Her smile disappeared. “Yes. I’m sure that you’re right. It must be a burden, being that busy and with so much responsibility on your shoulders all the time.”
He shrugged. “I was raised to lead my people,” he explained. “When one doesn’t know any differently, then it doesn’t seem like a burden.”
She’d just taken a bite, and her hand froze as her eyes widened. “You’ve always been this busy? Didn’t you have a childhood?”
He chuckled and the sound appealed to Luna.
“I can’t say that I had a carefree childhood. But I had moments of being a normal kid. Or at least, as normal as a kid can be.”
She lifted her eyebrows, not sure she believed him. “I probably had a more normal childhood. You seem like the kind who never broke the rules.”
He laughed and Luna felt as if she’d accomplished something miraculous. This man didn’t laugh enough, she thought.
“Oh, I got into trouble, just like other kids.”
“How?” she demanded, wanting to know more about him. She couldn’t help but feel intrigued. After their moment during dinner, she could honestly say that she didn’t hate him anymore. But her feelings for the man were…well, that was another mystery. Furthermore, she wasn’t sure she was brave enough to delve into any of those confusing emotions-feelings-sensations just yet.
He leaned back in his chair and Luna could tell that he was looking for something “normal” but was struggling.
“There was a rabbit that used to come close to the palace each morning. It drove the gardener nuts. He was constantly shooing the rabbit away. What he didn’t know was that I was leaving carrots out for the rabbit, luring him in. Every morning, I’d watch the rabbit come closer and closer. Finally, I got the rabbit to eat the carrot out of my hand. After several more mornings, he finally let me pet him. So every morning, for about three weeks, that rabbit would appear outside my room and I’d feed him carrots and pet him.”
Luna thought that was a very sweet story. “What happened?”
He shrugged, then stood up to take their empty bowls to the sink. “The chef discovered that there was a carrot thief and was livid. He was trying to make something one night and needed carrots. But they were gone.” He turned back around, then leaned against the metal sink, an odd smile to his handsome features. She barely even noticed the scar any more. Especially not while he was telling her a story.
“I had to admit that I was the one stealing the carrots. My father was livid and the chef ‘forgot’ to put salt into my food for the next several days. The gardener cut back all of the plants near my room, and even put up a net so that the rabbit couldn’t come anymore.”
Luna hid the sudden stab of sadness she felt over the story, forcing her mouth to curl into a semblance of a smile, all the while, her heart ached. Tasim chuckled, shaking his head as if dismissing the story. But Luna understood. This wasn’t a story about a boy stealing carrots. It was a story about a boy trying to find a friend in a lonely world.
Tasim pushed away from the sink. “To this day, I can’t eat anything that has rabbit in it.”
“I can imagine,” she replied softly, feeling a surge of tenderness for the lonely little boy he had been.
He eyed her curiously. “Are you okay?” he asked, reaching out to touch her cheek.
His touch set her skin on fire! How could a simple touch do that? She wanted to pull away, but the look in his eyes told her that he felt it as well. She moved slightly and his fingers curled around her neck. The tension in the air increased, swirling around them like magic, luring them to risk more, to dare higher. Luna leaned in ever so slightly, lifting her head in a jerky manner, almost as if offering her lips for a kiss, but afraid to let him know that she wanted that kiss.
His hand tightened on her neck. She stood up and he pulled her in closer. It was almost as if their bodies were moving of their own accord, drawn together like a set of magnets.
The thought was so completely outrageous that it caused her to freeze her forward movement. “I should go,” she whispered. Her lips were so close. So incredibly close! He felt her breath wash over his face. She saw the heat echoed in his eyes. Should she…dare she? Luna felt as if the earth stopped moving, the world waiting, holding its breath to see what would happen next.
“You probably should,” he replied gruffly, but his hand didn’t pull away. In fact, his fingers drifted down her shoulder to her waist, a silent message to not move. The heat from his fingers increased, transfixing her.
Then, as if almost reluctantly, his lips brushed against hers. There was an electrified moment as they froze. Was the world going to explode? Wasn’t there some reference about not crossing the streams? No, that was “Ghostbusters”. But did that rule apply here? She and Tasim were enemies…
Weren’t they?
Luna leaned in, needing another touch more than her next breath. He paused, gazing down at her.
He kissed her harder, his mouth covering hers in a voracious kiss that stole her breath away. There was no space between their bodies. It was just pleasure and his lips, his hands moving over her back, as she tried to get closer still, cursing her thick sweatshirt that didn’t allow her to feel him more easily.
When his tongue moved into her mouth, she reciprocated, wild to taste him, wanting so much more. She felt his body harden and his arms tighten around her. Nor did she care.
