30. Hevva’s hand is tied.
thirty
Hevva’s hand is tied.
“ T hank you.” Hevva beamed at yet another well-wisher as she and her husband attempted to escape from their wedding breakfast.
“Congratulations, Your Majesties,” another wedding guest shouted as they passed the last of the tables.
“Thank you kindly.” King Hethtar tugged his wife along by their beribboned hands, though they’d likely have had their fingers interlocked regardless of the wrappings holding them tight.
“Congratulations again, brother,” Nekash began as he stepped into their path. “Sister,” he added, looking at Hevva through two black eyes. The left one, a standard purple fading to green, was from Ehmet. The right one, an angry mottled burgundy with some scratches—from sand—that was from her.
“No, thank you,” Hevva replied, pulling Ehmet to the side so they could skirt the prince and escape the crush.
Ehmet chuckled, allowing her to lead the way.
For a month they’d made Nekash await his punishment for fucking with their relationship. Hevva and Ehmet had their initial conversation with him weeks before, upon their return to Kirce. It was around the same time Great-Uncle Yusuf was stripped of his dukedom and left as nothing but an honorary lord. The other lords and ladies were contrite, sending lavish engagement gifts they all knew were little more than thinly veiled apologies for aligning with the wrong side.
Nekash claimed he’d acted out of fear Yusuf would win the Crown. Lady Tahereh had been the most viable option: She was the right age, would win Ehmet another ally in her father, and would not result in lost votes. Ehmet made it clear he wasn’t sold on the prince’s story. It was more likely Nekash was being Nekash, trying to steal something away from his older brother. Hevva figured the truth was somewhere in the middle.
He knew punishment was coming; they knew it was coming. And so, four nights before their wedding, Ehmet dragged his brother into the training room for a fist to face conversation that also included many choice words. Hevva pinned him to the wall, the wood floor doing her bidding, and she’d railed on the man too, for his shoddy behavior, blatant manipulation, and clear lack of morals. Then she’d sent a walloping magical punch, a blend of sand and wood, to mar his other eye, well-timed for the lascivious prince to try to pick up new ladies in waiting at the upcoming royal nuptials. She’d have used her fist, but he wasn’t worth the energy.
“Finally!” Hevva exclaimed on a release of breath when the ballroom door closed behind them.
Ehmet growled in response and halted his forward motion. With a jerk of his left arm, he stopped her as well. Hevva spun round to face him and tumbled forward into his chest with a gasp of laughter. With their bound hands tucked between them, Ehmet reached down with his free one to wrap his large palm around her bottom.
He gave her a squeeze, and she squealed as his pinky finger dipped briefly into the space between her thighs, wiggling. Then he applied a firm, broad pressure, pulling her into him. “Jump up.”
She obliged. Her skirts pulled tight around her legs as she struggled to latch on to her husband. “Don’t let go.”
“Never.” He held firm as she used her free arm to tug free her skirts.
When her ankles were locked around Ehmet, she pressed a kiss to his mouth and demanded he take her to bed.
He obliged.
Kicking the doors closed behind them, Ehmet crossed their salon and continued on. Stopping at the bed, he deposited his wife on the mattress with such force she toppled backward, pulling him down atop her.
She shrieked beneath him, her voice dropping into a low hum when Ehmet nipped at the lobe of her ear.
“I need to see you naked.”
“Mmm,” she agreed. “But we cannot untie these until the morning.” Hevva tugged at their bound hands, pulling them up and out from where they’d been trapped between them. The green and gold ribbons shimmered in afternoon sunlight. One cord symbolized their bond, their joining of paths, their commitment to one another, mind, body, and soul. The second was unique to marriage between king and queen. It represented commitment to their people, to justly rule, and to always love and protect the citizens of Selwas. They could not, under any circumstances, remove the ribbons until the following dawn, or their marriage would certainly be cursed.
“I could rip it off.”
Her eyes widened.
“Your dress.”
“Oh yes, please do.”
Within moments, the tearing of fabric rent the room as he divested her from her gown of silver and he from his suit of bottle green. A quickly crafted knife was required to cut through Ehmet’s wool tailcoat, the thing was sturdy.
She writhed beneath him, impatient as always while he clambered out of his pants. “I want you,” Hevva rasped, clawing at his shoulder with her free hand.
“I’m coming, give me a moment here.” He laughed, kicking free from the offending fabric.
And he was over top of her, with their connected hands stretched high above her head.
“Hevva,” he breathed as his darkened eyes raked down the length of her. “Gods, what I wouldn’t give to have this hand free right now.” He wiggled his fingers against hers.
“I guess you’ll have to use your mouth. ”
“And you yours.” He bent his face to kiss her on the corner of her lips.
Snaking her fingers through his thick hair, Hevva tugged him to her. She angled his head to her liking and gave him a searing kiss that put to bed all those weeks and weeks of confused longing and heartache.
Nose to nose, they gazed into each other’s eyes.
“I love you,” they murmured at the same time, before bursting into giddy laughter.
Giggling into each other’s mouths, they tangled again, rolling across the bed until Hevva wound up on top. She pushed her palm against Ehmet’s chest as she straddled him with her knees pressed into the mattress on either side of his hips. Lifted up as she was, he had perfect access to her center. He swiped her from back to front with the tip of his finger. Then, as though he couldn’t help it, with the entire palm of his hand. She mewed. He drew back, studying her.
She put her weight down, pressing her center against his length, and Ehmet let out a feral growl.
Hevva rocked her body, the friction eliciting a cry of ecstasy. Spears of pleasure pierced her, emanating out from her most sensitive spot and twisting through her every fiber. Angling her hips, she ground against him in slow gyrating circles.
“Stop that,” he commanded. “I will finish before we’ve even begun.”
She threw her head back and laughed, rocking against him again.
In response, he engulfed her waist with his free hand. Letting loose a guttural groan laced with desire, Ehmet swiftly rolled her onto her back.
Over top again, he gazed down into her eyes. All vestiges of green had vanished from his own as deep desire consumed his irises. “Please?” He cocked his head in question as the tip of his erection pressed against her swollen sex.
Hevva nodded at her husband before tugging him down for a kiss. “I am so happy that we saved this for now.”
“Have you done this before?”
She dipped her chin.
He growled.
“It wasn’t all that good.” Sir Gamil had nothing on Ehmet. She hadn’t even loved him, not really. “What about you?”
He nodded and she grumbled in response. “It wasn’t good, either.” He laughed.
“Let’s never speak of that again.”
“Agreed.” He captured her mouth with his own as his straining erection nudged against her, seeking home.
“Please,” she whimpered, wiggling each time his hot flesh teased her sensitive nerves. With her free hand she groped him, kneading his chest before sliding around to grip his arse. “Please? I need you.”
He lowered himself atop her, using his knees and the forearm that was bound to her to keep some of his weight off as he fisted his length and guided himself to Hevva’s entrance. Ehmet pushed in the tiniest bit, before pulling away again.
“No!”
He chuckled and pressed the broad head of his shaft against her, slicking it up through her wetness to apply pressure to her clitoris.
“Please, Ehmet?” She writhed against him, begging for more.
“Hevva.” He bent, breathing her name into her mouth as his length found her entrance again, and he pushed his tip into her sopping core.
“Ehmet,” she gasped against him as she accepted his girth. She was grateful, so very grateful he paused for a moment for her to expand to accommodate him. She’d done this before, yes, but it was a very long time ago. Plus, Gamil had nothing on Ehmet. Her newly relaxed muscles remembered what was happening, tensing around him as she pulsed, needy.
He moaned, tightening his grasp on their interwoven hands. “Ready?” Ehmet murmured against her lips as his body shuddered from restraint.
With their entwined hands taut above her head, she did all that she could think of in the moment and clawed at his bottom, yanking him into her in one fell swoop. He groaned as she cried out, her pulsing walls contracting wildly around his length.
“Hevva,” he ground out again. Then he was moving, pressure and strength thrusting in and out of her slowly, deliberately, languidly.
He wound her up tighter and tighter with each deliciously slow press into her body. Ehmet held firm, his entire length sheathed within her, balls pressed against her arse, and pelvis giving fleeting pressure to her needy sex. He ground against her before drawing away, lifting her higher and higher.
“Please, Ehmet, please, fuck me? I need you,” she rasped.
And he did, losing any restraint he still possessed. Ehmet’s rhythmic thrusting grew frantic as he rammed into her over and over, filling her to depths she never imagined possible.
Hevva wrapped her legs up and around him, not allowing him to escape as they ground together. Words of “love” and “forever” accompanied the pleas they panted into each other’s mouths.
She rolled her hips against his, and the tangle of their hot tongues coiled her tighter within. Then, like the moons on the lawn when he proposed, she was floating.
Hevva soared into the sky as he lit her up from the inside out. And with a final shaking thrust, he exploded inside her as he cried out her name. She shattered simultaneously into a thousand tiny petals of moonlight that fluttered down to the ground.
“Ehmet,” she murmured. Her hand found his hair and she pulled him down.
“I love you, my Saka.” He smiled into her mouth. “You are positively luminous.”
“I love you, my Berim.” Bonelessly, her legs slid from his back and came to rest again upon the bed.
Ehmet rolled onto his side, bracing himself on the forearm of their linked side as he gazed down into her face.
“I am so glad I found you, my common king.” She beamed.
“And I am so glad I found you, my reluctant queen.”