Chapter 72 : Need Time

Chapter 72 : Need Time
Chapter 72 : Need Time

She blinked, hoping to clear the fog in her head, but that did nothing to help. In fact, the intoxication seemed to heighten with every breath she took. His question echoed in her mind and she shook her head in response, even as her lips sealed against his. 

It was a need. 

Everything happened too quickly. In the next moment, her back was pressed against the wall. Though he still held her against him, his hands were in her dress and her fingers were now in his hair. 

His lips moved from hers to her neck. Something hungry spiked in her veins. She threw her head back against the wall, her grip in his hair tightened as her eyes slipped shut and a moan escaped her. 

But he pulled away just as quickly. The hot pain of denial coursed through her and her eyes snapped open immediately, her breath ragged. 

“Nothing?” The word was thick with his accent, heightened by his emotions. 

Too much. 

It was all Aniya could think about. 

Now. 

Was the other. 

She wanted to just continue what they had started, the need would certainly not vanish anytime soon. Something about it felt so strong, irresistible. But Ikrus’s grip kept her firmly at the wall. 

His question echoed in her head again, and rage rushed through her veins affording her a moment of clarity. 

He wanted her to admit that she felt something for him so he could justify his Joining Ceremony proposal. 

Something that did nothing to guarantee her and Arlo’s lives!

The need was still there in her veins, like embers resting at the bottom of a fire breathing mountain, but her rage felt more consuming. 

“Let me go!” She snapped. 

“You still haven’t answered my question?” He asked, his words gruff. 

“I have. Nothing,” she snarled. “Let me go!”

“You kissed me,” he stated bluntly as his grip tightened around her. “That is not nothing.”

Hot fury blasted through her. Rage at herself, at these emotions she couldn’t control, at everything, “Of course, I want your body! I want you inside me, your lips on mine, your tongue everywhere. That is a feeling, isn’t it?”

Something about his expression softened. “Aniya?”

“This reckless desire.. this… this… this LUST!” 

“Aniya.”

“But is that not what this bond had created? I don’t even know if it is mine. If without this thing, I would even want you at all.”

A silence struck the room. 

He let her go gently and when her feet touched the floor, she swayed slightly from their loss of contact as he took some steps away from her. 

Her words had hurt him, she could see it. But she couldn’t think right now. He had come to her too quickly, and brought along with him kindness that she didn’t understand right after she had tried to kill him. 

She had not had enough time to plan, to prepare, to pick out her strategy and play by it. 

He had not given her gone at all! 

She needed time. She needed to be away from him. 

Right now, her emotions were high. There was no logic behind her words. Everything was still raw. 

Perhaps she was digging herself into a grave with these words, she couldn’t tell. 

She needed time. 

“I already told you that the bond does not impose itself on us. Our fates—-“

“Leave me alone,” she snapped, walking away from him. She knew what he was going to say. That didn’t make anything better for her because a part of her believed it. The other part of her… needed time. 

Needed time to find out how she would make it out of this place alive with her son. 

A part of her… she needed to think.

“Go away, Ikrus, please I…” she dragged in a breath, feeling the weight of his gaze on her. “I need time to think,” she finally said as she turned to him. 

There was a good distance between them but he still felt too close. 

Was this how things would be from now on?

Ikrus’s gaze held hers for a long time, accessing her like she was a warrior opponent in a ring with him, one whose next move he couldn’t predict. 

Ever she couldn’t predict her next move. 

Then he finally broke their gaze and turned to the door. “Take all the time you need, Kharesh.”

The door closed behind him and she was left alone with the silence. 

Time. 

How ironic. 

That was the very thing she did not have.