Graysen stole the blunt from me. "Like the alcohol, you won't be able to handle this."

Stealing it back, I skipped out of reach and awkwardly lit it. Poking the air with the hand that held the blunt, thin strands of smoke coiled from its burning tip, a sweetly rancid smell perfumed the air. "I've had a really, reeeaaallly, shitty day at the office. I just need a break from all of this,"— twirling a finger around my temple—"going on in my head."

I took a drag, just like I'd seen him do before. Too hard, too long. Doubling in half, I coughed and sputtered and hacked against the burning tickle, trying to gasp down air. "Holy shit!" I wheezed.

Graysen rolled his eyes at me, leaned sideways to pick up a glass of water next to a splayed book on the bedside table, and handed it to me.

Taking a sip, the water soothed the scratchy, ticklish feeling in my throat. Eventually, I could rasp out, "I just need to...I don't know. This seems to calm you. So why not me?"

"Take small easy puffs," he advised, plucking the glass of water from my hand.

This time I did, and found that he was right; it was much easier to inhale the smoke that way. Crawling onto the bed, I sat down in the middle, cross-legged, fixing my skirt over my knees.

Graysen strolled over to the light switch and reached for the button—

Cold panic engulfed me. "Not off!"

He regarded me incredulously as if surprised. His gaze softened. "I wasn't going to."

The dread clenching my heart eased and my breathing evened out. But it was a different kind of feeling that tied knots into my stomach—the realization that he wouldn't do that to me so soon after my panic attack down in the catacombs. Something momentous had shifted in him with regard to me.

Graysen twisted the round button. The illumination spilling from the brass chandelier above dimmed, bathing the room in a softer glow of light and shadow. "I promised you a date."

"A date?" I'd forgotten what he'd said to my father, what had excited me earlier—a date with kisses. A thrill rippled through me at the thought of a date with Graysen, even if it was at home in a guest bedroom. "Is this what you do on all your dates? Set the mood?" I teased.

He shrugged, turning to stride toward the tray of food sitting on the table beside the window. "I wouldn't know. I've never been on a date."

"Me either," I murmured. Learning that he'd never taken anyone on a date before shouldn't have surprised me, but it did. I knew he played around...but still, he hadn't taken one single girl on a date? Even just to get into her panties?

He retrieved the tray of food he'd gathered from the kitchen, and joined me on the bed, placing the tray between us. He'd sourced meats and cheeses, olives and grapes, with freshly baked bread and crackers. While we ate, we passed the blunt back and forth, using an empty side dish to tap the ash onto.

"Why not?" I asked, crunching down on a cracker topped with brie.

His gaze honed on me and he appeared confused as if I should already know the answer. "I don't date. I don't do girlfriends."

"Is that because of me...us?" I asked, motioning my half-eaten cracker between us. Because we were promised to one another and someday soon we'd be married? Something small and new fluttered inside—hope, that he might say—Actually, yes.

He shook his head slowly, squinting at me as if it was the most ludicrous question he'd ever heard. "Nope," he replied before biting into bread loaded with meats and olives.

Those knots inside my stomach untangled and something heavy weighed me down with disappointment. Of course not—being tied to me wouldn't stop him from doing whatever he wanted, who he wanted. Gods, I was a fool. I placed the cracker down on the tray and fiddled with the tiny pearl buttons running down the front of my skirt, no longer hungry.

An awkward silence stretched between us.

I sighed, giving him a sideways look. "People talk, you know on dates." I knew it from all the books I'd read and all the TV shows I'd watched. I'd even experienced it second-hand from all those late nights I sat with Lise after she'd returned from a night out with Aldan Reska to dissect every spoken word, every nuanced look, every stolen touch.

Graysen just gave me a pained expression

"Right, so when you said this was a date, you really meant it was a non-date," I huffed, feeling prickly and annoyed.

He groaned, dragging a hand through his hair, messing it up. "Gods, what do you want to talk about?"

"Forget it," I said, giving him a dismissive wave of my hand. I didn't want to bother talking with someone who clearly didn't want to talk to me. I picked up the blunt and drew in a small lungful of smoke, blowing it out in a hazy stream.

He frowned. "Wychthorn—"

But a terrible thought had struck me. I straightened, my eyes widening, a little panicked. "What is this?" I jiggled the blunt between my fingers. It better not be any of our own strains—cannabis mixed with magic. From what I knew, our own weed was a mind-bending experience, and highly addictive, even to us. One hit and you craved it like a heroin junkie.

"Relax," he murmured, settling his back against the bedhead, legs spread and both knees bent. "It's Persian Gold. Pure unadulterated weed." He leaned over, his muscled arm flexing as he picked up his tumbler of whiskey from the bedside table, and took a long sip.

"Phew...Okay, good," I said, feeling better and handing him the blunt.

The high crept upon me slowly, a pleasant feeling that surrounded me with the warmth of an early spring morning, sunshine promising heat and wonder, and a little bit of blustery wind. And my mind was skipping about all over the place, but I felt...calm and at ease...and I couldn't stop smiling. Everything seemed crisper and clearer. Even the food tasted better.

All of a sudden, I didn't even mind being on a non-date with Graysen.

Lying down on his bed, I tucked an arm beneath my head and crossed my legs at the ankles, popping a grape into my mouth and relishing the burst of sweetness on my tongue. Graysen rose, padded over to the media system, and flicked on some music—Chromatic's Shadow—and my foot tapped in time with the melancholy beat. The ceiling was as hypnotizing as the song flooding the room. Why hadn't I noticed the ceiling before? There seemed to be some sort of incandescent pearl sheen to it. And then I realized I was cradled by the softest feeling...a cloud, I was cradled by a cloud.

Oh...it's just the quilt!

I started moving my limbs, making snow angels, luxuriating in the feel of soft fabric skimming my arms and legs. "This is the softest, cuddliest quilt ever, in the whole entire world. It's like a cloud," I told Graysen earnestly as he settled himself back on the bed.

He laughed. I did too. And his laughter was like sunshine breaking through storm clouds.

"How do you feel?" he asked.

I rolled over and over and over, laughing, even when I fell off the bed onto the floor with a heavy thump and a sprawling of limbs, expelling a startled oomph. "Good...really, really good...I like this."

The carpet was a downy sensation against my skin. "Holy hells, you should come down here. The carpet is amaaazing." Brushing my face back and forth, the long wisps of carpet softly stroked my cheeks and nose. "I looove you carpet."

"Fuck, Wycthorn. I knew this was a bad idea." But I heard the smile in his tone.

I popped up from the floor, resting my chin on my folded arms nestled on the edge of the mattress. "Is this why you smoke?" He'd smoked a few blunts in front of me over the course of a year.

"It takes the edge off," he muttered, then took a drag from the blunt, blowing out a whirl of smoke that eddied upward.

I could understand why he needed that, especially after yesterday—the truck and innocents burned alive. A cold shudder ran down my spine at the memory. "So every time something bad happened...at the office?" I smiled at my choice of word, office.

His dark eyes slid my way. "No. Sometimes I need to take the edge off being around you."

The way he said it, low and husky, as if he wasn't implying he needed the weed because he detested being in my company but the complete opposite, made my heart jolt. "As if, Crowther." I shook my head at him. Absurd. And I burst into a chuckle.

Except, my laughter died when I realized he was telling the truth. Not about me annoying him, not with that look he was giving me. It was heated. And it had warmth spiraling through my chest, spreading down, down, down, to the tips of my toes.

Graysen took another hit off the blunt. His chest expanded as he inhaled the smoke, holding it in, before letting it stream from his mouth and swirl through the air between us. All the while, his eyes never left mine. And I didn't think, even if I'd wanted to, I'd have been able to tear my gaze from his either.

I hauled myself back onto the bed, wondering what the hells I was doing, but unable to stop myself from crawling toward him. The low lighting carved shadows into his face, hardening his features, and yet at the same time illuminated his beauty.

I knew I should be running away from him—fleeing in the opposite direction. He was the man the world's most powerful crime lords feared. He broke them when he had to. Ended them when necessary. And here I was, hoping he wouldn't shatter me with one wrong look, one wrong word.

Despite it all, I couldn't resist him. The soft quilt scuffed my knees as I knelt between his spread legs. My heart rapped an excited beat to be this close to him, to be enveloped in his unique scent. I took his tumbler from him, went to twist around and place it on the bedside table, then hesitated.

Hmmm...why not, a bit of Dutch courage.

I took a generous sip, and instantly regretted it the moment the whiskey slid down my throat and set it on fire, the taste of it equivalent to petrol fumes. I wheezed, slapping my chest. "Holy fuck!"

Graysen burst out laughing. His whole body shook. Taking the tumbler from me, he drained it before leaning sideways to put it on the bedside table. Spreading his warm palm against my back, giving me comforting strokes, until I got my sputtering under control.

"Awful...that was awful. How can you drink that stuff?"

"Easily," he grinned, arching a cocky eyebrow.

Rolling my eyes at him, I rose up on my knees and raked my hands through his hair, trying to smooth back the hank of hair that dipped over his eyes. But every time, that cowlick forced the strands of hair to flop forward again. "Stupid beautiful cowlick."

A flash of straight white teeth as he smiled widely, practically beaming.

"You need to smile more often," I told him. He'd smiled and laughed a lot today with me and I liked how it made me feel. Delighted and special.

"Sure, I do," he rumbled sarcastically. "I smile plenty."

"Not real smiles. Not like that one," I replied, tapping his mouth. "You're mostly smirking or it's a cold smile, promising violence."

He gave a surprised huff of laughter. "I guess I do."

Sitting still, he let me play with his face and hair. Didn't protest, or shove me aside, like I thought he would. Just sat quietly as I investigated him. The hand holding the blunt rested on his knee while his other hand grazed down my spine before settling on my waist. His thumb brushed back and forth in a lazy motion, and everything inside me suddenly narrowed on that touch that had flames licking my nerve endings.

I could feel his intense gaze as it slid over my face to sharpen on my mouth, and the desire rolling from him in blistering waves scorched my skin and sang to my soul. I tried to push aside the questions that bloomed in my mind and wouldn't go away—What was going on between us? Where was this all leading?

Taking a deep breath, I refocused on his face. There were faint freckles beneath the natural golden hue of his skin. I marveled at that, finding a few darker ones. Thick black eyebrows—a scar ran through the left and bisected it. Long eyelashes fringed obsidian eyes. And his eyes weren't pure black. A sprinkle of golden flecks surrounded the pupil and a thin band of gold circled the outer iris. And that nose—straight, imperious, yet...when I ran my fingertip along its bridge, I felt an almost imperceptible bump. "Your nose has been broken," I said, surprised.

"Quite a few times. Kenton." His breath skated across my lips, reminding me just how close we were to one another. I could lean forward and kiss him if I wanted. Gods, I wanted to. I really wanted to.

He shifted slightly, the mattress dipping with his movement as he pincered me gently with his thighs. Letting let go of my waist, his touch languidly drifted up and down my side. I chewed the inside of my mouth at the alluring erotic sensation.

Holy Skalki, that feels good.

What the heck were we talking about?

I cleared my throat, blinking. "Your brother? What did you do to piss him off enough to break your nose?"

"The usual. Getting too mouthy. The guy has a fucking stick up his ass. No sense of humor."

Tracing his mouth, I discovered his upper lip was nicked with a tiny white scar before I swept my touch along the plane of his high cheekbones. His bristly five o'clock shadow prickled my fingertips as I ran them along his jawline before coasting down his throat where ink coiled in shades of black and gray.

I shook my head. So, so wrong for one person to be this beautiful.

Graysen frowned with curiosity. "What?"

I wasn't going to say it. The guy had a big enough ego and I wasn't about to inflate it further. My gaze dropped to his hand resting on his bent knee, and I fiddled with the thin leather straps and silver chains that bound his wrist. It was safer to change the subject. "When was the last time you slept?" He hadn't last night, nor caught any today.

"Two days ago."

I glanced up, stunned. "You're an insomniac?"

A light shrug of a shoulder. "I'll probably go under in the next day or two."

"For how long?"

"If I'm left undisturbed, most of the day."

I couldn't wrap my mind around it. What would it be like not to sleep? To be awake for hours and days on end? And yet he seemed fine. He didn't appear as if he were sleep-deprived. "Have you always been that way, unable to sleep?"

He shook his head.

Pinching the blunt from him, I dragged in a lungful of sweet cigar-tainted smoke. "Did something happen to you—"

He cut me off with, "No." His tone was sharp, too sharp, and I took his denial for what it was—a lie.

I flipped through my memories, sorting through everything I knew about him. I didn't know he was an insomniac. "Does anyone else know? The Heads?"

"Just my family. A close friend. And now you."

Happiness blossomed inside my chest—he trusted me enough to share this about him. I couldn't stop the smile alighting my mouth. His gaze slashed to my lips lingering there before slicing back up, and the impact of meeting desire-darkened eyes made my breath catch.

It was too much. So I dropped my gaze, only it strayed across the expanse of his powerful chest, and I greedily eyed the white t-shirt straining against his broad upper body. Beneath the stretched fabric I could just make out the ridges of ruined skin, and curiosity begged me to ask, "Can I see?"

Graysen tilted his head, his eyebrows nudged together, not understanding.

I pointed to his chest. "Your brand. House Crowthers' insignia." I'd missed seeing it last night when I'd confronted him after discovering he'd acquired the guest bedroom next to my own. There was also a small devious part of me eager to see him shirtless again.

One side of his mouth tipped up, a dip of the chin—a yes.