Chapter 24 #2
“I’m not loyal beyond reproach to the King of Brestolya.
I am bound to act as if I do, an example for all the gifted failures in this world, that he will find a way to bind to him what he considers valuable, whether they like it or not.
” Barely contained anger simmered beneath the velvet of his voice, and when he lifted his gaze to Lory’s once more, the glowing ember of his power peeked through.
“I failed her. I failed my family. And I failed my people.”
How he could be so calm, knowing his sister was being held hostage by the ruler of the continent, was beyond Lory. If this had been Evven, she’d have moved Eroth’s Veil to get him back, but something told her, Khayrivven had already tried everything in his capacity to save Elina.
“Don’t look at me like that, Lory.”
“Like what?”
He raised a brow. “Like you pity me. I’ve made my peace with the role I’ve got to play as long as Elina remains safe, which she will, as long as I execute whatever missions I’m given, no matter how bloodthirsty. It’s all right that I’ve become a monster because it means she’ll live.”
There—there it was. The truth of his resignation and the dead end his life had become.
“You’re not a monster.” All those times he’d led people to their execution, all those times he’d acted like he was made of stone, all those times he’d let her think he believed in making her life a taste of the torment behind Eroth’s Veil—not real.
None of it was real. Except for the one thing Anees had told her all those weeks ago: Khayrivven was ruthless when it came to protecting the things he believed in—but what she should have said was the people he loved.
When Lory lifted her hand back to his cheek, grazing it with her thumb, his gaze found her, his pupils two black pits captured in flaring fire, all she could see was that look, those thick lashes fluttering like the silken wings of butterflies.
When he opened his mouth, it wasn’t to speak but to mold his lips over hers in a kiss that could have ended the world.
A streak of fire ran up Lory’s spine, igniting that volatile magic in a raging inferno, but she focused on the sensation of Khayrivven’s arm sliding around her waist, pulling her against his chest, and the flames remained beneath her skin, a wild, hungry force ready to break free, but she wouldn’t let that happen—not when he was kissing her like that, hands roaming her back, tracing lines of heat along her shoulders, where the fabric of her dress was barely covering the torch-shaped brand.
Lory didn’t let her pounding heart interfere.
For once, she was in control of her magic, even when he was devouring her like she was the rain over the desert.
She was burning on the inside, her molten core a furnace, ready to take his steel.
His breath was ragged, a caress on her neck, lower, on the seam of her breast as he kissed a blazing trail along the neckline of her dress.
Lory’s low moans drifted into Khayrivven’s hair, where she buried her face as he licked over the edge of golden lace. His chuckle tickled the sensitive flesh, and she bit her lower lip, holding back a groan as his hand skated the side of her breast.
“I can’t stop thinking about you, Lory,” he murmured between kisses. “From the first moment I laid eyes on you at that trial, I knew you would be the end of all my self-restraint.”
Lory arched into his touch, sliding her leg over his, straddling him, and the dress flapped open so her lace-covered center rubbed over the hard front of his pants as she rolled her hips.
“You need to stop this, Lory, or I will no longer be able to do the right thing.” The torment in his voice barely made Lory slow as she moved over him, pressing the tips of her breasts against his chest.
“And what is the right thing?” Guardians, she couldn’t care less what was right or wrong, as long as he didn’t stop the kisses along her neck and his hands wouldn’t move from her swollen, aching breasts.
In that corridor, when she was blindfolded, she’d felt a hint of what Khayrivven could be like if she broke the leash he’d put on himself, if he lost control the way she felt she was losing control.
“When I’m with you, I’m close to forgetting what right and wrong even means, Gutter Gem.”
A groan ran through him as he pulled back an inch, his hips moving against hers in a teasing roll, eliciting a gasp of pleasure from Lory, and he guided one hand to his face, fingertips touching his mouth.
His lids lowered as he inhaled a deep breath, and the throaty sound he made as he let go of that breath once more spoke of primal desire.
His glazed gaze as he opened his eyes again made her want to strip bare, just to keep that look on his face forever.
“I can still feel your wetness on my fingers, Lory,” he growled, a predatory tone entering his voice, turning the velvet into the rumble in the air before thunder strikes, and Lory’s toes curled, heat boiling hotter in her core as she tried to figure out whether to be turned on or embarrassed.
The way Khayrivven’s eyes wandered down her front, drinking in the view all the way to the place her dress cleaved open, exposing shimmering gold, like he could scent her.
“I can almost taste you on my tongue.” He lowered his hand to her thigh, lightly brushing against her skin before digging his fingers into her flesh.
Lory’s back arched as she stroked over his trapped cock, the lace forming the sort of friction that made her want to scream.
“If you want to stop this, now is your chance.” The edge in his tone was still there, a predator lying in wait as he grasped onto what was left of his control, but Lory wanted to see it snap.
She wanted—needed—to see that final kernel of the mask he wore to appease the Triad, his role as a hand and captain, slip.
She needed the real him, and she needed. Him. Now.
Without thinking, Lory reached for the brooch at the front of her dress, tugging it open.
The fabric spilled from its grasp like from an opening fist, falling away from her chest and hips like an opening robe until the collar at her neck and the two straps running to the sides of her breasts were the only things holding it in place.
The lace barely covering her breasts and the woven gold over her slick center shimmered in the half-light.
“I want you, Khayrivven.”
When she said it this time, darkness didn’t pull at her vision; neither did she dive into a dream where she could break free from the constraints of reality.
Khayrivven took one shuddering breath, and instead of laughing the way she’d imagined he’d do if he ever saw those flimsy underthings earlier, his grip tightened on her thigh.
With one quick motion, he flipped her to her back, one hand unfastening the band of golden lace covering her breasts, fingers grazing the skin on her arching back, while he braced his weight on the other arm.
With one knee, he nudged her legs apart while his mouth explored her exposed breasts, licking and sucking on her peaked nipples until Lory believed she’d climax from a touch alone.
“Tell me to stop,” he sighed against her skin, but his hand was between her thighs, stroking the sensitive bundle of nerves at their apex.
“Don’t stop.” Lory’s hips undulated, following his hand, aching for just. A little. More.
When Khayrivven lifted his head, pausing for a heartbeat as he searched her face for any signs she wasn’t serious, and found none, a wicked expression entered his features.
Lory barely got a moment to wonder if she’d been right to wish to unleash the predator before Khayrivven slid lower, his head disappearing between her legs, and chuckled against her slick flesh.
“I hope you aren’t particularly attached to these.”
Lory was about to ask what he meant when he ripped the lacy underpants off her, dropping them behind him on the floor.
“Perfect,” he growled against her skin, kissing the insides of her thighs, nose blazing a trail as he inhaled her scent. “Fucking incredible.”
With a gasp, Lory fisted the sepia silk when his tongue found her clit, teasing and stroking.
“I’ve been wondering what you’d taste like since that first dream.
” His words were a touch of heat against her already molten core, and when he lapped straight up her center, Lory moaned his name, back arching and hips undulating, but he pinned her with a firm grasp, his sensual chuckle rolling over her slick flesh.
“Oh, I’ve dreamed about you a lot, Elory Vednis. ”
She didn’t bother asking what he’d done in those dreams because, with an expert lick, he made her scream as pleasure coiled so hard she was about to shatter.
Fire steamed over her body, small flames that did nothing to quench the heat between her legs.
But Khayrivven didn’t seem to care. His tongue followed the orange glow along her skin, extinguishing them one by one as he moved up, mouth gliding over her breasts, up her neck until it covered hers.
He tasted of sage and crackling embers—and of her. The thought of where that tongue had been made Lory’s core tighten, and when her hands reached down between them to open his pants and free his cock, her mouth went dry at the sheer size of him.
He twitched between her fingers, silk-covered steel, and he made a deep, needy sound in his throat that made Lory wonder how she could have ever lived without hearing it.
“Last chance, Lory. If you’re not ready, you need to tell me now.”
How he could fathom stopping at this point was beyond Lory’s rationality—perhaps because she no longer had a rational thought within her. All she could think of was how she was aching to feel him inside of her, even when she was still wondering how he’d ever fit.
“Don’t stop.” Lory’s hands were shaking as she guided him to her entrance, savoring that first hard inch as he gently nudged.
He couldn’t have been in more than an inch, but the stretch was already so delicious, Lory’s eyes shuttered.
The second inch made her moan. He pulled back those two inches, while protest rose in Lory’s throat, but the words never crossed her lips.
With one long, luxurious thrust, Khayrivven sheathed himself inside of her, and the protest turned into a scream of pleasure.
He set a slow, luscious pace, one hand massaging her breast while, with the other, he braced himself beside her head.
His mouth devoured hers in hungry kisses and oh.
My. Guardians. Did he know what he was doing?
Every stroke of his tongue made the heat coil tighter in her belly, and every thrust he made brought her close to the glowing gold-and-orange edge that would be the point of no return.
“Come for me, Lory,” he murmured, pushing himself up so he could watch the expression on her face as she moaned, close to tears from the intensity of him.
Had she believed before Khayrivven was captivating, she was proven wrong: He was a force of nature, his body a chiseled masterpiece and his intensity the unleashing of a storm.
“Let go, little Flame.” His hand slid back to her hip, beneath her ass, lifting her for a better angle, and—had she thought she’d had all of him?
Fire exploded in her belly as he filled her so deep she could no longer tell where she was ending and he was beginning. Flames, the color of the sunset, danced in his eyes, and as he thrust into her with a slow, hard stroke, Lory’s world ruptured.
Through the inferno surrounding her, she watched Khayrivven study her from lust-addled eyes.
“Burn for me, little Flame.”
His other hand grazed her breast, circled her nipple, pinching lightly and sending a fresh onslaught of pleasure through her.
Her core tightened around his cock, clenching and quivering, and Lory reached for him, slinging her arm around his neck and pulling him into a kiss, rolling her hips against his.
The fire spread through her entire body, burning her alive as she kissed him, taking his tongue into her mouth and sucking. She needed more, needed him to cut that leash he’d been keeping on himself.
“More—” she moaned, not ready to let go of the all-consuming pleasure still running through her body.
Khayrivven obliged, setting a brisk pace as he thrust into her, and Lory’s hands wandered over his back, his shoulders, knotting in his silken hair as she kissed him, taking each hard push and yearning for more.
A rain of heat washed over her, but it didn’t hurt her.
She’d happily burn like this forever, gobbling up the wildfire of Khayrivven’s pleasure.
His pace picked up, muscles coiling tighter, until with a groan he sheathed himself with one final thrust. His cock twitched inside of her as he found his climax, and Lory basked in the feel of him, his weight pinning her, and his breath ragged against her neck.
His hips rolled one last time, and damn him if the friction didn’t send another stroke of heat up her core, eliciting a deep moan from Lory as she tumbled into another climax.
She couldn’t tell how long they lay there, him buried inside of her and her arms wrapped around him, when he finally rolled to the side, facing her with an expression of both satisfaction and wonder in his eyes.
Between his fingertips, an inch-high flame was dancing, and the shirt he’d been wearing hung in tatters of singed fabric from his shoulders.
A smile graced his features as he let the fire wander across his fingertips.
Lory threw a glance around the room, expecting half the furniture to have caught fire, but only one blackened spot, the shape of a handprint beside her head on the satin sheets, told the story of his loss of control.
When she turned back to him, Khayrivven’s eyes were already waiting for hers.
“Apparently, you ignite me, little Flame.”