No Longer Luna novel · Chapter 19 of 24

Chapter 19: The Mark

He didn't drive to the pack house, and he didn't drive to Fernbank.

He drove to the end of the docks, where the narrow gray house stood on its pilings over the low tide.

The gulls were loud, and the afternoon light came gold and gray through the kitchen window.

Rhys put his keys on the counter and didn't turn around.

"I'm asking for the real one," he said. "Not the show, not the deal."

He touched the place where my neck met my shoulder.

"My teeth, here, for good. I'd want you to say yes because you want it."

"And if I don't?"

"If you want nothing from me but the three weeks, I'll drive you home."

"Term one," I said.

"Dead."

"Term one is dead."

I put my hands on the buttons of his shirt, and this time there was no reason in the world for it.

He stood still and let me undo them, one at a time, and the scars showed pale across his ribs in the window light.

I pressed my mouth to the long one that ran down into his hip.

His breath hissed out above me.

"Skye."

"I like your scars. I'd like to hear where you got them."

"Later."

"I know. I'm not asking now."

I stood up, and he caught my face in both hands, and for the first time he kissed me slowly, with all the time in the world.

It was slow.

It was deep and warm and unhurried, his thumbs under my jaw, and it undid me faster than the table had.

I felt him hard against my stomach through his jeans.

I got my hand between us and found him, and he let his forehead drop to mine.

"Turn around," he said.

"Why?"

"Because I want to watch the water over your shoulder, and I want you to be able to see it too."

I turned.

The kitchen window ran the whole width of the wall, and the harbor lay under it, gray and bright, with the boats rocking on their lines.

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