The Divorced Military Queen Awakens (by Sadie Baxter) novel Chapter 716

Chapter 716 Dark Clouds Over Desire 
“There was.” Quinn offered the truth without flinching. 
Color drained from his face as they reached the bedroom door in a heartbeat. 
The door flew inward under his boot; in the same motion he tossed her onto the mattress like a discarded coat. 
The cushion caught her, but the jolt still wrinkled her brow. 
He loomed, fingers clasping her chin. “Still carrying a torch for your ex? Remember whose wife you are.” 
She met his glare. “If I still wanted him, I wouldn’t have sent him to the police. My selfishness was keeping you out of trouble.” 
Julius let out a laugh with no heat. “Even if I crippled him, so what?” 
“Maybe you’d walk free,” she answered, “maybe you’d pay hush money. But I don’t want you skating the edge of the law when smarter doors are wide open.” 
His brow tightened. Somewhere in the back of his mind a younger voice murmured, “Quinnie, if possible, I wish I’d met you clean–without blood on my hands.” 
Was that memory truly his? 
Had he ever spoken those words aloud, or were they only wishful echoes? 
Because she stood so unflinchingly in daylight, perhaps he wanted to be a man worthy of standing beside her. 
His knuckles brushed stray hair from her cheek. “Will you climb higher someday and leave me behind, like he warned?” 
Their bodies formed an intimacy that felt too deliberate, a question spelled in posture not words. 
His face drifted closer; warm breath painted her skin, carrying promises and threats in equal measure. 
The moment her soft laugh slipped free, Julius felt it skim across his nerves like the first drop of brandy. Warm, biting, impossible to ignore. She didn’t retreat when he closed the last inch between them. Instead, she tipped her chin and murmured, “Climbing a higher branch? When did you start doubting yourself? I said yes to the signet ring. I’m not going anywhere” 
The bite of jealousy flared before he could teach it. His voice came out lower than intended. Just because of the ring? The faint edge embarrassed him even as it left his throat. 
Her answer landed almost gently, yet the words carried iron. ‘No. Montly because of you because the one I love is you.” The confession stole the air from his lungs. Then her hands tightened. The world tilted. She used that returning strength he kept pretending not to notice. 
Mattress slammed against his back before the thought finished forming. Quinn’s momentum pinned him, shoulders first, then hips, until gravity obeyed her instead of him. 
She straddled his waist, settling with a deliberate patience that burned hotter than haste. The glow in her eyes wasn’t mischief this time; it was quiet triumph–she’d tested herself and passed. 
The word slipped out, ragged. “You–Shock cracked across his chest; he had never imagined she could overturn him so easily. 
She leaned closer, heat and challenge mingling. “And why brood over whatever Trent spat out? If we’re stockpiling grievances, should I be terrified too? He claimed you’d lose interest in me -said you’d never stay with this body.” The accusation stung because it grazed a fear he had never worded, not even to himself. 
Heat crawled up his neck. “I… I’m not uninterested,” he managed, hating how small it sounded beneath her steady gaze. 
Her fingertip pressed into his sternum, a single, unhurried point of claim. “Oh So even like this, in this body, you’re interested?” she breathed, lips almost brushing his ear. Lightning shivered down the side of his neck, pooling heat where her breath lingered. 
A tremor flickered through him, small but uncontrollable. The ear she toyed with felt scalded, as though her words had come branded with fire. 
This frail shell answered her far too readily, every nerve wired to her touch. He despised that helpless surrender almost as much as he craved what followed. 
Logic reminded him the simplest escape lay in straightening his arms and rolling. The impulse never reached his muscles. 
He swallowed. “You’re my wife. No matter what shape you take, I..” The rest tangled behind his teeth. 
Her mouth sealed over his before the sentence could escape. She pried his lips apart, turning a promise into breathless silence. 
Instinct overruled thought; he met every sweep of her tongue, following, yielding, demanding. The room narrowed to taste and heartbeat. Then her voice slipped in between their shared breaths. “Julius, do you want me right now?” 
Air rasped in and out of him like it cost money. He stared up at the woman holding him down, cheeks flushed, eyes ferocious. 
Had she always taken what she wanted this boldly? The memory bank of their past offered no certain answer. 
He had built a life on directing every variable. 
Yet with her, the reins slipped, and part of him whispered relief even as the rest shouted danger. 
His pulse kicked hard. Want unfurled, thick and molten, stirred entirely by her, for her. 
Breath still jagged, he tried for reason. “Do you understand what you’re asking? Your current condition-” 
“I’m cleared,” she murmured, words trailing across his jaw. “Dr. Gavin Huxley says I’m healing well. Just–no pregnancy scares.” Her lips drifted to his throat. 
She lingered at the hollow of his Adam’s apple, breath painting that patch of skin with slow heat. 
His body answered with a full–body shiver; his Adam’s apple bobbed beneath her poised lips. 
The contact felt unbearably ticklish and searing at once, forcing the caged want inside him to batter against its bars. 
“Quinn, don’t… stop playing,” he gasped, fingers knotting the sheets as he wrestled the animal urge to flip her and claim. 
“I’m not playing. I’m deadly serious.” Her whisper vibrated against his skin while her fingers worked methodically down each button of his shirt. 
When her fingertips skated over his bare chest, the thin membrane of composure he’d stretched around himself began to tear. 
“Julius, tell me–do you want me now?” The question hovered between them like scented smoke, impossible to wave away. 
Her voice, soft as silk but edged with daring, curled around his ear, the sweetest provocation he had ever tasted. 
Julius’s breath caught. A shiver ran through his chest as he parted his lips and whispered, “… want.” 
The confession felt alien. He was certain hypnosis had scraped him clean of feeling, yet the instant her eyes met his, pride and logic slid aside like glass fogged by warm breath. 
Quinn tilted her head and smiled, soft but unyielding. “Then tell me you want me only because I’m me, not because the papers call me your wife.”