Chapter 22
Twenty-Two
Kyron opens the door to his room, and I take a step back. It’s small, no bigger than a broom closet. The white walls are bare and in the back is a silver box with a grated door.
“What is this? Have you been sleeping in a cage?” The question is outrageous, but what am I to think? This is the door to his room.
His laughter is like rich honey as he slides the door up. He motions for me to enter and closes us inside. “It’s a lift, and it will take us to my room.”
He pulls a lever, and the metal floor trembles beneath us. I gasp and cling to the front of his shirt. I can’t see anything, but I can feel the cage lifting us into the air, far away from the ground. This thing is a death trap that can send me plummeting to my demise.
Kyron kisses the top of my head, and his chest rumbles with a chuckle. “I should have thought of this sooner.”
“Oh yeah, so you could get a good laugh at my utter terror,” I say, my voice trembling.
“No, so I would have a reason to keep you distracted.”
He cups my cheek and tilts my head back. His mouth meets mine with a slow, soft kiss that has my toes curling in my slippers. Every tense muscle in my body relaxes at the stroke of his tongue. I pull him closer and rest my back against the lift’s cold metal wall.
“This is a very good distraction,” I say, my fingers easing under his tunic and sliding along the waist of his trousers.
“Is it now?” He grips the back of my thigh and hooks my leg over his hip. “I think I can do better.”
His hand glides up the inside of my thigh, and his thumb strokes over the center of my lace undergarments.
I close my eyes as he dips his fingertips under the damp fabric and teases me.
My hips roll with the rhythm of the lazy circles he draws around my clit.
Every rotation is a gentle tease that never gives me exactly what I crave.
“Please,” I say in a desperate plea.
His voice is a deep rumble against my ear as he asks, “Please what, princess?”
“I need more.”
The ground shudders, and fear jolts through me. I hold my breath, waiting for us to go crashing to the ground. It never happens. Nothing happens. We’ve come to a stop.
“My mission here is done,” Kyron says, releasing my leg and kissing my forehead. He slides the gate open and stands to the side, allowing me to walk past him.
“Not even close,” I reply, stepping into his room.
His room, if it can even be called a room, is shaped in half of a circle.
The one wall houses the door to the lift and two others, but the rest of the space is open to the elements.
Smooth pillars hold up the roof and embedded in the floor are smooth river rocks.
There are no energy-powered lights like the rest of the palace.
Instead a large bronze bowl sits in the middle with a crackling fire inside.
The furniture is simple: a plain chest of drawers, a high-back chair, and a breakfast table with several sketch books scattered on top.
I thumb through the pages and note that each impeccable charcoal drawing is of a body part but not a complete person.
Lips, eyes, hands, legs, breasts—all are pieces of my body.
I close the book and store my questions about the sketches in the back of my mind to ask when I’m not dumbstruck by his room.
Simple white linens cover the large bed, and a mountain of pillows are stacked to look out at the stunning view of Stigian and beyond.
The floor extends further than the roof, creating an open walkway with no railing to keep someone from falling over the edge.
It triggers my fear of heights, and I stop next to a pillar to safely take in the city below and the endless night sky.
“I never took you as the damsel in distress,” I say, looking back at him.
Kyron removes the Posseda from his pocket and places it in a gilded box on his dresser. “What?”
“Isn’t the damsel always made to sleep in the castle’s tower in fairytales?”
He moves behind me, wrapping his arms around my waist. “I suppose that’s true if I wasn’t the one who locked myself up here.
I wanted a place where I could feel close to you.
So, I removed the walls, thinking I could share a small part of your days and nights.
I know it sounds strange, but the sky brought my broken heart some relief.
I’d remind myself the sun that was warming my skin warmed yours too.
The waxing and waning moon, the stars, they were all the same for you.
It was like they were shining for us.” Heat spreads through my body as he presses his lips to my nape while making easy work of the delicate buttons along my spine.
“I wasn’t looking to be rescued; you had already saved me, Raelle. ”
He slides the sheer fabric of my dress down my shoulder. I tilt my head to the side, offering him my neck. I close my eyes and savor the feel of his lips as his words replay in my mind. While I was praying for the Statera to make me forget him, he was finding every way possible to remember me.
Tears dampen my lashes and my voice trembles as I say, “Your heart will never break because of me again. And you won’t need the sun and stars for comfort. You will have me.”
He guides me around to face him. “I love you.”
“Forever. I’ll love you forever, Kyron.”
My dress falls to the floor, leaving me in nothing but delicate, lace undergarments.
His gaze skims over me from head to toe.
It’s like he is drinking me in, quenching a thirst he’s lived with for way too long.
He lowers to his knees. His hands run down my sides, and he kisses the center of my torso, making me tremble.
My fingers comb through his soft, black hair, pressing down.
He follows my silent demand, leaving a wet trail toward my navel.
When his mouth moves over the black lace covering me, I grip his hair and lean into the pillar.
Every lap of his tongue and open-mouthed kiss has me aching for more. I’m desperate to remove the barrier that keeps him from my skin, but his mouth feels so good sucking on the lace. He nips at my sensitive flesh and my knees buckle, threatening to let me melt into a puddle at his feet.
Lowering the lace from one hip, Kyron smirks up at me. “I could spend the rest of the night on my knees.”
“Statera help me, you need to stop teasing me,” I breathe.
He lowers the fabric down my thighs. “It looks like you have no issues with the commanding part of being queen.”
“Kyron.”
He laughs for the second time tonight, and I can’t recall ever seeing him this happy. His focus is on me, not the impending conflict, not his missing mother. This is our moment, one we both want to lose ourselves in.
“Yes, my queen?”
“Put your mouth on me,” I demand, no longer mincing words.
“As you wish.”
He lifts my leg over his shoulder, and with his gaze locked to mine, he glides his tongue through my center.
That long, wet touch is all it takes, and I’m lost to everything but Kyron.
The sensation pumping through me is euphoric.
He says he could spend the rest of the night on his knees for me, and that would be perfect.
After this, I don’t think I can go a single day without feeling his mouth between my legs from here on out.
My fingers comb through his hair, gripping the strands in both hands.
He kisses me deeper, his tongue slipping inside of me.
My back arches away from the pillar, and he captures my clit with his teeth.
Every lap, every suck pushes me closer to the edge.
It’s a leap I make with no hesitation. I tumble into pure bliss, Kyron’s name slipping from my lips like a prayer.
His fingers dig into my hip as he holds me to him. Not for one second is he letting me forget who is making me feel this way. Not that I ever could. This man holds more than my body in his hands, he is the bearer of my heart and soul.
With a final stroke of his tongue, Kyron stands, and his mouth is on mine. The mixture of him and me is invigorating. I drink it in, reawakening my need. It’s an ache I’m desperate to have him satisfy.
I pull his tunic over his head and yank free the string on his trousers.
As I shove the leather down his legs, he works free of his boots.
With nothing between us, he wraps me in his arms. We fall to the bed in tangled limbs and frantic kisses.
He guides me to the top of the mattress with him where he props his back against the mountain of pillows.
I straddle his lap, my mouth finds his jaw as his moves over my neck, chest, and nipples.
I reach between us and take his cock into my hand, my palm sliding over his smooth skin.
“Fuck, Raelle,” he moans, tilting his head back.
I lick the column of his neck, loving how he gives in to the pleasure.
He doesn’t censor his words or fight what comes naturally to him.
In my hands, he is free to let go of everything that haunts him.
I’m his safe place. I hold no judgment, just unending love.
He gives me a glimpse of him that no one else gets to see.
He grips my wrist, stopping me mid-stroke. “I can’t. You make it feel too good.”
The ego boost those words give me. I can’t fight the cocky smile that consumes my face. “I can make it better,” I say, slipping down his body.
He reaches for me, his hands circling my waist. One moment I’m facing him and the next he turns me away.
My legs rest on either side of his hips.
He kisses my back and pulls me against his chest. One hand slides up my torso until his fingers rests around my neck.
The back of the other glides down my spine until it leaves me to grab his cock.
He sweeps it through my wetness before pressing the head to my entrance.
I look back at him and say, “I want to watch you as you move inside me.”
“Trust me, princess.” he says, urging me down with a gentle push.
My worries subside as I surrender to the feeling of him easing inside of me.
He holds my hips, moving me over him. When the center of our bodies meets, he pulls me back to recline against him.
I roll my hips, basking in the fullness of him inside of me.
He peppers my neck and shoulders with kisses, gently rocking against me.
Soft caresses move over my thighs and down my arms. I glance down to find his shadows coiling from his fingers, touching me in all the places he doesn’t. I crane my neck back and brush my lips against his jaw.
“Look at the stars, Raelle. They are here to watch me worship you,” he whispers, his breath warm against my skin.
I give my attention to the millions of sparkling voyeurs. They watch as my parah cups my breasts and pinches my nipples. I don’t shy away from them. Let every brilliant star memorize the way he makes me gasp and clench around him.
“That’s it. Let them see you take your pleasure from me,” he says, easing his fingers between my legs. “Show them that I’m yours.”
“No,” I say between pants. “They have to understand that I belong to you too. Let the stars stare in envy as we love each other. Let them wish to the ether that they could have what we do.”
Kyron thrusts upward, reaching deep inside me. “They do, princess. They do.”
His breath quickens, and his hand leaves my breast to cling to my hip.
We set a perfect tempo that is amplified by his fingers moving faster over my clit.
We race toward our release until we meet it together.
It feels as if our bodies collide until they shatter with pure ecstasy.
It’s a sensation I grasp on to, wanting to remain in it for as long as possible.
Eventually, it subsides, and I’m left out of breath and with liquified muscles.
Kyron holds me close, rolling to our sides and curling his body against mine.
Drawing circles with my fingertips on his forearm, I stare at the stars and flash them a cheeky smile.
I hope each and every one of them understand that he is mine, and I am his.
Not them, the sun, or the Statera will ever be powerful enough to obliterate our love.