Chapter 18 #2
He drew back just enough to look at her, his amethyst eyes blazing with barely restrained desire.
His hands moved from the last clasp of her gown to the delicate ties of her undergarments, fingers working with surprising deftness despite the determination running through him.
Each ribbon loosened was like another wall crumbling between who they’d been and who they were becoming, until the soft fabric slid away entirely, leaving nothing between his touch and her bare skin.
Cool air kissed her, raising goosebumps that had nothing to do with temperature. His gaze traveled over her slowly, possessively, as if committing every curve and hollow to memory.
“Perfect,” he murmured, the word carrying authority. “Every part of you.”
“Show me,” she said, reaching for him with steady hands. “Show me what we fought for.”
Her fingers found the edges of his formal jacket, pushing it back over his shoulders.
He shrugged out of it impatiently, letting it fall forgotten to the marble floor.
Beneath, his shirt strained across the breadth of his chest. She made quick work of the fastenings, her hands trembling with urgency now.
When she finally bared his chest, she couldn’t help but trace the lines of old scars with her fingertips, a map of battles won and survived.
He stood still under her exploration, letting her learn him, his breathing growing heavier with each stroke.
The faint shimmer of his skin seemed brighter now, pulsing in time with the Valenmark.
“We have spent our lives destroying what others built,” he said, voice thick with emotion. “Now we create.”
She answered him not with words but with a kiss that held every unspoken promise. Her hands slid up his chest, over his shoulders, into his silver hair. She pulled him closer, needing the full length of him against her, skin to skin, heat to heat.
He groaned into her mouth, his constraint fracturing.
His hands moved to her hips, lifting her fully onto the ledge and stepping between her parted thighs.
The pressure of him against her core, made her gasp.
She could feel the hard evidence of his desire, the ridged texture pressing insistently, promising sensations she remembered and craved.
“Emmeline,” he breathed, forehead pressed to hers. “I need you to understand what this means. Here. In this sacred place. This is more than passion. It’s a covenant.”
“I know.” Her voice shook but held conviction. “That’s why I want it. That’s why I want you. All of you. Now.”
Something in him broke free. His mouth crashed against hers with renewed hunger. She reached for his waistband, fumbling with the fastenings until he helped her, stripping away the last barriers between them.
When he stood naked before her, she couldn’t help but drink him in. He was magnificent, all lean muscle and coiled power, his body a weapon honed by centuries of warfare. But it was the vulnerability in his eyes that undid her, the way he looked at her as if she held his entire world in her hands.
And perhaps she did.
She reached for him, her palm sliding along his length, along the textured surface pulsing beneath her touch.
He made a sound low in his throat—half growl, half prayer—his hips pushing forward into her hand.
She explored him with confident strokes along his pulsating mounds, watching his face as she learned what made his breath catch, what made his eyes roll back.
“Emmeline—” Her name came out strangled. “Stop, or I won’t last.”
“Then take me,” she whispered, guiding him closer. “Claim what’s yours.”
He positioned himself at her entrance, the head of him pressing against her slick heat. But instead of pushing forward, he paused, his free hand coming up to cup her face with devastating tenderness.
“Look at me,” he said softly. “I want you to see me when we become one.”
Their eyes locked as he began to enter her. The stretch was exquisite, familiar yet overwhelming, the rhythm of his mounds creating friction that stole her breath. She whimpered, not from pain, but from the sheer intensity of him filling her, claiming her, completing her.
“That’s it,” he murmured, voice strained with effort. “Open for me. Take all of me.”
She did, her body yielding inch by inch until he was fully seated inside her. The fullness was almost unbearable in its perfection. For a moment they simply stayed like that, joined, trembling, clinging to one another.
“We fit,” she breathed. “Like we were made for this.”
“We were.” He pulled back slowly, then thrust forward with controlled power. “Made for this. Made for each other.”
He set a rhythm that was both powerful and demanding, each stroke deliberate, purposeful. This wasn’t the desperate coupling of their first time. This was something deeper. A claiming. A consecration. Every movement spoke of possession and partnership, dominance and devotion tangled into one.
The chamber’s air warmed, vibrating with their shared heartbeat.
Every pulse from the Valenmark sent a shimmer of light rolling over their skin, tracing their outlines like living fire.
The cushions beneath her was cool but she burned, her body aflame with sensation as he drove into her again and again.
She hooked her ankles behind his back, changing the angle, pulling him impossibly deeper. He groaned, the sound raw and desperate, and captured her mouth in a bruising kiss. His tongue mimicked the rhythm of his hips, claiming her in every way possible.
“You’re everything,” he informed her. “Everything I never dared hope for.”
“Then don’t just hope,” she challenged breathlessly. “Make it real.”
His hand slipped between their bodies, finding the swollen nub at her apex. He circled it with firm pressure, matching the rhythm of his thrusts. The dual sensation was overwhelming. Her head fell back, a cry tearing from her throat.
The Valenmark’s glow intensified, spilling threads of silver and gold across the dais, the floor, the high vault of the chamber. It pulsed with the rhythm of their hearts, its glow reaching up the dome like a sunrise. The ancient stones seemed to sing, resonating with their passion.
Every sound sharpened, the slap of flesh against flesh, the soft hitch of her breath, the deep rumble of his voice as he praised her, demanded from her, claimed her. Their world contracted into sensation—heat, breath, the glimmer of light at the edge of vision.
“Don’t close your eyes,” he commanded roughly. “Stay with me. I want to watch you shatter.”
She forced her gaze to his, seeing herself reflected in those amethyst depths—wild, wanton, utterly his. The intimacy of it, the intense vulnerability, pushed her closer to the edge.
“Apex— I’m close—”
“Then fall,” he urged, his movements becoming fiercer, more urgent. “Fall and I will catch you. Always.”
His fingers pressed harder against her sensitive flesh, his hips driving forward with relentless precision.
The pressure built and built until she couldn’t contain it anymore.
Her orgasm crashed over her like a tsunami, violent and all-consuming.
She screamed his name, her body clamping around him in powerful waves.
The sensation triggered his own release.
He thrust deep one final time, his entire body going rigid as completion took him.
His shout of triumph echoed through the chamber, primal and victorious.
His knot swelled within her, locking them together.
The Valenmark exploded with radiance so intense it illuminated every corner of the vast space, the pattern spiraling outward until the entire dome blazed with the symbol of their bond written in light.
They clung to each other, shaking, as aftershocks rippled through them both. Gradually the light settled to a warm, steady glow. He lifted his head to look at her, and the tenderness in his expression made her throat tight with emotion.
“You are my beginning and my balance,” he said, voice rough with emotion.
Her eyes glistened with unshed tears—joy and relief and overwhelming love. “And you are mine.”
He kissed her then, slow and deep, a sealing of vows spoken and unspoken. When he finally withdrew from her body, she made a small sound of loss. He smiled—that rare, precious expression—and gathered her against his chest, lifting her off the cushions.
He guided her to where ceremonial cushions lay scattered in one section of the sitting area, remnants of some ancient ritual. He arranged them quickly into a makeshift bed and drew her down beside him, pulling her into his arms.
They lay tangled together, limbs entwined, hearts still racing in unison. The Valenmark pulsed steadily between them, a constant reminder of what they’d built together. Not just a bond, but a future. Not just survival, but triumph.
Emmy traced idle patterns on his chest, his heartbeat slowing beneath her palm. “The war is over,” she said softly. “What do we do now?”
“Now?” He pressed a kiss to her forehead. “Now we live. We build. We love.” His arms tightened around her. “We create the world we want instead of destroying what others made.”
She smiled against his skin. “That sounds like a good plan.”
“It is the only plan,” he said. “As long as I have you.”
“You do,” she promised. “For as long as we both shall live.”
The chamber around them hummed with contentment, the ancient stones remembering what it felt like to witness not war, but peace.
Not ending, but beginning. The light from their joined marks painted hope across the walls, a promise that what they’d forged together was stronger than any weapon, more enduring than any empire.
They had fought for this moment. Bled for it. Nearly died for it.
And now, finally, they could live for it.
Together.
Above them, the dome continued to glow softly, constellations rearranged into the eternal spiral of the Valenmark—a testament written in light for all who came after. This was their legacy. Not destruction, but creation. Not war, but love.
And it was enough.
More than enough.
It was everything.
This concludes the Intergalactic Warriors series. But an exciting series kicks off next with The Alien War King, the first book in The Krymmerians, part of The Alien Mating Auction!