But I also couldn’t risk sending him alone or with only a few men and being attacked.

He looked over at me from across the Mayan-themed lobby and nodded in silent acknowledgement. His gaze was stoic, set in determined resolve. He would wait on me, for that I was grateful. I respected his obedience, even though he felt somewhat like a mentor to me.

The girls checked us in, Roxie speaking in her fluent Spanish and then we were off to our row of rooms on the seventeenth floor. We all had a roommate; I believed that was important, you know to maintain camaraderie and all that. It was my own damn order, but as I watched Amelia slip into her shared room with Roxie I suddenly regretted suggesting to Jericho that we share.

I followed Jericho into our room, and immediately we spread out. Both of us only had a backpack, but somehow our things multiplied as we took over the room and made it ours. Jericho stepped out onto the balcony that overlooked Peru’s capitol. The sun was setting over Lima and the lights from the clustered buildings were shining like beacons across the city that rolled out from under our vantage point.

I stood there for a moment in indecision. The view was nice and definitely demanded to be appreciated. And I couldn’t damn well appreciate it with Jericho blocking my way.

“Get out,” I ordered suddenly very decided with what I was going to do.

Jericho turned from his place on the balcony with a confused look, “What?”

“Get out,” I repeated clearly. “Listen, I have some work to do and I need you out. Like now.”

“You’re seriously going to kick me out?” Jericho walked into the room, his expression complete unbelief.

“Listen, man, I’m sorry, but yeah, I need you out.” He grunted an incredulous laugh so I attempted to pacify him. “If it means anything, I’ll owe you one.”

Granted I hadn’t tried very hard.

“It doesn’t mean anything!” Jericho half shouted. “You are literally kicking me out of my own hotel room! Where am I supposed to go?”

“I don’t know, but it has to be done,” I argued solemnly.

“Whatever,” Jericho sighed and I could tell he was only a little bit mad at me. “I’ll just get my own room. I should have done that in the first place. I should know better than to try and put up with his royal sulkiness.”

He grabbed his backpack off the bed he claimed and gathered whatever odds and ends had made their way around the room.

“Thanks man,” I said seriously, feeling a little bit like a douchebag.

“It better be worth it, Avalon. Like seriously, you need to lock this down. You’re way too moody for this mission. Get the girl, and then get your head on straight.” Jericho lectured from halfway out the door.

“That’s the plan,” I agreed.

“Good.” And then he stalked down the hallway.

Once he was gone I couldn’t hold myself back any longer. I counted to ten bouncing on my toes and then I rushed out the door and down the hall. I didn’t know Amelia’s exact room number, so I walked toward her magic just a few doors down.

I stood on the opposite side of the heavy wooden door gathering my nerves. I was determined and focused, but that didn’t mean I felt any kind of confidence. And since this was the first time I had ever put myself in this kind of vulnerable position I didn’t know if this was how every guy felt when he was pursuing a girl, or if this was Amelia exclusive.

But either way, she had stripped me of the pride and surety I was used to. I was the King of a damned kingdom and yet as I stood at the threshold to her room…. to our future…. I was a stripped down version of myself, all arrogance, all poise buried beneath a mountain of nervous anxiety.

There were other girls in this world, other eligible candidates for Queen. But at the core of honesty was the realization that if Amelia rejected me there would be no one else. Somehow this girl had swept in and captured every part of me. I belonged to her. She owned me. And if she didn’t want to be with me, there would be no one else. I would spend the rest of my days pining for a compassionate, feisty, spoiled princess.

And it would suck.

Really bad.

I mean, I might never recover.

But that foolish knowledge was better than even pretending another girl would be able to bewitch my attention like Amelia had.

So with a shaky breath I raised my hand and took the plunge. I decided in the quick second it took for her to open the door that I would approach this situation the only way I knew how.

I would lead.

And even if I spent the rest of my life following this girl to the ends of the Earth, which was a real possibility. A possibility I was more than fine with…. I would lead her into this today. Because for whatever reason she was being way too stubborn about what was between us.

She needed to be led.

Amelia opened the door, the look of surprise on her face barely hidden. Her long, wavy hair floated around her as she moved the door in a jerky motion out of the way. Her big brown eyes widened with her shock and her perfect lips pursed as if she was stopping herself from saying what was really on her mind.

“Amelia,” I acknowledged in a voice husky from nerves.

“Avalon,” she sighed my name and a hot heat flooded my veins. “Do you need Roxie?”

I swallowed a laugh at her words and an underlying current of lust and reminded myself of why I was here. “No,” I paused and held her gaze with mine. “I need you.”

I let my intentions hang in the air as her lips formed a little O in more surprise. She looked adorably confused and only the movement of Roxie in the background kept me from pushing her against the open hotel room door and kissing her senseless just to prove how much I needed her.

“Come with me,” I whispered and held out my hand.

She glanced over her shoulder and when she turned back to respond she was chewing on her bottom lip as if she didn’t know what to say.

“Amelia, come with me,” I demanded a little firmer.

She nodded her head with a nervous tilt of her chin and put her delicate hand in mine.

I turned away from her to hide my cocky smile and led her back down the hall to my hotel room. I swiped the key card into the lock and then turned the handle and led her inside.

In the solitude of my room I felt her nervous magic spread out from her like a bird getting ready to take flight. She was painfully jumpy and I felt her own anxious emotions reflected in mine. There were so many reasons to fear what I felt for her or the future that lay before us, especially in this moment of uncertainty while Terletov ran wild. But at my very center, at the most elementary part of my soul I didn’t want to be uncertain anymore. I wanted, with firm and unquestionable certainty, I wanted to know that this girl was mine.

I wanted, no needed to know, that whatever happened after this moment, that Amelia Cartier belonged to me in the same way I already belonged to her.

“Avalon, I-“

Before she could say anything else, something principal and dominant took over me completely. The lock clicked in the door behind us at the same time she said my name and all reason snapped and disintegrated into miniscule pieces inside of me. I took the hand that I still held in mine and pulled her roughly to me.

Whatever she was going to say was lost the moment my lips crashed down to hers. I felt her surprise deep inside her magic as it stuttered in the air around us. I playfully bit at her bottom lip to bring her out of her paralyzed shock. And then I swept my tongue over the exact spot hoping for something, for some kind of response to the desire that was bubbling so quickly inside of me I knew there was no coming back from this. Not ever.

So when she answered with the softest moan and she pressed herself tighter to my chest I lost all ability to think reasonably.

She kissed me back fiercely and without reserve. She opened her mouth to mine and I claimed her in that kiss. I didn’t know if she realized what was between us yet, but she would. And the longer I kissed her, the longer our magics wrapped together in the same passion we kissed with, the sooner I knew she would admit it.

I would just have to continue kissing her until she did.

Chapter Twenty-Five

With the same certainty I knew that I was breaking down whatever impossible wall Amelia had built between us, I knew I couldn’t push her further than this kiss. But that didn’t mean I couldn’t make it the hottest, most memorable kiss ever.

If she did decide to still reject me after this, after I laid it all out for her, then at least I would leave her with a very memorable kiss that would not be, could not be rivaled among men.

Yes, Avalon St. Andrews god of all kissing.

Her mouth worked against mine in a perfect harmony of tangled tongues and crushing lips. I grabbed her waist with both of my hands, holding her tightly against me. I pushed her backward until she was pressed against the bare hotel room wall. She sighed as her back hit the wall, her hands moved up slowly taking in each inch of me like she was shy but trying to memorize how I felt at the same time and then in a perfect moment of unrestrained want she tangled them in my loose hair. As her hands worked to get a tighter hold of me, she pressed herself into me, melting her body against mine. Our magic was like a frenetic energy field around us, mine swallowing hers up as I drew it into mine.

I couldn’t let her be the same after this kiss. I had to change her so that there would always be something missing without me next to her, without my lips against hers.

It was selfish. I could admit that. It was an egotistical, bastard thing to do. But I wanted a chance with her. I was fighting for her in this kiss.

And I was determined to win.

I deepened the kiss with those thoughts on my mind. My arms wrapped around her with a desperate need to feel as much of her against my body as I could, with a need to prove to her how badly I wanted her…. how much I needed her.

She reacted to me, moved with me and I had never felt more of a sense of pride in my life. This girl wanted me as much as I wanted her. A completion I didn’t know I was missing swelled and spread in my chest as she gave me as much of herself as I gave her in that kiss. She clutched at me like I was a lifeline, like if she let go of me she would collapse on the ground. Like she would be lost without me.

I groaned against her mouth with that thought. I didn’t know when it happened but that was me. I was lost without her. Wandering aimlessly. Somehow even though I could acknowledge that she had become everything to me, letting me have her, letting me hold her, the truth and solidity of those feelings cemented that reality to the deepest, most real part of me, to every nerve ending and blood vessel, to every thought and image in my head. To my core.

I slipped my hand from her waist to the back of her thigh. As these thoughts flickered and flashed in my head I couldn’t even pretend that the perfection of Amelia kissing me didn’t awaken my very male nature. Desire flamed through me, setting my magic to an electrified boil. Our magics snapped and popped around us and when I lifted her leg off the ground she went willingly, wrapping her leg around my waist and then she lifted her other leg as I reached down to grab it.

I kept a tight hold on the back of her thighs while she wrapped her arms around my neck like she wasn’t just holding on for balance, but like she was clinging to me for breath.