Chapter 39 #2
His grin was absolutely lethal. “I want you,” he said, each word deliberate.
Clear. “Have wanted you since you first walked into my castle covered in blood and radiating murder. I want to take you to my chambers and worship every inch of you until you forget your own name. I want to hear you scream mine until your voice breaks. Is that clear enough?”
His words shattered something in me.
That tightly wound thing I’d been guarding behind sarcasm and restraint? Gone. Melted under the weight of his words, of the promise laced between every syllable.
Still, I wasn’t ready to surrender. Not yet.
“I don’t know…” I dragged the words out, slow and dangerous, my fingers walking up the front of his shirt one button at a time. “I think I need you to be more specific. You want to worship me? Sounds like a lot of work.”
Varyth’s jaw twitched. “Isara.” A warning. A plea.
I grinned. Bit my lower lip like I knew what it did to him. Because I did, and I was going to use every weapon I had. “You sure it’s me you want? I mean, Fenric does have that charming smile—”
His hands snapped to my thighs, grip bruising as he yanked me forward so I was flush against him, every inch of his body screaming restraint that was rapidly fracturing.
“Don’t,” he growled against my neck, lips brushing skin. “Don’t say his name while I’ve got you like this.”
My breath hitched. “Why not? Worried I’ll compare—”
His mouth devoured the rest of the sentence.
And I let him.
Gods, I welcomed it.
I barely had a moment to register the shift before Varyth suddenly spun us around. The world blurred. A gasp caught in my throat. My spine met stone.
One of Varyth’s hand braced against the wall beside my head, the other cupped my breast through my tunic.
My hands worked hastily at his shirt, yanking at buttons, baring skin. I pressed my palms flat to his bare chest, nails scraping down, hard enough to leave lines of red.
Varyth’s hips drove forward, grinding into me with a curse so raw it cracked.
“Isara,” he groaned, my name shattering on his tongue. “We need to stop. Now. Before I—”
His words died the second I moved. Rolled my hips against his, challenging that control with every inch of my body. Varyth’s mouth collided with mine again. His kiss was a storm. There was no space. No breath. Just him.
My nails scraped down his chest again, following the lines of muscle, and he shuddered. A full-body tremor that betrayed how close to the edge he truly was.
His hand slid beneath my shirt. Rough, calloused fingers ghosted over my stomach, and then higher, finding my breast with possessive certainty. His thumb brushed over my nipple, and I whimpered, my body arching into the touch.
A deep, satisfied growl rumbled in his chest, his breath hot against my throat. “You feel that?” he whispered. “How your body begs for me?”
Yes.
I arched into him, lost in the sheer force of him. Of this.
My hand slid lower, unstoppable now, knuckles brushing the hard lines of his abdomen. Gods, he was wrecking me.
But I would drag him down with me.
And gods, the sound he made when I palmed him through his pants—filthy, desperate, trembling at the edge of total surrender.
That was the sound I’d waited for.
“Isara,” he growled. Desperate. Starving. “Fuck, Isara.”
I grinned and tightened my grip, stroking the hard length of him through the fabric, watching his composure fracture.
His hips bucked into my hand.
“More?” I whispered, licking the shell of his ear. “You want to fall for me, Varyth? I’ll make you crawl.”
His breath hitched, harsh and broken, when my hand curled harder around him, stroking him through the thin barrier of fabric like I knew exactly how to shatter him.
Varyth’s eyes were wild—silver nearly devoured by black, feral heat blazing as his gaze dropped to my lips, my throat, lower.
“Fucking stars,” he muttered, and then his mouth was on mine again. Desperate, claiming, tongue sliding deep as if he could taste the filthy promise in my words.
His hand fumbled at the waist of my pants, impatient fingers working the fastenings.
I gasped against his mouth as the fabric loosened, hips rocking forward into the hard line of him. His hips surged in response, grinding into the pressure of my palm.
But then—oh gods—his hand slipped inside.
I moaned, the sound muffled against his mouth as his fingers slid beneath the fabric.
His groan was pure sin. “Fuck, Isara.” His head dropped to my shoulder, chest heaving against mine, and I felt his whole body tremble as his fingers dragged deeper.
Then his fingers shifted until the rough pad of his thumb circled right there.
A strangled cry clawed its way up my throat.
His mouth ghosted over my jaw as he worked that bundle of nerves in tight, devastating spirals, maddeningly slow. Just enough pressure to leave me gasping. Not enough to push me over.
“You’re already shaking,” he murmured, lips brushing the shell of my ear. “I haven’t even started.”
I smirked against his jaw, then nipped at it. “Maybe you’re just slow.”
His breath caught. And then—
He sank a finger inside.
I choked on a moan, my spine arching off the wall as pleasure skated up my spine like lightning on blood.
“You were saying?” His voice was velvet and venom and fucking triumphant.
I bit his shoulder through his shirt, hard enough to make him grunt.
Another finger joined the first. My breath shattered against his neck as he thrust them into me. I gripped him hard, each pass dragging another broken, helpless sound from his lips. He bucked into my palm with that same frantic rhythm his fingers used inside me.
His thumb never stopped moving. Not once. Circling in those tight, devastating spirals, pressing hard enough to steal my breath.
“Fuck,” I gasped, my head slamming back against the wall. “Varyth.”
He groaned against my throat. “I feel you, Isara. Gods, you’re perfect.”
And still, my hand moved. Stroking the full, thick length of him through the fabric that strained to hold him back, dragging the heel of my palm over the tip just to hear the way he choked.
His hips surged into my grip. “You’re going to make me come like this,” he growled, teeth sinking into the curve of my neck. “You’re going to make me fucking lose it.”
His hand on my thigh flexed, holding me up as his thumb pressed harder, faster, perfect.
“You’re not walking away after this,” he growled into my mouth, lips crushed against mine as his fingers thrust, again and again, deep and possessive. “You’re mine. Say it.”
“I’m not saying shit,” I gasped, tightening my grip around him. “Not until you beg.”
His fingers curled, and everything else dropped away.
My climax tore through me, crashing through every nerve, drowning every thought until there was nothing left but him. My body trembled against his, my cry muffled as Varyth caught my lips with his.
He swallowed my moans, his fingers slowing but never stopping, drawing out every last pulse, every tremor, until I was shaking, breathless, half-limp in his arms.
When I finally came back to myself, Varyth was still holding me, his fingers buried inside me, forehead pressed against mine as his ragged breathing matched my own.
I was trembling, my body hypersensitive, my mind blissfully empty. And I was still holding him.
“Isara,” the plea was strained.
I silenced him with a kiss, my hands fumbling to free him.
I needed him. Inside me. Now.
My fingers had just undone the last fastening when—
“Varyth?”
The sound of footsteps followed quickly.
Suddenly, time slowed.
The air in my lungs turned solid as I saw Darian step onto the balcony, his gaze sweeping the space before hitting us.
A ripple of undiluted horror crossed his face. The worst kind of horror.
Pure mortification.
His mouth formed a perfect ‘O’ of shock as he registered exactly what he had stumbled upon.
Varyth and I were pressed intimately against the wall, my legs wrapped around his waist. Varyth had one hand under my tunic, the other down the front of my pants.
My own hands were no better, currently frozen where they’d been unfastening his trousers.
There was no room for doubt as to what we had been doing.
Darian never floundered. Never. But he did now. Miserably. And then he made a noise. It was somewhere between a scoff and a pained groan.
Varyth froze against me, his body going so still it’s a wonder he didn’t turn to stone. But before either of us could move or speak, two more figures emerged onto the balcony.
Cindrissian.
And Fenric.
The blood drained from my face.
Where Fenric looked ready to throw himself off the balcony to escape the agony of this moment, Cindrissian’s expression remained neutral.
I did not breathe.
Because although Cindrissian’s face was unreadable, his eyes were not. They found Varyth’s hands, where each rested.
And narrowed.
A long, unbearable silence stretched between us.
Then, so completely void of emotion it was somehow worse than if he’d reacted at all, Cindrissian said, “I see you’re busy.”
A vein in Varyth’s temple twitched violently. His grip on me tightened imperceptibly before he finally seemed to remember how hands worked and removed his from their incriminating locations.
Slowly, he lowered me to the ground. But he didn’t just steady me. His hands lingered. Then he quickly refastened his pants, attempting to regain some semblance of dignity.
I, meanwhile, had reached a level of shame and suffering so profound that I was preparing to launch myself into the nearest fire.
“Well,” Darian said finally, his voice strangled with the effort of not laughing. “This is... educational.”
Fenric made a sound that might have been a whimper. His eyes were fixed on the stone railing like it held the secrets of the universe and he needed to memorise every crack. “I think I’m blind. I’ve gone blind. That’s the only explanation.”
“You’re not blind,” Darian said, in that same strangled tone. “Unfortunately, we all saw—” He broke off, shoulders shaking.