Chapter 18 #2
I run my hands up the inside of her thighs, spreading her wider across the desk's surface, positioning her exactly where I want her.
The bracer on her wrist catches the light as she braces herself on her palms, and the sight of it sends another surge of possessive satisfaction through my body that translates directly into a desperate need to claim her in the most fundamental way possible.
"You are magnificent." I lower my head to press kisses along the sensitive skin of her inner thigh, working my way toward the center of her with deliberate slowness. "Brilliant and brave and so impossibly responsive. Do you have any idea what it does to me, knowing that you chose this? Chose me?"
Her response dissolves into a wordless cry as I finally put my mouth on her, using lips and tongue and the careful edge of my tusks to drive her toward the edge with practiced skill.
She tastes like victory and sweetness and everything I have ever wanted, and I lose myself in the act of pleasuring her, cataloging every gasp and moan as evidence that I am doing this correctly, that I am worthy of the gift she has given me.
Her fingers tangle in my hair, gripping hard enough to sting as her body arches off the desk, and I feel her thighs tremble against my shoulders as she crests the first wave.
I work her through it relentlessly, drawing out her pleasure until she is sobbing my name and pulling at my hair in desperate demand for more.
"Inside me. Knox, please, I need to feel you—"
I rise over her, positioning myself at her entrance, and pause just long enough to meet her eyes.
She is flushed and trembling, her hair spread across my desk like a dark halo, the bonding bracer gleaming on her wrist, and she has never been more beautiful than she is in this moment.
I push forward slowly, giving her body time to adjust to my size, watching her face for any sign of discomfort even as the tightness of her threatens to shatter my control entirely.
"Yes," she breathes, wrapping her legs around my waist and pulling me deeper. "Just like that. You feel so good, Knox. So perfect."
She is impossibly tight around me, her internal muscles fluttering and clenching in a rhythm that seems designed to drive me mad, and I have to close my eyes and think very hard about quarterly tax projections to avoid ending this encounter far too quickly.
"Move." Her command is accompanied by a sharp dig of her heels into my lower back. "I didn't agree to marry you so you could practice restraint. Show me what you feel."
The word "marry" on her lips breaks something loose inside me, some final barrier I had been unconsciously maintaining, and I begin to move with a intensity that makes the desk creak ominously beneath us.
She matches my rhythm with her hips, meeting every thrust with an eagerness that sets my blood on fire, and the sounds she makes—desperate, hungry, gloriously uninhibited—fill the office with evidence of our claiming.
"Mine," I growl against her throat, pressing my teeth lightly against her pulse point. "My partner. My equal. My bonded mate."
"Yours," she agrees breathlessly, her nails scoring lines down my back that I will wear like badges of honor. "All yours. Forever."
The word "forever" tips me over the edge, and I bury myself as deep as I can go as release crashes through me in waves of white-hot pleasure.
She follows me over moments later, clenching around me so tightly that I see stars, and we cling to each other as the aftershocks gradually fade into the warm glow of satisfaction.
The city skyline glitters through the floor-to-ceiling windows, a kingdom of lights spread before us like a map of territories yet to be conquered, and I find myself smiling at the sheer improbability of how my life has changed since I first broke down that conference room door.
"What are you thinking about?" Cypress traces lazy patterns on me with her fingers, the bracer warm against my skin.
"I am thinking about how thoroughly you have transformed my understanding of victory.
Before you, I measured success only in terms of territory claimed and enemies defeated.
Now I find myself calculating wealth in terms of moments like this one, small eternities of peace that I never knew I craved until you taught me how to want them. "
She props herself up on one elbow to look at me, her eyes soft with emotion. "That might be the most romantic thing you've ever said to me. And you once compared my asset allocation strategy to a perfectly executed cavalry charge, so the bar was already pretty high."
"That comparison remains accurate. Your approach to portfolio diversification is genuinely inspired."
She laughs and kisses me softly, then settles back against me with a contented sigh. We lie there in comfortable silence for several minutes, watching the city lights twinkle in the darkness, until a thought occurs to me that I have been delaying for far too long.
"There is one additional matter we must discuss regarding our bonding ceremony."
"That sounds ominous. What kind of matter?"
"It is customary, in Orcish tradition, for the bonded pair to receive the blessing of both clan matriarchs in person before the ceremony can be considered official.
" I pause, bracing myself for her reaction.
"Which means it is finally time for you to travel with me to meet my mother.
In the flesh. At the ancestral Bloodaxe stronghold. "
The silence that follows is profound enough that I can hear the distant sounds of the office celebration still carrying on somewhere down the hall.
"Your mother," Cypress says slowly. "The one who raised the warchief who once conquered seven rival corporations in a single fiscal quarter. That mother."
"The very same. She has been most eager to inspect you properly since our video call with the Council. She has many questions about your methodology for calculating compound interest, and she wishes to personally assess whether you are worthy of bearing the Bloodaxe name."
Cypress buries her face against my body and makes a sound that might be a laugh or might be a scream of existential terror. "I'm going to need so many more spreadsheets."