Chapter 45
Forty-Five
A good brownie always covers for their friend.
Even at the destruction of her own vagina. - Arienna
By the time he carries me out of the tunnel, I’m half asleep and in his arms, with my face buried against his chest. My dress was placed back on me at some point, but I doubt I look presentable.
He sure as hel doesn’t with his waistcoat and shirt missing buttons and his jacket being covered in cum from having been used to clean us up.
As we walk down the hall, I yawn lazily.
Richard’s chuckle vibrates against my cheek. “Satisfied, my queen?”
“Exhausted,” I mumble. Satisfied left town ten orgasms ago. A delicious lightness fills my limbs, dragging me down into bliss. But right as I start to drift off, a thought pops into my head.
A person, really.
I jerk awake.
“Where are we going?” I ask, suddenly remembering that Fabia is waiting in his chambers with a bottle of poison – an act of treason that’ll see her executed.
“And where’s Jace?” He’s usually always with Richard, but if he’s gone up ahead of us, then he might find Fabia before I can figure out a way to sneak her out.
The idea of having to choose between her and him is making me sick.
“He’s most likely waiting outside my chambers, which is where we’re heading,” he says as he steps out of the castle and onto a branch of the tree; no balcony graces this floor as it’s more open to the public. The darkness of night still wraps around the forest.
Shifting me in his arms, he spreads his wings. And for the first time, the thought of flying makes me smile.
Fabia doesn’t have wings.
She can’t have made it up to his floor. Which means she can’t be there waiting with a bottle of poison. Relieved, I start to relax again.
As the sounds of the party rumble through the night air, I close my eyes and breathe deep.
I’ll tell Fabia about my change of heart tomorrow. I’ll get her to understand that this is one monster I will never give up. I’m in love with him.
My king.
My monster.
My everything.
The jostling of his arms wakes me. As he shifts me to make it through the door of his chambers, I peer up at him with sleep-filled eyes.
“Morning, beautiful,” Jace calls from close behind us.
I turn my head to look at him. A dreamy smile graces my lips.
He laughs. “He did that number thing, didn’t he?” His teal eyes twinkle. “How high did you go?”
My cheeks heating, I bury my face against my king. Even for a brownie, saying that number sounds too greedy. Like I’m so damn insatiable.
“Triple digits?” Jace teases.
When I whimper, Richard kicks the door shut in his face. But I felt his hands move on my body, flashing numbers at his friend.
His cockiness makes me smile beneath heated cheeks.
“I’m never going to talk to him ever again,” I moan as Richard carries me into his bedroom.
“Trust me, there is nothing we could do that would shock Jace.”
I peek up at him. “Nothing?”
He nods.
“What about monster porn?” I press, thinking of Fabia’s books. “Tentacles and tails and stuff? And monster dicks? With barbs?”
Stopping at the foot of his bed, he looks down at me. “Is that the sort of stuff you’re into?”
“Oh gods no. I’m asking for a friend.”
“A friend… Fabia, you mean?”
“Noooo,” I say, dragging the word out to give me time to think. “You don’t know her.”
“Mmhmm.”
“So would that bother him?”
“No.”
“What about bondage? Or wand play?”
“You’ve never had wand play or done bondage before, have you?”
“No, but I don’t see what that has to do with anything.”
His grin is full on delicious. Were my pussy not already completely wrecked and desensitised, it would have wetted with desire instead of throwing closed the labia gates and drying up the moat.
I am not having sex again tonight.
Maybe not even for a whole month.
“You’ll see,” he says, his words like a promise. Walking around to the right side of the bed, he pulls the blanket back and then lays me down. Stripping the dress off me, he tosses it on the floor.
I sigh in contentment as he kisses my forehead and tucks me in. I close my eyes, breathing deep, relaxing. But when he doesn’t crawl into bed beside me, I ask, “Where are you going?”
Looking up, I find him in front of the doorway.
“I have a few things I need to get done tonight.”
“Like what?”
He hesitates, and it’s like a blow to my heart. He still doesn’t want me here. In his business. Sharing his crown.
“Never mind,” I mumble, giving him an out. Myself one too. “I probably won’t understand it anyways.”
“Yeah, it’s a bit complicated.”
Closing my eyes, I fight the tears. How can we feel so close and yet still so far apart?
“But maybe in the morning,” he says slowly, “after you’ve had some rest, we can go over a few things?”
My eyes snap open wide. I stare at him, wondering if he means it. Hoping like hel that he does. “I would like that,” I say. “I’m actually pretty clever. I know that doesn’t always come across, but I pick things up pretty quickly.”
“I don’t doubt it.” He grins. “My little cum bucket.”
Groaning, I close my eyes. “Don’t say it like that.” All cute and funny and cringey. “Make it sound sexy again.”
Lowering his voice, he growls, “I don’t doubt it, my little slutty cum bucket.”
I half-giggle, half-moan. I can listen to the deep rumble of his voice all day.
“Good night,” he says. “I’ll see you in the morning.”
As he taps the rune on the bedroom light, making it go off, a smile spreads across my cheeks. He wants to see me in the morning. I am sleeping in his bed. Actually sleeping – thank the gods. Fuck, I’m never complaining about Karl’s four seconds ever again.
A hand flies over my mouth as I giggle.
But it isn’t mine.
Eyes widening, I roll to the other side of the bed, away from the hand reaching up from beneath it.
My body hits the edge and continues over.
My arms flailing, I try to grab hold of the mattress.
But all I grab is blanket. Smacking onto the floor, I yelp.
Then suck in a breath as I realise there is something beside me.
Slowly, I turn my head to look under the bed.
Fabia’s wide eyes stare back at me.
My jaw drops.
Before I can ask her how in Hel’s name she made it into his room, Richard bursts through the doorway.
“What happened?”
He’s down by my side in an instant, crouching by my head. If he looks around for an intruder, Fabia is screwed.
I sit upright and wince. Grabbing my head, I try to rub the pain away. He pulls at my fingers to look at my scalp.
“Is it bad?” I ask, hoping it’s a gusher so he’ll be forced to take me to a healer, and Fabia can then sneak out.
“No. No blood, though there is a lump forming.”
I hiss as he touches it. “Sorry,” I say, my mind racing for something to say that will make him leave so I can sneak Fabia out of here. “I had a nightmare and must have rolled off the bed.”
He frowns.
“I have always been able to jump straight into dreaming when I fall asleep,” I gush. “As soon as I close my eyes, there it is – a dream!”
“Uh huh,” he says, helping me to my feet. “What was it about?”
“Ah.” I glance away as I shuffle the blanket around my shoulders. I make sure it reaches the floor, covering the gap below the bed. “It. Was… about… wa...sps.”
“Wasps?”
“Uh huh.” My fingers twist in the blanket. I’m so frickin’ stupid. Wasps? Scary? Come on! But there’s nothing else for me to do but sell it. “Don’t you know they’re venomous?” I ask. “That’s pretty scary.”
His eyes narrow. Bugger, he isn’t buying it.
“Hey, it’s a dream. It doesn’t have to make sense.” I smile innocently, my heart thundering in my skull.
He inclines his head in agreement, but he still doesn’t look like he believes me.
Ugh. Fabia, you totally owe my vagina for this, I whine.
Reaching forward, I run my hand over his chest. “You know what I just realised?” I wink.
He looks down at my head, watching as it trails past his stomach.
“I need a shower.” I bat my eyelashes despite wanting to do nothing but crawl into bed and fall asleep. “Do you want to join me? I might have trouble washing everywhere. Dead limbs and all that.” Another wink.
He grabs my hand. “What’s going on?”
“Okay, fine, you caught me.” Pulling my hand away, I glance down, looking as if I don’t want to say this at all.
And I really don’t. I really, really don’t.
“I rolled over to... sniff... your side of the bed. Then I started to... play... with one of your pillows when…” I trail off, my pussy crying in utter terror over what I’m building up to in the future.
“Play with one of my pillows?” he asks slowly.
“Yeah. You know.” My cheeks heat. My vagina dies from sheer exhaustion. “Rubbing myself… on it… Masturbating.”
He crosses his arms. “Sixteen orgasms wasn’t enough for you?”
I tilt my head to the side, cursing Fabia left and right.
Shrugging, I say, “But that was before my nap. I’m all –” I swallow, choking the words out.
“Ready to go again now. But you were busy. And I couldn’t really…
be bothered to go another sixteen rounds.
I only wanted a quickie, you know? And this has nothing to do with your…
performance, I promise, but like… sometimes a woman just wants to…
you know, cut through all the… faff… and uh, just… get. To. The. End.”
“The end?”
“Uh huh.”
“By faff, do you mean foreplay?”
I wince. My body is going to hate me for this later, I just know it. “Yeah...” I say slowly. “But only sometimes. Most of the times, foreplay is great. Required even. But… Yeah...”
When he doesn’t say anything for a couple of minutes, I glance up. His eyes are narrowed in on me. Hot. Dangerous.
I gulp.
“Show me,” he murmurs.
“What?”
“Show. Me. I want to know how to get my queen off quickly when she, how did you say it? Wants to cut through all the faff.”
My jaw bounces off my boobs and hits the wooden floor. “You want me to…” At the thought of him watching me pleasure myself tonight, I want to break down and cry.
“Yes. I want you to show me how you touch yourself so I can learn exactly what you like.”
Oh.
Oh damn.
Fuck my body.
That was the hottest thing I’ve ever heard, and now my body, my very exhausted body, really wants me to do this. Holding his gaze, I start to lower myself onto the bed. Then I remember Fabia.
“The shower!” I blurt as I straighten. “I’ll show you in the shower. It can get a bit messy, you know, and uh, I want a clean bed to fall into.”
Grabbing his hand, I drag him towards the ensuite.
His feet pad behind me.
His eyes linger on my ass.
I can feel them stroking me.
“I’m going to fuck this tonight.”
Although he stopped after I hit my sixteenth orgasm, realising that I was seriously out for the count, I know that if I step into the shower with him, he’s going to make do on his promise.
The things I do for my friend.
“I’ll show you how I get out – off,” I say loudly, hoping Fabia is getting the message. “And then we’re going to bed, where you’ll join me. Right?”
“Whatever you want, my queen,” he says, husky and deep.
My ass clenches.
Fuck me. I’m not going to be able to stand or sit.
Fabia, you turd, you frickin’ owe me for this.