Chapter 3
3
T he second the latch on Damon’s chamber door clicked, Lilith snapped out of her daze. She squirmed in his arms, her voice sharper than she had intended. “Put me down this instant!”
Damon quietly obliged, lowering her onto her feet with maddening calm.
As she smoothed her dress, her gaze darted around the room.
“Oh!” she said quickly.
This isnae Magnus’s old chamber. He took a guest chamber.
The memory of her brother and his room was stained with too much darkness for her to bear. Feeling a rush of relief, she turned her attention back to Damon.
“I cannae believe ye carried me in front of everyone!” she exclaimed, her cheeks still burning with embarrassment. “What were ye thinkin’? Do ye have any idea how that must have looked like?”
Damon crossed his arms, watching her with a faintly amused expression. “It looked like I was carryin’ me wife to our bedchambers for our wedding night. Yer people needed to see that ye and I are united.”
She stuttered as she tried to formulate a response, the frustration building in her chest. “Ye-Ye?—”
“For someone so quick to scold,” Damon interrupted, his smirk finally breaking through his usual stoicism, “ye are awfully bad at finishin’ yer sentences.”
Lilith froze.
Was that an actual smirk?
The sight of the pleasure he was getting out of this only fueled her irritation. “Ye are impossible.”
“And ye are red as a ripe apple,” he countered, his tone teasing.
Lilith’s retort died on her lips as he took a step closer. She hadn’t realized how close he’d gotten until his towering presence seemed to envelop her. The air in the room thrummed, heavy with something she couldn’t quite name. It wasn’t fear—not entirely. But it wasn’t comfort either. It was a raw, hot charge that made her pulse quicken.
“Wh-What are ye doin’?” she stammered, her voice quieter now, the bite replaced with uncertainty that unsettled her even more.
Damon’s gaze burned into her, dark and unyielding, a contrast to the careful way his hand rose to her face. His fingers brushed her jawline, firm yet deliberate, as though testing her reaction. The warmth of his touch seeped into her skin, and she couldn’t help but lean into it. His hand moved lower, settling around her neck with a possessive gentleness that sent a shiver through her.
“Stop lookin’ at me like a frightened rabbit,” he murmured, his voice low, rough-edged, and dripping with command. “I’m claimin’ me wife.”
The words seemed to wrap around her like a cord, drawing her closer to him despite her instinct to resist.
Damon’s other hand found its way to her hip, strong and unyielding, grounding her in place. He leaned in, and she felt the brush of his breath against her cheek—a warm, teasing caress that both calmed and inflamed her nerves.
She couldn’t move. She couldn’t even breathe properly as his lips descended toward her neck. A soft gasp escaped her when he pressed a kiss just below her ear, the sensation so startlingly intimate that her knees almost buckled.
The touch wasn’t hurried or impatient. It was slow, deliberate, and maddeningly confident, as though he had all the time in the world. His lips moved down the column of her throat, the lightest graze of teeth following, setting her skin ablaze with sensation. A quiet, traitorous part of her wondered if he could feel the erratic flutter of her pulse beneath his mouth.
Lilith’s breath hitched, the sound betraying the war raging within her. His touch was both gentle and possessive, a contrast that left her more disoriented than she cared to admit. When his teeth grazed her skin in a soft nibble, it sent an unexpected jolt of heat through her, pulling her deeper into the heat of his proximity.
His hips pressed into her, and then, like a lightning strike, the trance shattered.
“Stop!” she cried out, her voice trembling, as she shoved him back with all the force she could muster.
Her palms pressed against his chest, the solid wall of muscle unmoving at first, but he relented, stepping back with a pace that felt deliberate, controlled.
Her breathing was ragged, and her heart pounded so loudly that it drowned out all other sounds in the room. She wrapped her arms around her middle as though to shield herself from the ghost of his touch, glaring at him with wide, fiery eyes.
“What the hell was that?” she demanded, her voice wavering between anger and confusion.
Damon stood silent for a moment, his expression unreadable. But his eyes—those intense, storm-filled eyes—held a flicker of something dangerous. Not anger, not amusement, but something deeper, like a challenge.
“What’s the matter?” he replied evenly, his voice steady, though his gaze flicked to her lips before meeting her eyes again.
Lilith took a steadying breath, careful not to let her composure crack. Her hands clenched and unclenched at her sides—an act that was not missed by Damon’s ever-observant gaze.
“I need to make something very clear, Damon. I willnae share yer bed. We married for the clan, nae for… this!”
His blue eyes studied her, his face betraying nothing. “Ye intend to deny me my husbandly rights for the entirety of our marriage?” His tone was neutral, not laced with anger or disappointment—just curiosity.
“Aye.”
“Why?”
“That’s none of yer business, is it?” she snapped, her voice sharp.
Keep it together. He’s a stranger. Dinnae let him in.
Memories of her brother’s anger and her father’s descent into the deepest pits of sorrow flashed across her mind.
She blinked away the memory quickly, but it raked its nails across her brain uncomfortably as she watched Damon move and sit on the edge of the bed, his posture relaxed yet somehow still imposing.
“What about heirs, then?” he asked, his tone businesslike as if he was discussing clan strategy with one of his councilmen.
The question plucked the string on her raw emotions and set her on edge instantly. The detached way he spoke about it made her blood boil.
“Nay, I dinnae wish to have children.”
“Why?” he asked.
“Why does it matter to ye? Maybe ye should find someone else to give ye an heir! It willnae be me!” Lilith shot back, her anger threatening to open the floodgates on the tears pricking the back of her eyes.
Damon furrowed his brow slightly, a flicker of surprise breaking through his calm exterior. “What kind of man do ye take me for?” he asked, exasperation creeping into his voice.
Lilith met his gaze defiantly, her fingers curling into the fabric of her dress. “The kind of man who always gets what he wants. If it’s nae given to him, he takes it.”
He rose swiftly, his frame towering over her as he stepped closer. She flinched, her eyes dropping to the floor on instinct.
Here it comes…
She was trapped between his arms, his knee between her legs, and her back pressed against the wall. His eyes bored into her, willing her to look at him. She felt his face mere inches away from her own.
“Listen carefully, Lilith Aragain ,” he began, drawing out her new last name with delicious ease, his voice low and firm. The sound of her name on his lips tugged on a place deep below her navel. “I’ll never do anything against yer will. But I cannae give up on an heir. And I’ll be damned if I share me bed with anyone else but me wife.”
Her pulse quickened, though she wasn’t sure if it was from fear or the intensity of his proximity.
“I already told ye, I willnae change me mind,” she said, her voice wavering slightly. “So, either ye do as yer sister promised and respect me wishes, or ye will have to take me without me consent. Just like the brute we all ken ye to be.”
Her eyes met his finally, fire and fury behind them. A challenge.
Like water off a duck’s feathers, Damon let her accusation roll off his tall, imposing frame. His body rolled slightly above her as he inhaled, his chest closing the space between them. Lilith squeezed her eyes shut as a tingling pressure built between her thighs and her breathing quickened with a new type of primal need.
As if finding space between them where there was none, Damon pressed into her. His heat radiated through his tunic and soaked into her skin. A greedy growl rumbled in his chest, sending a chill through her.
Nay! He wouldnae. We cannae. Nay… please…
“Seven nights,” she heard him say, finally breaking the silence, his voice steady and calculating.
“What?” she blurted, wrenching her eyelids open to meet his blue stare. “Seven? I’m willnae spend one night with ye?—”
“Spend seven nights with me,” he spoke over her. “If I cannae change yer mind by then, then I’ll let the matter go.”
“I still dinnae understand. Why would I do that?”
“ Nay beddin’ or claimin’ ye.”
“Well, what then?” Lilith asked impatiently.
The words ‘bedding’ and ‘claiming’ did very little to lower her body temperature. Given that his knee was still comfortably wedged between her legs, pinning her to the wall, she couldn’t free her mind from her illicit thoughts. She rolled her bottom lip between her teeth to keep from speaking any of them into existence.
“Because it’s more than enough time to show ye who I really am. Nae the brute ye fear or the stranger ye mistrust. I dinnae wish for a wife who thinks that she must guard herself every moment in me presence. That her husband would take that which isnae freely given. Seven nights of courtship, if ye follow.”
She was stunned into silence by his revelation. Calculating and strategic as it was, it was also thoughtful and vulnerable.
Damon continued, “This marriage is founded on duty, aye, but if we are to lead this clan together, there cannae be hesitation or room for doubt between us. Melissa spoke with me, ye ken?”
“Aye, I am aware. Though she didnae tell me what ye spoke about.”
“She worries for ye and me. She worries that we got married out of necessity and duty.”
“But we did , Damon,” Lilith pointed out.
His name had dripped past her lips, not for the first time, but the way his eyes darkened at the sound of it was not lost on her.
“Aye,” he managed, “but sometimes duty is all we are given. Even so, we choose how we bear it. If we are bound to this path, let it at least be one we both understand and accept. Nae one filled with doubt or unanswered questions.”
“It doesnae matter how much time passes. I willnae give ye an heir. I cannae?—”
“An heir is a necessity, Lilith, whether ye like it or nae. The clan needs stability. It’s already changed hands once.”
Lilith held her breath as he spoke against the spot below her ear, where he had kissed her just moments ago, his voice soft but unyielding as he moved his lips from one ear to the other.
“Make nay mistake, lass. I’m a man who doesnae believe in draggin’ matters on. If we cannae build trust in each other by the end of the seven nights… then I’ll leave it be. I willnae force this. I’m only askin’ ye to consider that our union, though built on duty, can be one of mutual respect and purpose. We both deserve that much.”
His lips were hovering just above hers as he finished.
He has a way of speaking that just irritatingly makes me feel like an immature child throwin’ a fit! How does he do that? How do these words flow out of him so easily?
Her brother’s words echoed in her mind. “Men will say anything they think ye wish to hear in order to get what they want. The higher up the man, the better their vocabulary.”
Calculating, indeed.
Lilith narrowed her eyes, suspicion creeping in. “And what would these seven nights involve?”
“Again, nothin’ ye dinnae agree to,” he assured her. “Ye will always have the choice. But give me the chance to prove ye wrong.”
She wanted to argue, to tell him how pointless it was, but the intensity of his gaze held her captive. For a fleeting moment, she saw something in his eyes—a flicker of tempered emotion beneath the immovable iron frame.
“Fine,” she said at last, her voice quiet but wary. “But ye will fail. I willnae change me mind.”
“Let me worry about that, lass,” Damon replied, his lips quirking into that infuriating smirk again.
As he finally stepped back and dropped his hands, giving her space, Lilith felt a new and intoxicating mix of relief and curiosity. Her hand drifted up to her neck, where his lips had lingered, the sensation still burning her skin. A new itch that she, for some reason, needed him to scratch.
Damon’s eyes followed her movements hungrily, and his features darkened before he turned around and left her alone in his chambers. The air was thick with the echoes of his touch and the unspoken promises in his words.
This is goin’ to be a long seven nights.