Chapter 39
CHAPTER THIRTY-NINE
T he rage inside is building, getting battle ready for a fight. I’m not supposed to be meeting Eryn yet, and I fear something is wrong for him to ask for me days early. Impatient with the guard taking my cloak, I snap at him to hurry and not make his prince wait. I gently run to the bedroom, about to call his name and ask if he’s okay.
Riley .
“Riley.”
Riley.
Standing next to Eryn in the middle of the room, is Riley, with an unreadable expression, looking me over.
Eryn looks from me to Riley and back to me with a stupid grin on his face. He all but skips toward me and leans in for a quick and unreciprocated hug, whispering conspiratorially. “Well, I bet he doesn’t think you look gross.” And then the prince saunters past me to his sitting room door. “I’ll just be in here, pretending I don’t exist for a bit.” He closes the door with a self-satisfied chuckle.
Riley looks tired. His hair is a little longer, hitting his shoulders and tucked behind his ears, but he’s freshly shaven. He’s wearing his light tan colored linen shirt with most of the buttons undone and sleeves rolled up, exposing the corded muscles of his forearms. His leather weapons harness sits empty. His trousers are black, fitting snugly everywhere and I’m certain they’re new.
He’s still staring, taking in every inch of me, exactly as I am doing to him. I am wearing the beige lace underwear and the champagne dress, so no doubt he can see absolutely everything they don’t cover. The urge to hide myself barely registers.
I’d left my hair out, which I recently had one of the servants cut for me. It’s still a crinkly mess from trying to dry it quickly with a towel. I wonder if I look tired. Because I am tired. Deep into my bones and the darkest depths inside me.
I’m frozen in place. I can’t decide what I want to do as the rage dances around my ribs. Do I run to him, or walk and take a seat by Eryn’s window? Do I reach for him, or ask him how he is? Do I miss him, or do I miss what could have been? Do I hate him or only want to hate him?
The decision turns out to not be entirely mine as he races forward, picking me up with one hand by the meat of my ass, so I am forced to wrap my legs around his waist while his other arm wraps around my back. The momentum of the action has us spinning, or maybe it just feels like it.
I’ve tangled my arms around his neck and over his shoulders while burying my face down by his ear. I’m not sure how long we stay like this, clinging to each other. It may be hours or no time at all.
“I thought you were… again ,” he murmurs into my neck. “I had to see for myself that it was really you.”
“I’m okay.”
I unwind my arms from around his neck, releasing us both so I can face him. I stop when he turns as I pull back, and our lips graze. He looks my face over as if trying to commit every corner to memory, stopping on my lips a few times. He’s breathing as hard as I am.
“Can I kiss you?” he whispers in question, tightening his grip enough that I dip closer to his face.
“Ye—” But before I can get the full word out, my mouth is already on his. It’s a hurried, frantic, desperate kind of kiss. Both searching with our lips, exploring with our tongues—he tastes so good. I miss his touch so much it hurts, my rage hurtling inside of me so violently I’m dizzy with it. When we stop for air, our breaths are heavy, lips bruised.
He’s walking, carrying me, and I look to see that we’re almost on the far side of the room, away from the door to where Eryn is. When we reach the wall, he adjusts his grip from around my back so he can press me into it and cups my face. I close my eyes and turn into his hand, ignoring my rage still battling to be free. I just want to feel him.
His thumb brushes over my swollen lips and he leans in for another kiss. This time it’s slow, as he presses his body into mine. The kiss is soft, but his hardness rubbing between my legs is sending heated signals all over my body. Grinding into me, swapping soft moans, the kisses turn rough and demanding before becoming slow and delicate again.
I’m almost shuddering at how much I need his touch. The hand cradling my face slides down to hold the side of my neck as he begins to kiss down the other side to my collarbone.
“Don’t think I didn’t notice what you’re wearing,” he says huskily between each slow, tiny kiss. “I like it.”
My hands, still tangled in his hair, pull his head back roughly. “What I’m wearing has nothing to do with you.”
It only makes him grin.
But it disappears just as quickly, and I remember our last interaction, what I tried to make him promise, and the way he refused.
I don’t care that I can’t have more than his touch, that he can’t give me more than this. I reach down and fumble to undo his pants. His confusion and then realization is apparent when he almost drops me.
“What are you doing?” he asks in a quick whisper.
“Obviously, I want you to fuck me, Riley,” I say with an edge of exasperation, getting frustrated that I can’t undo his pants fast enough. I want to do this before I remember all of the reasons why I shouldn’t. Maybe if I get this out of my system, I’ll feel as dirty and debased as I usually do after sex. And then I won’t crave his touch anymore.
Despite the hesitation and the confusion on his face, he helps me to undo his pants, and I look between us as his erection springs free. I grip him firmly, and he shudders as I stroke him. He whispers my name. My name . Not Firecat. Mika . It sounds like a promise on his lips, one I might want him to keep. Forever.
Something about hearing my name on his lips tips me over the edge, and I guide him between my legs, moving the stupid scrap of lace out of the way.
“Are you sure?” he whispers, as he tries to make me look him in the eye .
Refusing to answer or look him in the eye, I slide the head of his hard cock up and down my slit, coating him in my wetness. He exhales hard, whispering my name again. I finally look at him, a needy moan escaping me as I continue to stroke myself with his cock.
“Kiss me instead of making that sound.”
So I do, because I cannot wait any longer. I nudge him only slightly inside me, and light on fire. Slowly, he begins to ease himself deeper, my entrance stretching to accommodate his cock that’s as big as I’d feared it would be. I whimper into his mouth, my fists clenching around his collar.
He stops. “Are you okay?” he whispers while concerned eyes search my face.
I nod a yes and grab his hips to thrust him toward me as I buck into him. But he doesn’t budge. “Slowly, or I’ll hurt you.”
“I don’t care,” I growl.
“I do.”
He moves slowly , edging in only a fraction more. Again, I try to force him deeper, knowing that even now he is stretching me painfully. But the rage is screaming, and I need to drown it out.
“Don’t use me to hurt you. If that is your aim, we can stop right here,” he says, grabbing my face to force me to look at him. I lock eyes with him long enough that it should be unpleasant, but it’s the opposite. My rage calms a little.
He moves out and back in gently, keeping eye contact with me, until finally, he fills me. I breathe heavily, savoring the fullness of him inside me. Then he moves more rhythmically, harder. I kiss him, trying not to make a sound, but I still make a throaty whine of pleasure, albeit muffled against his mouth.
I’m bouncing against the wall, our muffled breathy moans rivaling each other. He pulls the strap of my dress down to expose my breast, and I arch up to meet his mouth. I cover my mouth with my hand as he licks my nipple and then teases it between his teeth.
“ Riley, ” I whimper into my hand.
He pulls my face back to his mouth, and I kiss him hard and forcefully. I’m reaching a pinnacle. Overwhelmed by the taste of him, the scrape and slide of our lips, and his tongue against mine, the pressure inside me continues to build.
He adjusts me in his grip and now I’m more exposed and open for him. With one hand on his shoulder for grip, I slide the other between us, desperate. Our eyes lock again as I circle my fingers around his cock as it pumps into me, squeezing the base before sliding back up to play with myself too. His tempo increases and I’m panting as my back begins to arch involuntarily.
My climax is intense. My knees grip tightly around him. Sounds become muffled and distant as heat explodes from my core and takes me over entirely. My hand has dipped under his shirt to hold onto his side, the other digging nails into the back of his shoulder.
Riley’s hand has come up to cover my mouth. “Shh, shh,” he laughs between pants of his own.
Following closely behind with his own release, Riley empties himself into me as I continue to clench in pleasure around him, his moans muffled between my breasts.
As my ecstasy slowly fades, Riley moves his hand from my mouth and back to my ass to hold me up, my legs no longer clamped around him with such a vice-like grip. I move his hair out of the way and hold his face, my thumbs stroking along his sharp jawline. The need to see his eyes is coursing hot through my veins. His eyes—eyes I don’t understand how I ever thought were regular and normal green.
Yes, Riley’s eyes are the green of the forest as a Nemorisborn, but they aren’t just green. They’re a dark evergreen of dense forest, dancing with an outer ring of colors from the waters of a silent beach. Speckled with warm light through young leaves, and golden hour warming their center. His eyes are breathtakingly beautiful, and I cannot believe I have never truly seen them until now.
“What are you looking for?” he asks with curiosity.
I look at him a little longer, wanting to bask in this moment with him before I allow reality to set in. It’s already circling like carrion birds waiting to descend.
With fully dilated pupils, Riley leans in to kiss my neck and whisper. “You have no idea how long I have waited for you.”
Like a bubble popped, the rage is back and screaming in my ears, if it ever stopped in the first place. I can’t do this with him. What is wrong with me? Held prisoner for the second time in as many moons and allowing lust to take over like some horny teenager. Disgusting. I am playing with fire, and I should know better, be better. This was silly at best and dangerous at worst.
Hate. I need to hate him. I’ll make him hate me instead. Make him hate me so much that he will never risk touching me again. It shouldn’t be too difficult.
“I’m just looking for you, Riley. Trying to find something real.”He leans back to look at me, confusion creasing his brow as I continue. “This isn’t real. We aren’t real,” I say sardonically, almost taunting. My skin prickles, and my heart rate increases wildly as I struggle to breathe evenly.
“What do you mean, ‘we aren’t real’?” he questions, trying to move closer to me against the wall, even though he’s s till inside me.
“Us. You and me. This isn’t real. It’s just sex,” I say, out of breath, getting agitated and lightheaded.
“You don’t get to decide what’s real for me. This was never just anything, Firecat.”
I’m trying to push him away so I can get down, but I’m struggling against him. The rage I've barely kept inside is becoming louder than I can bear. I’m biting the inside of my cheek and tasting blood as I continue to struggle in his grip.
Trying to get me to look at him, he pleads. “Stop. What just happened?”
“Let go of me!” I hiss, staring him straight in the eye.
He lets out an angry breath, holding my gaze for another moment before gently easing me off him and releasing me to my feet. I try to move around him as I straighten my dress. The giant mountain that he is, captures me as I try to go around. He lets go immediately but still won’t let me pass as he tucks himself back into his pants.
“This is more than scratching an itch, and you know it.”
“You said not to fall in love with you!”
His eyebrows go up. “And you said your heart didn’t exist.”
“It doesn’t!” I hiss again as I can’t seem to whisper. “This is all just a game. You can’t care for me!”
Riley finally loses his temper at my antagonizing. “Stop twisting my words, that was about Tovi! And this has never been a game to me, even though it clearly is to you.” His words are like a hot knife into the haggard pieces of what’s left of my soul. It’s the reminder I need: I am a monster. So, I will fucking act like one.
“And the other women?” It’s a low blow and I know it, but I’m losing the will to push him away, to fight. I need him to hate me.
“What other women?” he angrily whispers.
I try to get around him again, but this time he grabs my face in his hands, engulfing my head easily. Before I have time to struggle away from him, he’s leaning down to my eye level, and gently repeats himself. “What other women?”
“I’ve seen you with them. Sneaking into their rooms in the middle of the night.”
He makes a frustrated sound. “Yes, okay. Once , but that was before. I won’t apologize for being with women before you.” He frowns, using his grip on my face to bring me closer to him as he straightens up, maintaining eye contact. “As I told you in that cave, you’ve done something to me.”
The memory of him leaving the room of the beautiful Erduborn woman in the middle of the night, as she held his face after he kissed her cheek, crashes hard inside my chest along with my rage. I want to scream until I have no breath left in me and my throat is raw. My rage reminds me how pathetic and weak I am for letting him get this close again. Closer .
Jaena’s cruel laughter echoes in my ears.
Shaking my head, as much as I can when two giant hands are holding it, I say, “Not just before.” I grab onto his empty weapons harness to push him away. “So, you’re a liar too. Let go of me, Riley.”
I slam against him with my fists holding the harness to push him away from me, but his hands only drop to my shoulders as he opens his mouth to say something.
“It doesn’t matter anyway!” I get in first. “We aren’t bonded. I don’t have your heart and you don’t have mine. We’re nothing. You can lie, sneak around and fuck everyone else. Just continue to do whatever you like Riley. I. Don’t. Care. You’re just the drunk prince and I’m the monster you bought .”
I try to give him the most hateful and vicious look I can, as I’m not sure how much more of this I can take. My heart feels like it is just vibrating now, not even bothering to beat.
He falters for a moment, a flicker of emotions scrolling over his face. Our eyes are still locked as he starts shaking his head. “No. I don’t know what this is, what you’re trying to do right now, but no .”
I snarl like the beast I am. I can’t breathe. The edges of my vision are swimming.
“I have never lied to you!” he says, his voice beginning to rise.
Snarling again, I go for another shove. “Then who was the Erduborn woman you snuck around with in Waadi, mere hours after trying to fuck me? Or is that considered before ?”
Confusion and then recognition dawns on Riley’s face as I hear a rap on the door. It quietly begins to open, with Eryn chanting, “Please don’t be naked,” with his eyes firmly squeezed shut.