Chapter 39
CHAPTER THIRTY-NINE
“You have to tell me how the king is helping you, what he has on you,” I say as he drags me down the corridor, his hand a warm vise around mine, when I should be asking other questions. Focus. “And your plan about ending him. Did you mean it?”
My heart is on the line, dammit. I feel everything he has told me nailed into the soft flesh of that particular organ. I need to know I can trust him, that his jaw-dropping beauty reflects goodness in him, and that… that he cares. For me.
For some reason.
We take a turn and another, and suddenly, he turns and shoves me under a staircase. “Sh… It’s the page boy,” he whispers. “Let him pass.”
My pulse is ringing inside my head. It’s half-dark under the staircase, and his body is once more pressed to mine, a firm wall of solid muscle. He has braced a hand by my head, head turned to profile, presumably keeping an eye out for anyone passing by.
I’m stuck staring at his silhouette, at the strong nose and thick brows, the curve of his mouth, and the slash of his jaw. At the corded neck and big shoulders, thick with muscle, the powerful arms, and callused hands. Arms and hands that control draks and wield two dark swords. That weave shadows.
All the advantages he gave up to enter the Death Games, entering as a mortal.
For me.
Almost against my will, I reach up and touch his tousled hair. It’s so soft, much softer than I thought it would be, the lock curling around my finger like silk.
“He’s gone now,” he murmurs, then takes a step back, and his hair slips from my fingers. “Rae…”
I draw an uneven breath. I know I said I was coming with him only to talk, but… this body has needs and a mind of its own.
He still has one hand splayed against the wall under the stairs, caging me. Lifting the other to my neck, he presses his fingers there.
“We’ll work this out,” he says, his mouth tilting into that slightly crooked smile that has my heart pounding and my body humming. The intensity of his dark gaze is scorching. His eyes darken as they drop to my lips. “I’ll tell you everything. I’ll tell you about the plan. But you also need to tell me who you are. Deal?”
“Jai…” I breathe.
His strong fingers curl around the back, his grip hard, hauling me against his body again, letting me feel how aroused he is, letting me feel his strength. He doesn’t treat me like I’m a fragile girl. He knows I can take it. He thinks I’m strong.
I want to prove him right.
Thoughts swirl in my head.
We fought together to survive the first trial. He helped me, but he saw me swim and climb and fight to live. He sees me. Sees the person I am, stubborn and resilient, and doesn’t balk. Doesn’t tell me to accept my fate and die, accept defeat.
I need to talk with him, understand his relationship with the fae king—but right now, I need to feel him, feel his strength, his power. I want him to put those callused hands on me, to have that soft, firm mouth trail over every inch of my skin, over my breasts, between my legs.
I wanted to see him shatter, but what about my control? It’s smashed, gone, when he’s near me. Over and over, he has broken my thoughts, plowed through my plans and goals without even trying, with a look, a touch, a smile, a hand wrapping around mine.
Offering a calm haven when panic gripped me.
Offering pleasure.
If only I could trust him completely, if only his role over the years as the king’s envoy wasn’t at the back of my mind?—
His mouth closes over mine once more, the kiss deep, hard, desperate. His hand now protects the back of my head as he crushes me to the wall, taking over, his tongue plundering my mouth. The fire in my belly flares again.
I want him. I’ve never wanted any man like this—though, granted, my life has been odd of late. In the last years. Or decades? I kiss him back, my tongue battling his, my hands moving all over his sexy body. Muscles for miles, thick slabs shifting under my questing fingers. He doesn’t seem born but made , built out of perfect, smooth bricks of muscle and sinew.
And his face… Put together so pleasingly, from the broad forehead and thick straight brows to the hollows of his cheeks and the hardness of his jaw, and his mouth…
Gods, his mouth. Made for issuing commands and speaking words of power, though now I’m starting to believe it was primarily made for kissing. Why else would it be so soft, his lips so firm and tempting?
Dark lashes flutter over velvet black when, after an eternity, I come up for air. His hand has slid to my face, his long fingers tracing the side of my neck, my cheek, moving upward to brush against my brows, sweeping white hair out of my eyes.
“Fuck, what you do to me,” he grinds out, his voice like gravel.
The irony isn’t lost on me, because he has no idea what he does to me .
We won’t make it to his room. I know it from the way his gaze moves down to my cleavage, flaring with darkness, the way his hard cock twitches against my stomach.
He wants me. Badly.
The truth of his desire is right there, pressing against me. Words can lie, voices can deceive, but bodies work by instinct, and there is no deception in lust.
It’s freeing.
For the first time since I got onto that barge and saw Jai, I know where I stand.
At least, I think I do until he bends a knee and lowers himself before me. He goes to his knees, lifting the long skirt of my white gown.
His dark gaze is still trained on my face, making dark promises, and I still don’t know what he’s about to do when he slides his hands under the skirt and drags down my undergarments. They are silk and easily glide down my legs to pool around my ankles.
The soft underskirt of my gown brushes against my bare ass. My bare thighs. I’m wet between my legs; I can feel it now.
When he lifts the skirts again and presses his face between my legs, against my soaked pussy, I jerk, my back thumping against the wall.
“You smell divine,” he groans. “I’m dying to taste you. I want you spread wide for me . I want to make you scream and have the entire palace hear you.”
That’s the opposite of what I should be doing. I should keep quiet and hidden, but every word he speaks against the lips of my pussy is a puff of heat that threatens to buckle my knees.
The sight of him below me, hands on my hips keeping the gown up, his eyes still on my face as he breathes me in, is fanning the flames. Scorching heat goes through me, and my pussy spasms, needing something to fill it.
Needing him.
I gasp when strong fingers part my folds, stroking me. Then, without warning, he grabs my right leg and lifts it over a muscular shoulder, spreading me, gaining full access to me.
And he wastes no time, apart from a murmured “ beautiful ” I’m not even sure I heard, before putting his mouth on me.
It’s like dying, my soul leaving my body as he drags the flat of his rough tongue over my pussy and clit, then doing it again, tormenting the sensitive nub of flesh every time. The world is crashing down around me, responsibilities and common sense smoldering to ash.
He’s the one burning, his lips, his teeth, his tongue searing my flesh, and yet I’m the one on fire. I’m the naked flame, I’m both the wick and the candle, consumed by my need of him, by that scent of burning incense and honeysuckle.
The raw strength in the hands holding me in place, spread out for him, is surely leaving bruises. I hope they leave bruises, to let me know tomorrow this was real, that I was marked by him, that this passion left traces behind.
His mouth presses harder against the softness of me, as if he needs to taste more, taste deeper. His tongue lashes at my pussy, unrelenting, while he pushes a finger into me, ratcheting up the pressure, making me whine deep in my throat.
Shadows twine around us, around me, ribbons wrapping around my waist, around my breasts, teasing and stroking. My nipples pebble instantly, turning into hard peaks, and a moan escapes me as pleasure streaks down, down where he’s licking and sucking and tormenting me so deliciously.
Oh gods, I’m going to come apart at the seams, shatter to pieces. I was wrong; I’m not a candle. I’m a sphere made of glass, the flame filling me, and any moment now, I’ll crack and break apart.
“Jai,” I breathe, realizing I’ve threaded my fingers through his soft black hair, and I’m tugging. “Jai, please.”
Make me come. Release this pressure, this incessant need of you, show me what it can be like, what you like, how you want me, how it pleases you to give me pleasure…
He growls against my sensitive flesh as if hearing me, and his finger curls while he sucks on my clit…
I fall.
Buffeted by pleasure.
Drowning in its waves.
I think I cry out; I’m not sure. There’s a rushing in my ears, like the tide coming in, swallowing all other sound. My knees finally give out from under me.
Surging to his feet, he grabs me in his arms, cradling me against his chest as I struggle to catch my breath, my gills whistling faintly. My gown slides down to cover my legs and the undergarments I dropped as his mouth falls to my hair and the circle of his arms sets me upright.
My heart feels like it’s being pulled out of my chest, pounding, aching. I’ve never felt anything like it before. I moan against his chest.
A tremor goes through him. He leans back to gaze at me, dark eyes wide. “ Makhair? ” he whispers, and his voice is hushed.
I blink up at him, my heart racing. “What?”
“Fuck, it’s a miracle,” he breathes, “ you are a miracle, but how can it be real, how can you be?—”
“What do you mean?” I whisper back, still fighting that strange pull. “And who is makhair ?”
“There has only been one woman for me,” he says, his voice choked, “only one mate, and that’s fate… No other can take her place. Fate can’t be undone.”
My tentative, faint smile freezes, the quip about his answer not being an answer to my question evaporating in the face of what he’s just said.
“He loved a woman once,” Tru had said.
“Fire and water don’t mix.”
“I see,” I whisper and feel like my heart is cracking in two. My throat tight, I step back, and slowly his arms release me. I pull up my undergarments with jerky notions. “Thank you for clarifying this for me.”
He just went down on me, made me see stars and new dawns, made my body sing and my soul smile. I almost made a huge mistake, committing my body to him, my eager, lusting body, and engaging my feelings.
“Rae…” He’s watching me with those dark eyes, a crease gouged between his brows. “Don’t you get it?”
“Oh, I get it.” I step back when he reaches for me again, and I want to curse him and run away, but the clearing of a throat has me whipping around. “Shit. Who’s there?”
A page boy, a familiar one, bowing from the waist, his face impassive. “My lord Athdara. I have been sent by His Majesty to find Lady Rae and escort her to the audience hall.”
“Well, here I am,” I say.
“My lady.” He straightens. “The king requests your presence. Now.”
You don’t keep a king waiting in his own palace. Much less when you’re a mere human and a contestant sentenced to death in the games. A contestant who left the ball without permission.
But Jai grabs my hand, his frown deepening. “Don’t speak to him, Rae, don’t say a word?—”
A hot flare of fury blinds me. “I’ll decide about that. You don’t get to tell me what to do after what you just told me.”
“What? Rae, wait?—”
But I brush past him—a whiff of smoke and fire, a last damning jolt to all my senses, and an arrow bolt through my heart—and I start down the corridor, leaving the page boy to scramble after me. “Take me to His Majesty.”