Chapter 13 Morco #2
“No. Much lighter, like…” She struggled to find a comparison and fell silent when she failed.
“The air moves, so the outside always feels fresh. Only indoors does it feel stagnant, like it does down here. The lands of my kingdom are beautiful, flowers in bloom in the valleys everywhere, the castle perched on a low mountain. There are many things I can share, but they’re impossible to describe when this is all you’ve known. ”
“What do you love most about it?”
She considered the question carefully. “The sunsets. My father and I used to watch them together on warm summer nights. The pastries the chefs used to make every morning, the croissants and scones. The song of birds on a spring morning.” Her eyes glazed over like she had been transported elsewhere.
“The gardens at the castle…all the flowers and bushes and trees.” Her mind continued to drift in the waters of the past before it sharpened and came back to me.
I’d only felt gratitude that she’d ended up here, and for the first time, I felt pity.
She’d lived a life of luxury in a beautiful castle, with wealth and power, her father the king.
I suddenly felt inadequate, because I couldn’t give her those things.
“I’m sorry that you’re here.” She’d been a blessing to me, but this place would always be a curse to her.
Her eyebrows furrowed slightly, either in confusion or surprise at what I’d said. Then they softened in a tone of sadness. “I’m not.”
The flush of heat was instantaneous, making me draw an involuntary breath I didn’t need when she knocked the wind out of me.
My hands ached with desperation, and my mouth suddenly felt numb without her kiss to make it burn.
I was even more aware of the swell of her breasts under her clothing, the toned shape of her legs in her trousers.
The girls had sewn her better clothes once she’d been accepted, and the outline of her curves had driven me crazy ever since.
I’d never wanted a woman more, and I knew it was because I wanted more than her flesh, but her soul underneath.
I wished I weren’t going to be her first so I didn’t have to handle this situation with such sensitivity, but I also yearned to be her first. “I should go.” I forced the words out of an uncooperative mouth, broke my gaze from hers because those eyes made me so volatile.
Without waiting for her reaction, I left the chair and turned toward the door, trying to cut a connection that was harder than the stone of the fireplace.
She left her chair and came up behind me. “Morco.”
I kept my back to her, knowing whatever she was about to say would make this worse.
“I want you to stay.”
I clenched my eyes the way I clenched my fists, the most extravagant meal dangled in front of a starving wolf.
She moved her hand to the back of my arm.
I could feel her fingers flinch at the touch, as if she felt something when we made contact.
Then she gently grabbed me, stroked my muscles with her fingertips.
“The maids would sneak their lovers into their quarters. My father would do the same with his mistresses. Sometimes I would see lovers come into the garden at night to make love under the stars. I want that too…and I want it with you.”
It was the first time in my life I felt bumps over my arms, and it wasn’t because I was cold. I turned back to her, my head tilted down to meet her gaze below. “As do I. But you’re pure and innocent, and it feels wrong to claim your lands in my name when I haven’t earned it.”
“It’s not something you earn. It’s something you’re given, and I get to choose when to give it.”
It was the most arousing moment of my life, and we were both fully clothed. But my honor bound me in place, my respect for her infallible.
She must have seen the refusal in my eyes because she said, “You said you and Allegra were just fucking. Is that what you want with me? Is that the problem—”
“No.” I felt the features of my face tighten in insult. I was hurt by the accusation, but I knew she was just trying to understand my resistance, not comprehending my position in the matter, how delicate it was. “The opposite.”
The hurt in her features wilted like the wet petals of a flower.
“I still want you to stay.” A slow confidence crept into her stare, a surge of bravery that emerged when she wanted something with all her heart.
Her eyes dropped to my chest, and she raised her hand before placing it over my heart.
Her touch was light at first before she flattened her palm and applied pressure to feel my heart beat.
She stared as the vibrations quickened against her palm, feeling the way she made my heart race.
Her stare remained for nearly a minute before her eyes came back to me.
My resistance waned, and I slid my hand deep into her soft hair and crushed my mouth to hers, listening to her gasp right before I took her breath. I squeezed her to me as my lips worshipped hers, as I felt our mouths move together like they’d known each other from years of acquaintance.
She was quick to touch me, her arm circling my neck, her fingers deep in my hair.
She was on her tiptoes to kiss me, her firm tits against my chest. She was the one to give me tongue first, her soft lips feeling mine after mine felt hers.
She moaned quietly into my mouth as if a storm of pleasure already rushed through her.
I gripped her tight ass through her trousers. I gently bit her bottom lip with my teeth before I let her go. I reached behind my shoulders and yanked my shirt forward over my head and let it fall to the floor.
She hesitated as she stared at me, eyes taking me in with slightly parted lips, her breaths slowly elevating the longer she stared, like she’d never seen a man with his shirt off.
She moved her hand to my chest, but instead of landing over my heart, she touched the center then slowly ran her fingers down, over my sternum, over the muscles of my stomach and the segments between, all the way down to the line of hair that disappeared beneath my trousers.
I guided her back to the bed then pulled her boots off before I kicked off my own. I reached for her trousers and unbuttoned them, watching her reaction to my touch, seeing if she showed any sign of hesitation.
I let the pants fall to her ankles and saw her standing in her underwear, thin gray cloth that stopped below her belly button. I moved my hand to her ass again, and I squeezed it as I kissed her once more.
She cupped my cheek, and she kissed me harder than before. She hooked her arm under my shoulder and dug her nails into the muscles of my back. She explored my body with her touch, mapped it out with her fingertips. A little moan escaped her lips again, like this wasn’t going fast enough.
I removed my pants, standing in the black shorts that I wore underneath my clothing.
She propped herself up on her elbows and stared at me as I stood beside the bed, studying the appearance of my body without clothing, her gaze mesmerized by the sight.
My knees hit the bed, and I joined her on the sheets, holding myself over her as I kissed her again, her kiss hungrier than it’d been a moment before. She circled my hips and squeezed my body as she gripped my arms, as her thumbs pressed into the segments between the muscles underneath my skin.
I moved my kiss to her neck and heard her gasp, her fingers digging into my hair, her nails clawing at my back like I’d done something more intimate.
I pushed up her shirt to expose her tight stomach, and I pressed kisses there, feeling her squirm and writhe like she was on the verge of a climax when I hadn’t touched her where she needed to be touched.
She was the one who pulled her shirt over her head.
She revealed a white garment underneath, crested with jewels along the cups, one of the few things she must have had from her previous life.
The piece was soft and made of material I didn’t recognize.
She pulled down each strap from her shoulder, and then her tits were revealed.
Firm and round with little nipples in the centers, a beautiful bust.
I felt the thrill skate up my spine, my mind having imagined their appearance on more than one occasion. Now I saw them in the flesh and remembered why I’d avoided intimacy—because I didn’t want to control myself.
She sat up slightly and reached behind her, undoing the material somehow against her back. She pulled it aside and dropped it to the floor next to my trousers.
I stopped to stare at her underneath me, rosy-pink flesh over a beautiful heart. Perfect tits for her petite size. The nicest set I’d ever seen. I moved my face right between them, and she moaned at the contact, her fingers deep in my hair.
I kissed the valley between her breasts, kissed and sucked each of her nipples before I palmed them each. She inhaled a deep breath at every touch, like each one was brand-new to her, like no man had explored her body the way I was.
I gripped her panties and gave them a tug before I looked at her, to check that this last step was okay.
She lifted her hips like she couldn’t get them off fast enough.
I pulled them down her legs, revealing light, curly hairs in the center. I imagined her sex was as anxious as the rest of her, glistening and slick, wet enough to take my size. But I pushed the thought away, knowing that wasn’t how this night would end.
I looked her over, a tight little waist and sexy hips, a woman’s tits on a petite chest, soft skin that had a rosy glow, hair that looked golden in the firelight—and eyes that sparkled like jewels.
Fuck.
I moved back over her and dipped my head to hers, catching her anxious lips. She gripped my arms as she kissed me back, releasing her excited breaths into my mouth, letting some of them catch on my tongue.
She reached for my shorts and started to tug them down.
I almost let her.
I guided her hand to my chest and continued to kiss her.
She didn’t try again.
We kissed and touched in her bed until the fire nearly went out, which meant at least an hour had passed. I tasted her nipples and her lips and her skin. I listened to her moan for me like I was deep inside her.
I made my way down her chest and stomach until I hooked her legs back and tilted her hips. My arms kept her in place, and I listened to her breathing, like she knew what I was about to do.
I pressed my mouth to her lower lips and kissed her, and the gasp she made was practically a scream.
As if she’d never known pleasure like this, she sucked in a harsh breath and stiffened.
I gave her soft kisses at first, to let her adjust to the intense feeling between her legs.
But then I kissed her like I wanted, swiping my tongue against the nub that made her gasp and teary in the eyes.
“Oh fuck.” She trembled and moaned and cried, as if her little body couldn’t accept everything I gave her.
I knew she was at the end, writhing and squirming like she didn’t know how to prepare for the surge of pleasure that would rip her into two. I reached for her hands, interlocking our fingers, and I let her squeeze me as I continued to kiss her nub as hard as I kissed her mouth.
And then she came with a cry, a cry that was so loud, others might have heard it.
There were tears and winces and moans, her hips bucking against my mouth like she’d lost control of her body.
Her hands gripped mine the way a soldier gripped the hilt of his blade.
Her moans dwindled in sound but not intensity, and slowly, the high started to fade lower until it disappeared altogether.
There was nothing I wanted more than to take her.
But I moved back up her body and kissed her again, let her taste herself on my mouth, dug my hand into her hair as I felt my shorts grow damp from the wetness between her legs. I knew she must have felt the hardness I was containing.
I moved to the spot beside her on the small bed and pulled the sheets over us both, covering her to her chest.
She seemed winded and exhausted by what had happened. It took her a moment to roll onto her side and face me, her eyes containing a dreamlike quality I’d never seen before. She looked me in the eye for a long time before she came closer, hooking her leg over my hip and her arm around my neck.
Face-to-face, we lay there in the silence, her blue eyes on my dark ones, and we stared at each other as the fire slowly burned out behind her.
I slid my hand up her cheek and into her hair, pulling the tangles from her face, seeing her eyes soften at my touch.
She even turned into the embrace slightly, like my warm affection meant the world to her.
Her hand went to my wrist, and she closed her eyes, like all she wanted was this—us.