No, she couldn’t be good. This was torture of the highest order. “Then why are you all the way over there?”
***
Bjorn hung his head. It was a fair question and they’d danced around it long enough. “I’ve made vows, Britt.”
“I’m not the one who keeps circling back to you breaking them.”
His heart cracked, because she was right. This was all on him. But she was all he could think about.
“I’m not going to be your conscience here. If you want me tonight, you can have me.” She licked her lips and let her gaze fall down his body. “Are you allowed to touch yourself?”
His cock throbbed. It wasn’t his own touch that he wanted. But while she might not be interested in being his morality police, she was still a good person who was sympathetic to his conflicted feelings.
Or maybe she just didn’t want to be a target for the guilt he would surely feel in the morning.
“It’s not a question of permission…” How to explain the choices he made every day in order to live closer to God and understand what He wanted for Bjorn?
She looked at him with far-too-knowing eyes. “So you do. Yes?”
Heat swirled through his body, lighting parts of him that had been long locked-down on fire. “I do.”
She grinned, but it wasn’t wicked. Or if it was, he was too lost to see it as such. Beauty, special and sacred and just for him, radiated off her as she dropped her gaze to where his cock ached inside his pants. “Tell me more, Bjorn.”
“I…” He exhaled roughly. “I think of it like exercise, I suppose.”
Her eyes flared wide and bright, silent laughter practically vibrating through the air between them. “Oh?”
“I know what that sounds like…” He flushed.
Her lips softened into a surprisingly understanding smile. “It sounds functional.”
“Yes.” He balled his hands into fists at his side. Functional release had been all he’d needed for years. Now he burned with lust, and as surely as he knew it was a desperate, distracting vice, he couldn’t pull himself away from her.
But he wouldn’t touch himself, either.
“Have you ever lain with a woman?”
He couldn’t help but smile at her careful question. “Yes. Not since joining the order, of course.”
“Do you think of them when you stroke yourself?”
“No.” It was the truth. That crossed a line. But he owed her another truth as well. “I have thought of you, though.”
Her lips parted and her brows drew together in confusion. “We’ve just only just met.”
And that was the rub of it. “I know.”
“Bjorn…”
“You don’t think it’s possible to know someone before meeting them? To be given a sign of their meaning to you?”
“By God?” The flames flickered, casting shadows across her face.
“Yes.”
“Does God give monks a heads-up that a woman is about to storm into their lives?”
That was the question of the day. Bjorn swallowed hard.
“I should warn you I don’t think I believe in fated mates.” She gave him a careful look, then pushed herself up, turning onto all fours. The curve of her spine and the flare of her bottom made his mouth dry even though she’d tried to warn him away. She grabbed another log and carefully added it to the fire.
He rolled over what she’d just said. “I don’t believe in the lore, either.”
She glanced over her shoulder at him. “I didn’t say that. I believe in the gods. But I also believe they are cruel, and take away as much as they give us.”
“Somethings aren’t meant to be had forever.”
“Would you like to have me for tonight?”
“I couldn’t do just one night,” he croaked out, his body hating him but his heart sure of the answer. He took a deep breath and shoved to his feet. He paced further into the cave, his steps echoing in the silence that hung heavy after that admission.
“I shouldn’t have sad anything,” she finally said quietly. He was a good twenty feet into the damp darkness, and her voice tugged at him, calling him back to the fire at the entrance.
He turned his head just enough to send his voice back toward her. “Or maybe you should say more.”
A pause, then she cleared her throat. “Like what?”
“If I wanted you for more than a night, could I have you?”
“You’re a monk. That’s hardly allowed.”
“And if I weren’t?”
“I don’t want to be the reason—”
He cut her off, and repeated the question, harder and faster this time, the words ripping harshly from him. “And if I weren’t?”