Free Confined (A Tethered Novel, Book 3) by Jennifer Snyder

the sensitive area along my throat.
    His hand slipped beneath my shirt and met with the bare skin
of my lower back. “Start from the beginning.”
    Kace tangled his other hand in my hair and gently pulled my
head back farther, exposing my throat for easier access. His lips kissed along
the side of my neck lightly as his tongue darted out every other kiss to lick a
little. I couldn’t think straight. The words I wanted to say jumbled together
in my mind, and what came out was nothing like what I’d intended. At least not
right away.
    “I’m tethered to Theo,” I managed to choke out in a small,
breathy voice.
    Kace drew back a little and paused in his slow kisses,
licking, and overall sexiness. Damn, I couldn’t have picked a more
inappropriate time to confess such a thing. Why had my guilty conscience chosen
that moment to explode into a million pieces and reveal all of the secrets I’d
been harboring?
     

     
     

     
     
    “Tethered? You’re tethered to Theo?” Kace repeated, his
eyebrows drawn together in utter confusion.
    One of his hands was tangled in my hair while the other
pressed against the small of my back, sending tiny sparks of my magick dancing
along the surface of my skin from the contact. My head was still tipped back
slightly, and my lips were swollen and parted, eagerly waiting for me to fix
the mess I’d created so Kace’s lips would be warming them again.
    “Yes,” I breathed.
    Kace unraveled himself from me and took a small step back.
His icy eyes swirled with conflicting emotions, both of which I could clearly
label—hurt and anger. He ran his hands over his face, and then met my stare
once more.
    “Theo Van Rooyen?” he asked.
    I nodded, unable to trust my voice. It might crack because
of what I was feeling. There was so much more to say besides just admitting the
tether. I needed to tell him about the kiss too, but also about my reasons for
agreeing to the initiation. He needed to know that he was my main reason
for agreeing. How I wanted to see where this thing between us would go once
Theo was out of my mind for good.
    Jesus. How had I let myself get this deep in shit?
    “How did it happen?” he asked. His hands fell limply at his
sides. “Does being tethered to him mean what I think it does…that you’re tied
to him in some way or connected or something?”
    “It happened the night the Boo Hag attacked me,” I said,
unsure how to answer the last question.
    Being tethered to Theo meant being connected to him in many
ways, and I wasn’t sure Kace was ready to hear that yet, or that he truly
wanted to.
    “Wait a minute, does that mean you’re part Hoodoo Conjurer
now?”
    I shook my head. “No.”
    At least that was an easy answer.
    “Since the Boo Hag? That was practically forever ago,
Addison,” he muttered. His jaw tensed, and I noticed how his teeth gritted
together.
    I kept waiting for him to yell at me, but he never did.
Instead, he began pacing.
    “I know,” I said, dropping my gaze to the hardwood floor
beneath my feet. “I thought we would have broken it by now or reversed it or
something. Nothing we’ve done has worked though. It’s only made it stronger.”
    Kace walked across the attic and sat down on the
puke-colored love seat in the corner. I followed him and tucked my leg beneath
me as I sat down beside him. Taking in a deep breath, I gathered the last few
things I wanted to say and held my breath before releasing them.
    “It’s made the tether so strong between the two of us that
there’s some type of physical attraction that came from nowhere…and we ended up
kissing.” I threw my hands up to stop him in case he was about to fly off the
handle on me like I’d been expecting and pressed forward. “But it was only
once, and I’ve felt absolutely horrible ever since it happened. It’s been
eating me alive actually.”
    My stomach twisted, and I swore I was about to lose
everything I’d eaten today any second from that revelation alone. I