Villain, Let Me Touch You! - Chapter 36
“Ugh.”
Why is this happening to me, author? Just three hours later, I woke up writhing in pain so excruciating that I couldn’t lie down.
I jumped up and ran around the room, only to fall flat on my face as my legs gave out on me, sending me sprawling forward. My knees felt like they were burning from the hard impact with the floor. There was thick carpeting, but it was no help at all. I clutched my knees and rolled over.
“Rienna!” Helios threw down the report and rushed over.
“It’s not working, Rienna.” Helios hugged me tightly. “Just holding hands isn’t enough.”
“Well, then?” I asked.
Helios bit his bottom lip and let go. Was he suggesting a kiss? His red lips looked very tempting, but I was still reluctant to kiss him.
It was the lesser of the two evils in this situation.
If it were painful enough to kill me, I would have clung to him without a second thought.
Helios’s ears turned red as he felt my gaze on his lips. The image of him so casually climbing onto the bed and taking my hand in his, hugging it so tightly that it was still pressed against his chest, was fresh in my mind.
“My name.”
He held me tighter, unable to meet my eyes. Naturally, his lips found my ear.
“Let me touch my name, Rienna.”
His hot breath washed over my ear, and for a moment, my mind went blank. Without realizing what I was doing, I nodded.
“If you’re embarrassed about me seeing it, I won’t look.”
Helios had found a way to touch me without looking. His upper body pressed against my back. His hand rested on my flat stomach. For a moment, I swallowed hard.
“You don’t want to slip,” he said, worried that I might fall.
But it felt more like a snare—a solid snare, holding its prey in place, unable to escape.
A muffled voice snapped me out of my reverie. I had to stop Helios, but his hands were quicker to pull up my skirt. The cool air on my bare legs made the hair there stand on end.
“Your Highness…” I squeezed his forearm across my waist. “Your Highness, I’d rather have your hand…”
But it was difficult to say that we should hold hands longer. In order for me to survive for half a day, I had to hold hands with him for at least two hours. Time was given equally to everyone, but the value of time was different for each person. And the value of Helios’s two hours was enormous. He had a lot of work to do. He was still in a tug-of-war for power with the nobles who viewed Helios with disdain, and the Empress would take any opportunity to stab him in the back.
The Emperor had also regarded him more coldly ever since his battle with illness. Holding him in the bedroom was like chaining him by the ankle.
We have to think about efficiency.
What we do is necessary and justified, for his sake and mine.
“Rienna, may I touch you?”
Helios asked, belatedly, for permission. I nodded.
His chest heaved and then fell. And his hand gripped my thigh. It was quite a distance between his hand, which lingered above my knee, and where his name was imprinted.
“A little further in.” My voice cracked.
“I know,” he replied in a low voice and carefully brought his hand up.
Every time he touched me, I flinched and trembled. “Ah, inside.”
Helios’s hand stroked my upper thigh and moved inward. He did his best not to arouse me. It was amazing how his thick hands could move like butterflies. If it weren’t for the searing heat in his palm, I wouldn’t have realized we were touching.
“Rienna, is this it?”
He said he knew! I’m dying of embarrassment. He kept asking—of course he couldn’t remember the location after seeing it once.
“A little further…” I said, trying to hold back my embarrassment.
My body heated up until I couldn’t breathe, either because of Helios’s warmth or because I was beginning to get feverish.
I was breathing hard.
Then, Helios’s fingertips touched his name.
For a moment, a shiver ran through me. I covered my lower lip and held his forearm tighter.
“Hmph.”
A strange, e****c sensation radiated from the place where his name was inscribed.
