So here is the excerpt - enjoy!
She had gotten used to people staring at her over time. She barely noticed it any more, but Michael wasn't staring at her bloodred hair, nor was he frowning at her odd eyes trying to decide if she was a demon or not. The way he was looking at her had nothing to do with her features.
This time she had kept his gaze as penetrating as it was.
Did he see as deep as it felt? Could he devise her confusion when she was unable to? A thought flitted around the edges of that confusion. Did he know how to fix it?
"Do you want me to?"
She blinked at his quiet tone. "Can you sense my thoughts?"
He held out his hand and without thinking she laid hers in his palm. He pulled her to stand between his legs. "Anoré shared with me the ability to sense if someone was lying or not. It helps with my work, but I cannot sense thoughts just because I want to." He pressed her hand to his lips.
But for some reason when I look into your eyes long enough, your thoughts float into my mind.
Oh dear, I hope not everything.
He grinned and her mortification turned into a shy smile.
"That's better. I don't like to see you so unsure of yourself."
He put his free hand on the small of her back and pulled her right up against him.
It was not what she had expected to happen and didn't protest. Even when he just looked at her, letting her adjust to the heat and scent of him so close up, did she for a moment thought to push him away.
It was quite odd, she thought. "You didn't ask, and for some reason I don't want to refuse you," she mused out loud.
His immediate response was the movement of the thumbs against her back and hand. It made a different kind of heat flow into her veins.
"Do you want to kiss me?" Her voice was barely there. It felt wrong to repeat the question so she didn't.
"Yes."
"Why?"
"You're beautiful and I like you."
"Oh. Umm. Do you always kiss the people you like?"
His naughty grin appeared. "Only the women. I am not much into kissing men."
She couldn't help the giggle that escaped her. It felt so nice with his hands making those little pleasurable circles and the joy of his teasing, put together.
She put a tentative hand on his chest. Like her he had removed the outer layer of clothes when they came inside, and she felt his heart beating through the thin fabric of his shirt. This time heat infused her palm.
"Have you kissed many women?"
"Yes," he began, but held her in place when she wanted to pull away. "But only special ones get special kisses," he whispered before leaning closer and claiming her lips.
Andesine knew that he was an experienced lover, but his kiss told her so much more than his words. Kissing did not always mean love or lead to sharing pleasure, but she knew that sometimes it did.
Was it going to happen now?
Andesine had been kissed before. Teenage curiousity more than an actual desire to experience the sensation. At the time she had written it off as not worth the shivers her friends had pretended it caused. When she couldn’t get excited about it, with a boy she had liked, she decided to let it go.
Michael was not a boy.
And his kiss was not making her shiver either. It was causing her insides to quake and she feared her legs were not going to last much longer in keeping her upright.
She must have made some little sound to show her distress because he softened the kiss even more and lifted his mouth away. It was a relief that he still held her though. It would have been most embarassing if she fell to the floor at this point.
Feeling that she had to say something, she opened her mouth. “Um…”
He touched her lips to silence her.
Her confusion changed direction. He didn’t think her a tease or worse, did he?
“Did I take advantage?”
His voice was tender and she could feel his concern.
Instead of answering, she laid her head against his chest and closed her eyes. It took her a moment to realise that his heart was racing too and the hard heat against her stomach was still there.
Standing quite still she absorbed the feel of his body. He had wrapped both arms around her and she smiled when his nose shifted to her hair. Dragons had sensitive olfactory receptors and even as a female child of a dragon-human mating, hers were heightened.
Just like that the need for words was gone.
As a healer she came into contact with all kinds of people, and sometimes they were naked when a healing was required.
Michael, fully dressed, was an experience beyond which she had no reference. It was hot but his heat was calming instead of frustrating.
There was an unexpected safety to be held like this. On some level it reminded her of her parents, but it wasn’t the same. It felt more elemental, like the crystal she was named after. Something so basic and primitive that it could only be described in its elemental state of molecules and crystalline connections.
And overlaid was his scent to weave the moment together in her memories.
She had learned about pheromones and scent to attract mates in shifters, but she couldn’t smell the mustiness normally associated with that. Instead he smelled of the herbs they were working with this morning and fresh rain and some wood that invited her closer.
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