A Court of Bastards [ACOTAR]

Chapter 54

Grey light streamed in through the windows, muted, and warning of rain.

On a bed in the centre of the room lay a pair of fae, tangled in the twisted sheets. From beneath the linen here and there could be spied a limb or two, pale toes and golden shins jutting out at odd angles. They lay like that for hours, softly sighing in their sleep, curled up safely beside one another.

It was some time after dawn when Fiona blinked an eye open. The weak morning light had not yet ventured to her side of the bed, so it illuminated Xander instead, marking out a boundary on the rumpled sheets just past his thumb. It sought out every curl, shadowy locks turning blue-black in the dull glow, the tips of his lashes gold against his cheekbones.

The world fell quiet beyond the confines of the manor, and time refused to tick as she gazed at him, wondering how something so perfect could possibly be tethered to her. The stark white sheets made him look darker, sunkissed skin deepened to tempered bronze, wrought by some heavenly smithy and metered out over a rippling plane of muscles. Fiona's gaze wandered greedily over his back and the curve of his spine, the slope of his hips as a little voice inside her whispered -

mine.

mine - mine - mine - mine.

Memories of the night they'd shared came swimming to the surface as she recollected pieces of him. There was the knee he had knelt on while he kissed his way up her shins. There - the crescent-moon bite mark she had left on his shoulder when his tongue had swept between her thighs. And there were the thin red lines she had clawed along his back when he-

A pair of violet eyes blinked open and the breath caught in her throat.

Fiona looked down to discover bronze fingers snaking around her waist. Upon finding purchase in her hips they pulled her closer, until she was nose to nose with him, their bodies barely an inch from one another. Fiona was reminded rather abruptly of the necessity of the sheet when she spied the little pile of clothes in the corner of the room which housed her undergarments.

"Good morning." Her mate's voice was rough against her neck, low and heavy with sleep. Though the very sound of it made her insides twist with need, Fiona said -

"This was a mistake."

Xander leaned back from the kiss he had planted between her collarbones. "It didn't feel like a mistake," he answered, raising an eyebrow.

A sharp breath escaped her as his thumb grazed her nipple. Momentarily paralysed, Fiona was powerless to resist as he rolled over, his chest hovering inches above her bare breasts. He gazed at them hungrily before planting a trail of kisses over her sternum, deliberately ignoring the way she squirmed as he headed lower.

"We can't do this again."

Xander flashed her a purely male smirk. "That's not what you said last night."

It was all she could do to blush as he lowered himself between her thighs, his shoulders peaking sharply as he nudged her legs aside. Fiona's head tipped back involuntarily as his fingers crept towards the part of her that was starting to pulse, one hand drawing tantalising circles over her hipbone. He was toying with her, enjoying the way she wriggled beneath him as those fingers played and pressed everywhere except where she wanted them, where she was beginning to need them rather desperately.

And then, in a move that made her gasp rather sharply, Xander licked one long, deliberate stroke between her folds that ended in a flick right at her-

"Fuck," Fiona gasped, jolting upright. "Xander, stop."

"Those are two rather conflicting directions," her mate mumbled distractedly between her thighs. The rumble of his voice against her throbbing heat threatened to banish all thought from her head completely, but Fiona just managed to shift upright, and repeat, "I mean it, Xander. We can't do this again."