85
Mornon
I noticed her presence immediately. It was like a buzzing that grew and grew and grew until I couldn’t ignore it anymore. It was a call I couldn’t resist.
But.
But.
It was not possible that I sensed her here.
Slowly, I turned around.
Nauriel’s bright appearance sharply contrasted with the dark surroundings, nearly hurting my eyes.
Her shocked stare darted over my black blouse, tucked into leather pants, with a deep, pointed neckline revealing my hairy chest. For a moment, desire flickered across her face, but it was quickly replaced by fear as she met my gaze.
“How did you get here?” I asked, and though my voice was barely more than a hiss, it echoed through the room like a threatening thunderclap.
“I . . .” The elf took a step back. She glanced over her shoulder, her face twisting in confusion at the intimidating entrance doors. “I don’t know.”
That’s when my attention was drawn to the Crystal, hanging from her neck. A crystal that should have shone like a star, but instead looked like a simple, dull, insignificant jewel.
Because it wasn’t really here.
Nauriel was in my fucking mind.
In the blink of an eye, I was in front of her and grabbed her by the throat, slamming her so hard against the door that she burst into a hoarse cry. “How the fuck did you get in?”
She stared at me in confusion. “Wha . . .” she attempted to say as she tried to pull my hand away. “What?”
I tightened my grip, effortlessly lifting her off the floor until she was level with me.
So that I could bring my lips closer to hers and make my breath the one she inhaled, not the oxygen she desperately struggled to breathe in.
“ I am the one who has access to your mind,” I growled.
“ I am the one who controls it. You cannot be in mine.”
“Get . . .” Nauriel punched the crease of my elbow, then pressed her knees and feet against my torso, pelvis, and legs to push me away. “Get off me!”
She slapped her hand on my face and scratched from my forehead to my cheek before I grabbed her wrist and tore her nails from my skin.
As my magic healed the wounds, I watched the vermilion coat on the tip of her nails out of the corner of my eye, and I couldn’t hold back the sound that vibrated in my chest from the sudden craving to clean them one by one with my tongue.
I hated how easily my desire for this damn elf flared up without me being able to reject it. How easily lust took over me, stripping away my control over my actions, my emotions.
How easily it made me vulnerable.
Fuming with myself and the Spirits and Nauriel over the turmoil raging in my soul, I pulled my mate away from the door and slammed her against it again with such force that the wood creaked.
“Was it that Calien bitch?” I hissed. “Did she make you crawl in?”
“No,” she rattled, then kicked me in the balls.
I gritted my teeth with a grunt, and as punishment, I slammed her head against the door once again. “How. Did. You. Do. It.”
“I . . . did . . . nothing,” she replied.
I understood it a moment later.
The meaning of those words pierced my heart like lightning. My heart, for fuck’s sake. A heart that should feel nothing. A heart that in an instant felt every damn single emotion.
I felt myself falling into Nauriel’s eyes. Those eyes that clawed me to the bone and wouldn’t let go. Eyes that were the nightmare I couldn’t wake up from.
Eyes that made me feel. Too much. Against my will.
“It was you,” Nauriel breathed, shocked, causing me to realize with anger that I had unintentionally loosened my grasp on her neck. “ You called me. You were thinking of me.”
I released her roughly, horrified that she had understood it, too.
Horrified by my weakness.
Nauriel landed with her feet on the floor and touched her throat, where the delicate skin showed the reddish marks of my fingers. She cast a sidelong glance at me, her eyes filled with a mix of arousal and caution.
“Tell me why,” she whispered.
I stared down at her, my face as hard as stone. I refused to answer her. I refused to admit that I wanted to answer her. This damn elf had no power over me, not now, not ever. She was the one who was my slave. She was the one who moved under my command.
Yet.
Yet.
Her siren gaze held me captive with such intensity that it fueled my ire more than her resistance to giving me the Crystal. That it made my blood boil with an uncontrollable need to have her eyes locked onto mine as I fucked her in that wild way that made her lose her mind.
“Tell me,” she pressed, raising her hand without any fear and placing it on my chest.
The moment her cool palm touched my warm skin, the anger in me became so unbearable that I suddenly grabbed Nauriel by the jaw, forcing her head back so abruptly that she screamed.
“Because you should be here,” I snapped. “You should be there”—I pointed behind me with a sharp gesture—“on a throne next to mine.”
“My throne is in the Kingdom of the Elves,” she replied firmly, her hands crushing my wrist in a futile effort to free herself.
“That’s not what you want,” I growled, looking hard at her.
“It never was. You want something bigger. You want violence. You want the fight. You want blood.” My voice vibrated at the idea of tasting hers again, and from the way her pupils dilated, I could tell she had just had the same thought.
“I can give you the army you’ve always longed to lead.
You will not only be my queen but my commander.
And together, we will get what we’ve both always wanted. ”
Nauriel blinked rapidly, as if trying to erase the image of that near future from her mind, then pushed her fists against my chest to make me back off. I did so.
“I am not like you,” she declared fiercely.
“Oh, come on, Elf,” I mocked her. I paused to ravenously gaze at the darkness flowing through every single blood vessel and nerve ending of hers, making her a true work of art. “Do you really think the Spirits would have bound you to me if there wasn’t rottenness in you?”
Her heart skipped a beat. The blood fled her cheeks.
A smirk crept onto my lips, as if saying: You never thought about it, did you?
She slowly frowned. “No,” she stated.
I invaded her personal space once more, pleased that she didn’t recoil even an inch. “Have you not figured it out yet?”
Nauriel stared at me stoically, almost combative. “You are wrong.”
I ran my fingers through her hair and tugged it to tilt her head back.
To my satisfaction, it caused her to scream again.
She grabbed my hips in anger, clearly unsure whether to shove me away or pull me closer.
I simplified her decision by pinning her against the door with my lower body.
The deep sound she made coaxed a sneer from me.
“Look how you pant in my hands,” I said passionately. “It’s not fear. It’s not because you can’t breathe. It’s because you want me. You want the evil I carry inside.”
Her eyes looked like burning coals. “And you want the good in me.”
“I don’t give a shit about it, you stupid elf,” I hissed.
Wrath struck me like a whip, and I tightened my grip on her head until she whined. My palms tingled with the urge to smash her skull and crush her brain and then paint my face with her blood and suck the gelatinous mush from my fingers.
One by one. With great delight.
“The only reason I want you here is because I want to fuck you.” I pressed my hard cock against her groin, breathing in the moan that escaped her.
“Every fucking moment.” I bent down to kiss her, but at the last second, I managed to hold back.
To maintain control over my instincts. “I can hardly think of anything else,” I added angrily, peering down at Calien’s Crystal between us.
“That’s not the only reason you want me close.” Nauriel looked at me in a way that made me feel like falling to my knees at her feet. “It’s because you love me.”
My jaw ticked.
My breathing became faster.
My stare turned deadly.
However, I did not reply.
I did not deny.
Why didn’t I? Why couldn’t I?
Her hands moved to my chest, resting over my heart, her face filled with both anguish and hope. “And you desperately want to be loved.”
Ire came over me like a red cloth.
In the next moment, I let go of the elf’s hair, grabbed her by the throat, yanked her away from the door, and slammed her against it again with such force that the impact sounded like an explosion.