Chapter Thirty-Five
Bellamy
E ngaged—I was engaged!
And gods was it marvelous.
She loved me, more than I ever thought she might be able to. Asher was willing to give up everything for me. For us.
My tongue slid against hers, thanking her for what she had just given me. For the way she had and would change my life. Nicola had confirmed I was still on borrowed time, but as long as that time was spent with her in my arms then I no longer cared.
I wrapped a hand around her neck, the other gripping her jaw. There was a desperation within me, a need to never let her go again. Perhaps there was also terror, because Asher could choose to leave. She could take away my choice again. Asher could ruin everything by deciding she was no longer worthy.
So maybe I needed to show her that she was. And maybe she also needed to find out what would happen if she ever tried to leave again.
“Can I fuck you, Asher?” I asked between impatient kisses, my hands digging into her skin and shoving her back onto the bed. Ranbir would be so angry with me. She had just suffered physically and mentally. Underworld below, she thought I was fake mere hours ago. But I needed her. I needed us . And if she said yes, I would not ask again or hesitate.
Long, brown curls fanned out around her, crowning my princess. Impatient nods mussed the hair, but I would be sure to fetch her a new crown. A real one.
Leaning forward, I ground my erection into her, feeling the heat of her center through the cotton trousers Ranbir had offered her. My trousers.
My princess.
My fiancé.
My soulmate.
She was mine and I needed to make sure she remembered that before I lost her again.
“Can I punish you?” I asked breathlessly, still grinding into her and ravishing her mouth. She seemed to startle, stilling beneath me. For a moment I just sat there, hovering above her. Waiting.
“Punish me? You want to hurt me?”
“I will make it the most euphoric pain you have ever felt. I promise.”
Hesitating, she looked up at me, her perfect face a stunning testament to the truth of gods or Eternity or something. Nothing like this creature could exist without divine intervention of some sort.
“If you do not like this or wish for me to stop, then say…” I paused, trying to come up with a safe word. Something that would allow her a reprieve from the madness I was about to introduce her to. “Bread.”
“Bread?” she asked incredulously. We both burst into laughter, but I could still feel that anger simmering low in my gut and the terror clouding my heart. I needed this. Maybe she even needed it too.
“Your favorite,” I teased just as I swooped her up, standing and carrying her over to the spot in our room where a beam of wood cut through the ceiling.
“Stay,” I ordered, turning around and heading for my desk. Yanking open the bottom drawer, I quickly grabbed onto the red silk fabric I had bought after a daydream I had of Asher before I had even been inside of her at all. Then, I walked around her and pulled the sheet off our bed.
When I turned to face her, I found Asher still fully clothed and waiting for me. She had actually listened.
Twisting the sheet, I stalked towards her, eager to teach her what had to be the most important lesson she would ever learn.
“You stole from me, Asher.” Her already big gray eyes went wider, staring at me in shock and guilt. I only smirked, reaching out to graze her full bottom lip with my pointer finger. It was softer than usual, not as chewed and torn as it so often was from her constant stress. “You robbed me of my free will. In that field, you looked me in the eye and took yourself from me.”
Guilt clouded her face, making her expression fall. I wanted to apologize and tell her I had forgiven her, but I could not. She needed to be disciplined. Nothing was more crucial than reminding her that she was mine.
Something else twisted her face, something deeper. I felt like I could sense it somehow, like it was there at the front of my mind.
“This is real, Asher. I am real. Let me prove it.” Before she could speak, I reached forward and gripped her hair, crashing our faces together and pushing my tongue into her mouth. Her moan rattled my teeth, the vibration making my already hard cock twitch.
We were working with very little time, clearly.
Letting her go, I dropped the sheet and silk and stared at her body. Shirt first. Definitely shirt first. My hands were at the buttons of the tunic in seconds, deftly moving down them and freeing her. That was when I noticed it. Her skin, still the same shade of creamy brown, was free of any blemishes. Asher had no scars. Not a single one.
She must have realized what I was looking at, because she brought her hand to my cheek and gently caressed it.
“They took them. It must have been when I was asleep. They had me out for a week, and when I woke up, they had healed me completely. Even my hair, which had been cut off completely, was back to normal. I do not know how Tish survived it.” Her voice was a broken whisper, a plea of freedom from that pain. “They wanted me to forget.”
Bringing my lips to just below her left breast where I knew I had cut her during a training session in Elpis, I traced the now perfect skin. Then I moved, placing kisses to every spot I knew she had once been branded by violence and pain. I painted her story, doing everything I could to remind her of how far she had come.
“It was all real. I promise.” She gasped as my tongue slid across a peaked nipple. She tasted as she always had, like salvation. “Let me replace that pain, Asher. Let me remind you of just how real I am.”
Her nods were slower this time, but her body pressed into me. And oh if it did not fit perfectly.
I pulled down her trousers next, stripping her of the clothing that dared hide her from me. Because I could not stop myself, I allowed my mouth one quick taste of her. My tongue slid slowly up her soaked center, relishing in how she bucked forward and latched onto my hair.
I sucked in her clit, letting my teeth graze it before releasing it with a loud pop. Soft moans were her answer, but that simply angered me. I wanted her screams. I wanted her admittance. I wanted her submission.
Before trailing my way up her body, I grabbed the sheet once more. She looked on in confusion but remained silent.
Taking her hands, I lifted them above her head. I could feel her curiosity growing as I took the sheet and tied it around her crossed wrists. She had been tied up by me before, but if she thought this would be the same, then she was mistaken.
“Remember, my darling bloodthirsty princess: bread,” I whispered against her ear, licking the shredded top. Her shiver was glorious, but I heard a quiet giggle come from the back of her throat, and that meant she was not taking me seriously.
With a wicked smile and a slow wink, I bent my knees and then leapt up. My free hand caught the wooden beam with ease. Asher mumbled something incoherent as she watched me throw the sheet over the beam and let myself fall.
“Tell me you have not been taking lessons from Lara in sexual intimacy,” she mocked. I laughed as I pulled, tightening the sheet until her feet nearly hovered off the ground. Then I tied it, making sure she was firmly secured.
Next, I took the red silk and held it in front of her. She tilted her head to the side, observing the cloth in much the same way I would.
“You have been egregiously naughty, Asher.” She got one last look at my taunting smirk before I took the blindfold and covered her eyes. After fastening it, I was left with the sight of her completely naked body as it hung at my mercy.
“Bellamy, what is the point of this?” She squirmed as she spoke, her body twitching with unease and her perfect cunt glistening in the light that seeped through our curtains.
“The point is to remind you who you belong to.” Her dismissive huff of response made my teeth grind. I was not sure if I had ever felt this type of anger towards her. Not even when she tried to marry that ridiculous mortal prince. Regardless of whether or not he had no memories, that did not rid him of my ire. Of my deep desire to tear open his stomach and string his guts across our room as I fucked her.
But this now, it positively infuriated me.
Asher wanted to play the martyr. Well, I would show her that she would be nothing but a queen and a conqueror.
“I dare you to forget you are mine. The moment you try to leave for what you claim to be the greater good, I will drag you back kicking and cursing. I will punish you until I am drenched in your satisfaction and unhearing from your screams.” I grabbed her face, my thumb and fingers pressing into her cheeks until her lips puckered. I wanted her to feel just how much I meant what I was about to say. “You want to be self-sacrificing? Good, sacrifice yourself to me. You can be my brave, gorgeous hero, and I your wicked, filthy villain.”
And then I leaned in and pressed our lips together. It was no loving kiss like before. This was a joining that could demolish entire worlds. Ours was a union that could bring the universe itself to yield.
Asher’s mouth was just as desperate and needy as mine, our teeth clashing when we got too eager. Letting my free hand glide down the curves of her body, I slipped my mouth free of hers and moved my lips towards her ear.
“Tell me, Asher, what are you?” I asked as I brought my ringed thumb to her clit, pressing firmly as I circled it.
Asher liked pressure. She enjoyed quick fingers and slow tongues. Her body always arched more when I curved my digits inside of her. She loved when I flicked her nipples with my tongue more than she enjoyed when I placed kisses to them. Her moans were always louder when I honed in on the spot of her neck that curved into her shoulder. She did not care much for her feet being touched, though I had tried just for the fun of it. I had yet to attempt anything with her perfect ass, but I knew she loved when I squeezed it as I lifted her. Asher liked submitting, but only here. Only to me. I knew what she liked. I knew everything about her. So utterly obsessed and thankful was I, that I had devoted more time than I realized to learning her. And I would use every bit of that knowledge today.
“What do you mean?” she asked breathlessly, her head pressing into her left shoulder as she tried to tighten her body where she hung.
“You know what I mean. What are you?” I rasped into her ear, switching to my pointer and middle finger so I could move faster against her. Her head fell back at the new sensation, and I leaned in to ravage that very spot on her neck I knew she loved, now speaking against her skin. “Come on, beautiful creature, tell me what you are. Who you are. Please, for me.”
“I am—” She cut herself off with a moan as I let my mouth trail downwards. “I am the—” Again she silenced herself, this time to bite down on her bottom lip as my tongue offered another flick against her hard nipple. “Eternity above, Bellamy, how am I supposed to speak when you insist on—”
“Wrong,” I growled, letting my knees hit the floor and leaning away from her.
From this vantage point, I could see everything. She was like a deity before me. A goddess in the flesh there to make me remember I must bow and pray. She was deliverance incarnate.
“You are Asher Daniox,” I said, leaning closer to the heat between her thighs. “The rightful ruler of two realms.” Closer. “Manipulator and holder of minds. The salvation of Alemthian. The vanquisher of evil.” Almost there. “You are a survivor. You are the sun and the moon and the stars in the sky. You are everything, Asher.” A mere inch away. “But most of all, you are mine.”
I latched onto her like I might fall to the depths of the Underworld if I did not have her to anchor me. She screamed out, the first of many shouts that might tell the world that it was I and only I who brought her such pleasure.
Only my need for air stopped me after I began, the desperation to devour her so strong that I resisted my lungs cries for as long as I could. When I did stop, I used those precious seconds to pull her legs up and rest her thighs on my shoulders. Her shriek of surprise forced laughter from my lips, but I was quick to silence myself with the press of my entire face between her thighs.
“Bellamy, what are you—”
“Yes, shout my name,” I groaned onto her swollen clit. She began grinding against my face and squeezing me with her thighs, keeping me locked into place as she fucked my face. From there, speaking was not possible, so I waited and watched. I savored her ecstasy, but I relished in what I knew was to come. Just as she began to shake, the spasms vibrating against my shoulders, I smirked and tossed her off.
A hiss of pain met my chuckles as I slowly stood. When I reached out and lifted the red silk, I was met with a delicious glare. She murdered me with her eyes as she swung, her toes trying to find purchase on the ground. Staring at her had my mind straying to a rather wicked option. One that would prevent her from ever leaving—from even being able to.
I wanted a blood oath.
“You can come when you have learned your lesson. By the end of this, you will cut open your pretty little hand and vow to never leave me. When I am through with you, there will be no mistaking who you belong to, Asher.” I let my words register, her gaze going wide as she suddenly tried to free herself. “At your wits end already? You know the word. Say it and I will untie you and let you go on without offering me your oath.”
She stared and stared, those stormy eyes calculating.
No doubt trying to find her way out of this.
“If you use your magic on me, Asher, you will find me far less forgiving,” I warned. A smile twisted my face, curling upwards. “If you would only listen, I think you would find you like being punished by me, beautiful creature.”
A shiver seemed to crawl up her body, starting at her toes and climbing to the tips of her fingers. No matter what she said, Asher did like when I took control. Her reluctance to give it was a coping mechanism, a defense against pain. But inside, she knew I would never take advantage of her submission to truly hurt her.
Finally, she bobbed her head down and up, my permission restored. So I moved closer and returned her blindfold before circling her, watching as her ears guided her. She was half fae, after all. But I did not mind that. In fact, I wanted her to know where I was. To taunt and tease her. That was part of the fun.
“You have left me time and time again. Each hurt worse than the last. I find I have grown tired of being abandoned.” My hand darted out and smacked her bare ass, the skin instantly tinting red. She yelped, the momentum from my strike forcing her to swing again. “Tired does not explain it well enough. Exhausted. Infuriated. Those are better.”
Again I slapped her, the sting of my hand meeting her other cheek pairing with the sounds of both of our quiet moans. Her legs twisted, thighs pressing together and drawing my attention. Then I offered a slap to her center, earning a soft shout. Eight more times I let my hand mark her, both breasts now as pink as her ass and dripping cunt.
“Please, Bell.” Begging. I loved the sound of it falling from her lips.
Opening my trousers, I shoved them down my legs and quickly kicked them off. Then I reached back and gripped the collar of my shirt, pulling it over my head and letting the fabric pool next to my discarded pants. Her head was leaning towards me, listening.
Of all the things I knew I wanted my hands on, those thighs were at the top of the list. Grabbing them, I squeezed and forced her legs to part for me. She allowed me to do it, wrapping them around my waist when she realized what I was doing.
“Can you feel how real I am?” I asked as I let my hard cock rub against her. More breathy moans mingled as we both fought to stay in control. When I repeated the movement, her head fell back and her chest pushed forward. Nothing could have stopped me from bending my head and licking one of her nipples—from tasting her.
“Yes!” she shrieked. Whether it was in response to how real I was or the action itself I did not know, but I did it again, tonguing her nipple until she was grinding against me and using the rope to hold herself higher. Anything to give her some semblance of control back.
I stopped, pulling my body away and only barely holding her up by the back of her knees.
“No!” she yelled this time. I gave her a gentle kiss, letting my tongue dart into her mouth and slowly massage hers. She groaned and writhed, but I did not submit.
“You will bleed and promise before you come,” I whispered into her mouth. She had no chance to argue, because I let go of one of her legs and positioned myself at her core. When I shoved in, she screamed out. I savored the moment briefly, trying to rein in my desperation to pour into her while also basking in the perfection of her. Grabbing her knee again, I pushed both up to her chest, folding her in half. Then I set a brutal pace, the wet sound of our bodies coming together again and again like an erotic symphony.
It took every ounce of my own self-control not to burst inside of her as she became more frantic with her moans, clawing her nails against the sheet and arching her back. And just when she seemed like she could not take any more, her legs once more shaking violently against me, I freed myself of her warmth.
“Bellamy I will fucking kill you where you—” I ate her words, swallowing them whole and letting them sink into my stomach.
“Bleed for me, Ash. Promise me you will never leave me again,” I panted into her mouth. She groaned, pushing herself into me, rubbing her clit against my aching cock.
“You will finish what you have started even if I say no, I think we both know that.” Her words were a slap to the face, but oh was she right. There was no way I would be able to resist her. No world in which I could refuse her.
“I will not pretend like you are wrong,” I admitted, still holding her up. She huffed.
“Give me a fucking blade before I change my mind.” There was a split second where I stood, frozen. She was…agreeing. Gods, she was saying yes! “Hurry up!”
“Bossy bossy,” I purred, letting her legs fall. She growled as she swung, kicking me in the shin before I could get away. My laughs practically spilled out of me as I opened the drawer in my side table and grabbed a dagger.
She waited, breathing heavily and clenching her thighs. I wanted so badly to cut her, to let her blood drip onto me. Instead, I grabbed her wrists and slashed the sheet. She yelped as her feet flattened, falling against me and using her now free hands to grip my shoulders in panic. Smirking, I reached up and pulled off her blindfold.
Gray eyes met mine, and I swore I could have found release at the mere sight of the love there in the stormy depths. She watched intently as I brought the blade to my palm and closed my fist around it. The sound of my flesh splitting was the only one other than our breaths as I sliced upwards.
“Together?” I asked, handing her the blade and exposing my bloody palm to her.
“Always.” She smiled, grabbed the blade, and cut a line diagonally down her palm. She lifted her hand, pressing it against mine and threading our fingers together.
“I vow to never leave you willingly. To remain by your side for the rest of my life. You are mine, and I am yours.” Emotions made my voice hoarse as I spoke. We would make similar vows on our wedding day, but blood oaths were binding. Breaking them would strip you of a piece of yourself—tearing apart what made someone intrinsically them.
“I vow to never leave you willingly. To remain by your side for the rest of my life. You are mine, and I am yours.” Her repetition of the words was stronger, but still husky. I felt the oath slink into my blood, binding us. The tingle seemed to travel to my heart, passing the wards there and wrapping the organ in our promise.
With that, I used my free hand to lift her by her thigh, pushing both of us to the ground. Our lips clashed, my cock sliding back inside of her with ease. We made love like only those who were always meant to be could. It was as if the world itself was pushing us together.
“You and I—our love—will reshape this world, Asher. We will make something better. We will dream.” I moaned the words against her neck, trying to remind her that in the end, I wanted what she wanted. As long as I had her to show for it, that was.
When her orgasm freed her mind of every word but my name, I lost all control. My release came and went, cresting and crashing like waves. And when the sea settled, it was just as we said.
Asher and I, together always.