Chapter Sixteen
“Istill don’t understand what happened.”
Tristan and I stood outside the door to Ronin’s bedroom. It had been a strange and hectic few days since Lucifer killed Samael and ran off with his feathers, but somehow, we found ourselves back at the academy. Honestly, where else were we going to go?
Dora was here too, but in our room next door. The adjoining door was gone to give her privacy while she dealt with the aftermath of everything that happened over the last few months.
“Turns out the price of the sub bond is that if it’s ever broken, the person who cast the bond loses their life,” Tristan said.
“That is one of the many reasons why demons stopped doing it. There are many ways to control someone, so why trade your life?” He jabbed a hand over his shoulder.
“But that stupid dead lunatic doesn’t know how to turn it down when it comes to you. ”
I shouldn’t be smiling. I really, really shouldn’t. But a tiny smile slipped out all the same. “He really does love me, doesn’t he.”
“He does.” Tristan tickled my side, squealing a giggle out of me as he smiled back.
“He’s also lucky that trading your life can have multiple meanings.
Instead of dying, the magic stole his beauty.
He’s no longer got that mythical, legendary, can-command-armies-with-just-a-look face anymore, Charlie.
“Which means he can no longer sit on the throne of sloth. His future as lord is over.”
My smile vanished in an instant. “Wait, what? You can’t be serious. He can’t be Lord Sloth anymore just because his face lost its freaky juju? But that’s ridiculous! What does his father say?”
He jerked his chin toward the door. “Ask him. He’s ready to see you now, but he wants you to brace yourself. He doesn’t need a glamour anymore, so he’s not wearing one. You’re going to see the real him now, Charlie.
“And I hope you point and laugh.”
I rolled my eyes. I did not understand the relationship between these two. They absolutely hated each other, but they were also the best of friends.
But I won’t be the one to tell them that, I thought as I reached for the doorknob. They’ll have to figure it out on their own.
“Sniff, sniff.”
I jerked, twisting around as Tristan snapped back.
“Oh, shit, sorry,” he said. “I didn’t mean to smell you like that out of nowhere, it’s just...” Despite his apology, he inhaled deeply—scrunching his nose as he did. “Are you wearing a new perfume or something?”
“Perfume? No.” I sniffed my collar and smelled nothing. “I don’t even have perfume down here. Why?”
“It’s nothing, it’s just... you smell different.”
“Different? Different how?”
“You smell...” Tristan’s frown only deepened. “New.”
“Wha—?”
Tristan tossed his head, losing the scowl. “I gotta go, but hit me up after you’re done with that shithead.”
“Oh, uh, okay.”
I waved him off, then went inside.
Ronin was sitting up in his bed, his face obscured by the mirror he was holding.
“Is that the mirror you’ve been using to spy on me?” I asked. “Because I’ll be having that now.”
“Baby girl, brace yourself. You’re going to see what I look like now.”
Ronin lowered the mirror, and I gasped.
It was him. Sitting before me was the Ronin I knew and the face I knew.
Raven hair still thick and curling around two iridescent horns.
His eyes were still downcast, almond-shaped jewels.
His skin was still breakable porcelain. His jaw still smooth perfection.
His lips were still small little puckered things, and his nose still long and hooked.
Everything was the same... and not. I couldn’t explain it, but somehow, Ronin’s face was all of those things and more now.
His hair was a deeper, purer black. His ruby eyes shone ten times as bright.
His skin looked smoother, and his lips were even more pillowy and inviting—daring me to deny him a kiss.
“Wow,” I breathed. “You’re—”
“Hideous,” he finished, glaring into the mirror. “How can you stand to look at me?”
“Wow, dude.” I dropped down next to him. “If you think that face is hideous, you must struggle to keep down your breakfast whenever you see mine.”
Ronin frowned, his perfectly plucked brows drawing together. “What are you talking about? You’re the most beautiful creature there ever was or will be.”
I blushed, ducking my face. I was twenty-two years old for Hera’s sake. I wasn’t a red-faced teenager anymore, but even so, I had no defense against Ronin Belphe. The way he dropped compliments on me like he was just stating facts of life, undid me every time.
“So what’s going on?” I asked, changing the subject. “Why did you want to see Tristan before you saw me?”
“I needed his help with something. Turns out, that mutt has a use after all. The guy’s like an expert when it comes to making mortal women fall in love with him.
He’s got every pussy dripping for him,” said the never-going-to-not-be-a-fucking-work-in-progress.
“He gave me the secret to make you mine forever.”
I rubbed my temples. I suddenly felt a headache coming on. “All right. Lay it on me.”
“Hold on. I wrote it down.” He reached over and opened the nightstand drawer.
He pulled out a piece of paper. “It’s called...
con-sent,” Ronin pronounced. “So, it’s like, I ask you if you want to do something, and then if you say yes, we do it, but—and this is the important bit—if you say no.
” He clapped. “We don’t do it. Crazy, right? ”
“Astounding,” I deadpanned.
He blinked at me, so adorably clueless. “Have you heard of this consent stuff before?”
“I have.” A smile tugged at my lips. “And Tristan is right. Us mortal women get wet for consent like nothing else.”
“Well, there you fucking go,” Ronin crowed, whooping it up. “Let’s try it out right now.”
A tiny thrill of anticipation went through me, warming up my core. It had been a very long time since Ronin and I had rolled around in the sheets, and aphrodisiac or no aphrodisiac, we were incredibly sexually compatible.
“Here goes,” Ronin began. “Hunter, I know you want me to get the leech out of the wall, but after I do, do I have your consent to kill him?”
“No!” I blared, shooting upright. “And are you telling me he’s still in there? Dammit, Ronin, get him out!”
“All right, I will.” He couldn’t have sound less interested in doing so if he tried. “But if Professor Leech has to live, then can I at least get your consent to kill every other man who expresses sexual interest in you?”
I shook my head. “Only if they express that interest physically and against my will.”
“Has the mutt expressed his sexual interest physically and against your will?”
“He has not,” I clipped.
“Can I pretend you said he did and kill him anyway?”
I was full-blown laughing now. Climbing onto the bed, I swung my leg over him and straddled his lap. “Ronin, you could be getting my consent for much more interesting things right now, so do you really want to keep talking about Santino and Tristan?”
His brows shot up his forehead as understanding hit him in the face. “Charlotte Hunter, do I have your consent to fuck you like a wild beast?”
“Yes. I’d be offended if you didn’t.”
Giggling like outlaws on the run, our clothes came off in a flurry of kisses, nips and moans.
Ronin flipped us over—me on my back and him on top. Grasping my wrists, he pinned them down on either side of my head. “I want us to do it right this time, Hunter.”
“I want that too.”
He placed the lightest kiss on my neck, popping goose bumps on my heated flesh. “That’s why I want you to show me how you like it. How you want it.”
I blinked. He wasn’t saying what I thought he was saying, was he? “What does that mean?”
“Do you consent to be spanked?”
“Wha—?”
A firm swat landed on my backside. I choked on a shocked gasp that was more a moan.
“Hey, I didn’t say yes yet, you jerk!”
“Yet?” His grin was wolfish. “So you were going to?”
Was my face on fire? Because it felt like it.
Ronin kissed me hard and thorough. “I want to see you finger that tasty little pussy till it sits up and begs. Do you consent or no?”
This was a mistake. Getting me to verbally agree and beg for every filthy thing he wanted to do with me was going to leave me a puddle of embarrassment within two to three sex acts.
“Ok.” You could hear a mouse squeak louder than my voice.
Ronin rocked back, palming his cock. “Say my name while you do it. Tell me how much you want me inside you.”
Pulse racing, I felt dizzy. Just like his new and freed face, Ronin was dripping extra sexiness that night.
My hand trembled sliding down my body. “Ronin,” I whispered, squeezing the sensitive nub at my apex. “I love you, baby. I love it when you touch me.”
“How much do you love it?”
“So much,” I rasped, pushing three digits in. My stretched hole wept. “That’s why the last several weeks destroyed me. Because even while I hated you, I loved you.”
I lay bare and wanton on the silk sheets, no part of me hidden before him. Leaning on one arm, I started slowly, dipping my fingers in my pussy. “Ah,” I breathed. “That feels amazing.”
“That feels amazing... who?”
Gods, this pervert is gonna rewrite everything I thought I knew about sex. “That feels amazing, Ronin. Fuck me.”
He started stroking—his long, thick, pearled cock obedient in his hands. “I will.”
I clenched on my fingers. He wasn’t even touching me, and I wanted him so bad, I couldn’t see straight. “I want you to—to fill me so much with your cum, it’s leaking out of me for days.”
“That’s a promise.”
I was all-in now. There was no point in holding back.
“I want to sit on your face, and ride that filthy tongue till it falls out.”
“It’s a fucking sin that you haven’t already.”
My hand picked up speed. I wasn’t sure who was bringing me to my pinnacle. My fingers, or the hot, searing intensity of being watched by Ronin.
“I want you to be the one making my pussy sit up and beg,” I moaned. “Don’t you dare hold back.”
“How badly do you want my cock?” he asked, smacking my ass again.