask what this one is.

I eat. Light forgive me, I eat, because it’s so good it almost hurts.

And yet, my head starts doing the sums anyway. What one plate costs. How many doses of Onyx’s medication it would buy. How long we could eat on what this room spends keeping candles lit.

Asher taps one finger against the stem of his glass. “Stop it.”

“Stop what?”

“Whatever you’re doing behind those eyes.”

“I’m not doing anything.”

“Yes, you are. You’re worrying.” He drapes an arm across the back of his chair. “Tonight isn’t costing you anything.”

“That’s easy for you to say. Over here, everything you do costs something.”

“Mm.” He lifts his wine. “But not tonight’s dinner. Tonight is mine. I want you fed. I want to watch you enjoy it. Both of those things please me.”

I scoff and look away before he catches the heat climbing into my face.

But with him sitting so close to me, on my home planet of all places, my thoughts keep fracturing.

The cave flashes through my head. The fire. His mouth. The impossible tenderness that somehow makes everything else about him harder to understand. I hate that those words drag me straight back there.

Leaning in, Asher slides his hand beneath my jaw and tips my face toward his, his fingers pressing over the pulse in my throat. “You know what I was wondering? Where you disappeared to.”

“What do you mean?”