I opened my mouth, because I actually knew the answer, and he shoved his hand over it. “Shh. With your courage, and brains, and strength, and looks, you’re something Helen could never be.” His face went from joking to serious. “The goddesses would have aspired to be you, Leo, even if you stood side-by-side with Helen.”
“Careful,” I whispered. “If there’s one thing I remember, it’s to never compare a mortal woman to a goddess. It always ends badly for the mortal.”
“Lucky for you I’ve locked them away for eternity.”
“You did, didn’t you.” Now that he was on my favorite subject, I mirrored his posture. “Are all the stories true then? Perseus and Hercules and Orpheus and…”
Groaning, he went to his back. “I’m trying to seduce you, and you want me to tell you stories.”
“You are?”
He flopped toward me. “Am I what? Trying to seduce you? Absolutely. And truthfully, I thought it was rather obvious.”
Well, maybe a little, but Achilles teased so much it was hard to know for sure. Reaching toward me, he pushed my hair out of my face. “I’m not doing it very well if you’re uncertain of my intentions.”
His accent was heavier, pushing through those rounded Britishr’s.
I didn’t know what to do. My attraction to him was something I couldn’t deny, and I didn’t like what that said about me. I wasn’t fickle. I stayed focused in all aspects of my life.
Except this one.
“If you were to kiss Pollux, after kissing me, I would be okay.” He continued to stroke my hair away, gaze traveling over my face the way his kiss had. “Pollux will be, too. There’s nothing that will come between us, despite what Hector said. You can trust us to know what we want.”
And they wanted me.
I let out a breath. He could be lying to me, but he wasn’t.
Leaning toward him, I met his gaze and held it. He lifted his eyebrows, waiting, but letting me be the one to close the distance between us.
An inch from his lips, I held myself in place. “I’m going to jump.”
“I’ll catch you.” His hand went to the back of my neck, pulling me down to him. The second our lips touched, heat exploded between us. Our lips moved over each other, sucking, biting, pressing.
My entire body was on fire with something more than desire. It was need. And it came from him, too. The way he held me to him, kissing down my jaw, over my neck—it was a brand. He was laying claim to me. Making me his.
I groaned, and Achilles made a sound in reply. It seemed to come from deep inside him. His hands crept from my face down my arms to my waist and then snuck beneath the hem of my shirt.
Our skin burned where it met, and I wondered if I’d have his handprints on me, if my skin was on fire, and he truly was branding me.
One hand left my waist, went down my hip to my knee and hitched it up, pulling it against him to hold us more tightly together. He ground against me, and my body answered, rising up, rolling, and clutching.
“So soft.” It didn’t sound like a bad thing when he said it. It sounded like the perfect counter to his firmness.
When it was clear I wasn’t going to jerk away from him, he moved his hand from my hip, back under my shirt to my breast.
I wasn’t sure what to expect. My experiences with men had been rushed and unsatisfying.
Nothing that Achilles did was rushed. He seemed more than happy to palm my breast, kneading the flesh until I was pushing myself against his hand.
“Too many clothes.” He jerked the shirt up and off, and I didn’t even think about stopping him. His soft hair tickled my neck as he kissed from my lips, down my neck, to my breast.
“Oh!” I cried out as he drew me into the warmth of his mouth, sucking hard, then nibbling gently before releasing me to move to the other breast.
I couldn’t stop myself from undulating against him, but he was still fully clothed and there seemed something wrong with that. His shirt was fisted in my hands, and I released it to push it up. He pulled away only as long as it took to rip it over his head and fling it next to my bed.
“Gods.” The word came out on a breath. Achilles pulled back, staring down at me and shook his head. “Gods. I never could have imagined.”
My body was on fire, and flushed under the heat of his gaze. He slid his hand over my ribs and breast, up to my neck. “Such a pretty pink.” He kissed my pulse, and I shut my eyes, gripped his elbows, and held him to me. “I can feel how hot you are.”