The door opened and a half-asleep Cassian stood on the other side. He had just finished his monthly report on the Illyrian camps not far away from the House of Wind. Cass had a lazy smile on his face, his long hair was a mess, and he wore sweatpants with one of his plain black training shirts. The training shirts that he only kept on for the first five minutes of training.
Even though it was morning almost noon, Cassian looked exhausted as if he could sleep for the next fifty years.
"Hey," His eyes brightened, and his smile got a little less lazy. He was perked up speaking to Nesta.
"Hey, I missed you," Nesta said staring at his broad chest but then in the eyes when she admitted her feelings. Cassian grabbed Nesta's hand and pulled her into his room.
Cassian sauntered over to the bed with Nesta's hand in his looking back at Nesta a couple of times, to make sure that she was real. That what they had was real and she was not about to back out.
He climbed over his bed, the big and soft mattress that could fit 3 grown Illyrian males. "What are your plans for today?" Pulling Nesta onto the bed with him, fitting her beside him.
"Well, I can really leave the house unless I have someone take me," defeated I said, "or down the millions of stairs to get into the town."
"You will get down the stairs, you have it in you to keep trying." Cassian stares into Nesta's eyes shifting his head down to look at her.
"I know, I know." She said with anger. Nesta had been challenged to go down 10,000 stairs. To her, this was the only way she could go out on her own. The stairs are what made her believe the house was a prison. She did not know what she would do once she got down them, Nesta had changed since she first came to the House. She was different and was not that girl who slept around and got drunk every night. She reinvented herself for the better.
In that moment, where he could take advantage while Nesta was in her thoughts far away, Cassian wrapped his arms around Nesta and dragged her back into him. He moved the hair on her neck to the other side allow him access to her now bare neck. Cassian's nose grazed against the skin behind Nesta's ear. "Mmmm," Cass breathed, torturing Nesta with his nose tracking from her ear all the way down her jaw to her chin and back again.
All Nesta could think about was his hands on her body and his breath on her neck. "Shall I continue?" Cassian asked in his horse sleeping voice, both holding authority and storing but then soft and comforting.
Yes, keep going Nesta thought. She wanted him, wanted him to take the next step. Her mind was betrayed by her words when she said, "No... no." The second time quieter than the first.
Cassian released Nesta from his hold and lashed flat on his back behind her. It took all the strength in Nesta to stop herself from flipping around, crawling onto Cassian, and giving herself over. "So, what do you want to do?" Nesta asked, trying to get the scene of what she was dying to let happen to leave her mind.
The big and stunning Illyrian man turned over onto his side and lifted his head into his hands. "Whatever you wish, I suppose." Cassian's side on dis moth shifted upwards in a proud grin.
"Whatever I want l, like anything?" Nesta started to tap her chin like she solved the most complicated problem in the world needing as much thinking as she could get.
Cassian only grinned more. His smug look even though he did not know what was about to happen. Once he said that he knew she was going to take advantage of it. It was Nesta, she took advantage of anything and everything. Especially everything where he was concerned in.
"I think I will have you read to me. Yes, that is exactly what I want." She seemed to like this was the hardest thing Cass could do.
"Okay, I'll read to you but only if I get to hold you while I do." Cass looking still smug said, "and I get to pick what we read."
With Nesta's history with books, Cassian did not want to read what she normally read. The House was aware of their conversation at this exact moment and 3 books dropped in a pile on the end of the bed.
"I think the House has another idea in mind, I mean unless you have other books in here." She said glaring at the books and then back to Cassian with a smirk. Under her breath, she mumbled a thank you to the house and grabbed the books from the corner where they magically appeared.
Before Nesta could fully grab the books that the House provided, Cassian already had two of his own in his large manly hands. "The Tragedy of War or The History Behind General Silas, which one?" Cassian chuckled holding the books up for Nesta to see.
"Since I have no idea who that guy is, I guess the first one." Nesta was defeated that it was not going to be her books but was happy that Cassian was reading to her.
Cassian settled against the pillows in front of his headboard and opened the book, then looked up at Nesta with a crinkle between his eyes, "Something wrong," Still staring at the beauty in front of him.
Nesta for a few moments thought something was actually wrong and that they needed to go and fight or protect someone. Then she saw the playfulness in his eyes and knew that it was safe, and nothing was going to end this moment.
Cassian's arm slipped beneath Nesta, dragging her closer to him until her head was on his chest and he was comfortable with the proximity of their bodies. "Ah, better. Now quiet, Nesta. I have to read." Cassian kissed the top of her head as Nesta filled with blush and she melted on him.
He flipped past the acknowledgments and the prologue to the first chapter, "The beginning of the end" Nesta rolled her eyes, how original she thought.
The moment the first sentence form on his perfect lips Nesta moved her eyes off of the black ink inside the old book to him. Nesta took into account the way his lips moved as his eyes danced along the page, flashing from one side of the page to the other. She was not listening to the words but to the sound of his perfect soft voice that gave her a chill because she felt safe.
His angelic voice remained steady as his fingers started treading lightly through Nesta's hair with one hand while his other holding the book near his chest.
To Nesta, Cassian was captivating, she did not want to look away in fear that she would miss something. She did not want to blink in fear that she would miss a beat — miss a word from his lips, a batter of his eye with his thick lashes as he got lost in the words of his favorite military book. He was absolutely breathtaking.
They stayed like this for hours, Cass reading, and Nesta listening to every word, every syllable as it rolled off his tongue. She did not know the words he was saying, didn't care just taking into account the way he said them. She was memorizing the flow of his voice, memorizing the peacefulness of the moment.
Nesta buried her cold feet between his legs, craving his warmth, and Cassian paused for a moment and pressed his lips to the side of her head before returning back to the page. Nesta looked out the window to the side of the bed. The day was already away from them. They spent the entire day together, laying in Cassian's bed, reading and only reading. She focused her attention back on Cassian, still reading and only faltering once to look and her, and then picked back up again.
Her lids grew heavier, she tried to fight it, but eventually, Cassian's poetic voice got the best of her and she fell asleep in Cass's arms.
