Chapter Ten
THE PAIN TEMPORARILY subsides as confusion surges when Hexius suddenly lifts me up in his arms.
“Where are you...” My voice trails off when the answer is made obvious as we enter the en-suite and he gently sets me down on the couch.
Oh my stars.
The bedroom they gave me last night was elegant and all, but this room’s en-suite, though?
It’s definitely one worthy of the Leopard King. The sheer size of it is just incredible, being twice as big as the apartment I share with Anastasia, while the floor-to-ceiling views...
Magic can only be at work here, since I’m pretty sure what I see outside isn’t AI but a glimpse of one of those “inner” worlds that I’ve heard being whispered about but never saw...until now.
Think rainbows turned into skies. Trees of every season all in one place. And oh, the shower—
I mean, flowers.
The flowers are pretty amazing, but right now, I suddenly can’t take my eyes off the shower area, which is also impossibly big (enough to fit an entire football squad!) and has multiple rainfall heads, steam jets, even a waterfall feature built on one side, and no, absolutely not.
I am not thinking about sharing a shower with him there, really. The thought’s never even—oh.
The sound of running water makes me turn my gaze to him, and my cheeks blaze my heat when I see Hexius is waiting for the tub to fill.
Like me, he hasn’t a stitch of clothing on.
But unlike me, he doesn’t seem to mind at all.
If anything, he moves through the space like he was born to be naked, every step radiating the kind of confidence that comes from never having been anything but utterly wanted.
I’m trying my best not to stare, but it’s impossible.
He moves like the leopard king that he is, his every move a portrait of grace, danger, and stealth molded into one being.
His shoulders are impossibly broad, his chest hard and massive, and when he bends to adjust the water jets, my throat just turns dry at how the muscles of his back contract, and oh, let’s not even get started about the rest of him.
Stop ogling him, Sam!
I want to cover my eyes, but instead I find myself swallowing hard as I continue staring like I’m hypnotized. He’s just so perfectly big, so perfectly hard, and oh my goodness—
How many inches would that be, truly?
I honestly can’t wrap my mind around it. Did that really fit inside of me? He’s not even fully aroused and yet—
“You’re close to making me blush with how hard you’re staring.”
The mocking tone has me gasping, my cheeks burning like mad now as my eyes meet his amused gaze. How long has he known? How long has he been watching me watch him?
“I...I didn’t—I wasn’t—”
“We are mated, Samira.”
Oh my goodness, Hexius is actually purring, and the sound is to die for.
“Do you not know that means you own every part of me as I do yours?”
I...I have no words. Hexius is mine? Every part of him? Mine?
The concept is so overwhelming, so impossible to process, that I just sit there gaping at him like a fish while he watches me with those golden eyes that seem to see straight through to my soul.
“The water’s ready.”
He’s already crossed the room and scooped me off the couch before I even realize what he means to do. Preter speed will surely be the death of me, and oh!
Water spills over the tub as he lowers me first, and then he settles right behind me while I’m nestled between his powerful thighs.
The heated water is like silk against my oversensitive skin, but it’s nothing compared to the feel of his hard body cradling mine.
I can feel every inch of him pressed against my back, including the growing evidence of his desire.
I’m so dead.
“Relache-toi,” he murmurs against my ear. “Let me take care of you.”
My toes curl as he starts soaping my body, his hands moving over my shoulders with reverent care—
So, so dead.
“You’re still thinking too hard,” Hexius purrs. “I can practically hear your mind racing.”
“Sorry, I just—” I break off when his hands slide down to cup my breasts, my body jerking as his thumbs brush across the hardened tips. “H-Hexius!”
“That’s better,” he says with dark satisfaction. “Stop thinking. Just feel.”
His hands are everywhere after that, sliding soap across my skin with movements that are half healing touch, half seduction. When he works his way down to my thighs, I can only arch back against him with a whimper as he spreads them gently open and his fingers find my swollen folds.
“Hexius...”
“Oui, ma belle?” The French endearment comes out rough, possessive. “Tell me what you want from me.”
I want him to never stop touching me like this.
I want his hands claiming every inch of my skin.
I want...
“You,” I whisper, the words tumbling out. “I w-want you.”
His hands still for a moment, and then he’s turning me around in the water, positioning me so I’m straddling his hips.
“Then say you’re mine, Samira.”
The evidence of his desire presses against my core, and it’s just too, too much once again.
“Say it.”
A command wrapped in a growl, and the words he demand come tumbling out in surrender.
“I’m y-yours—”
My words end in a gasp, with Hexius suddenly moving, and before I know it, he’s already impaled me on his throbbing length, and oh, oh, oh...how is it possible that I feel even fuller, my walls stretched deliciously beyond capacity?
“Parfait,” he growls, his hands gripping my hips with possessive force as he stills to let me adjust. “Can you feel it, Samira? Can you feel how you’re made only for me?”
I can only sob in agreement...since he’s already moving, his fingers digging into my flesh as he teaches me how to ride him.
I’m hesitant and awkward at first, but need soon takes over—oh, it’s impossible not to lose myself, the moment we become one like this—and then I’m the one completely out of control.
“That’s it, Samira.”
I’m the one bouncing up and down on his length, my breasts swinging and scraping against his chest—
“Take me deeper. You can do it.”
And so I do.
I rise and fall on him, learning the angle that makes him swear in French.
Every second has me spiraling, the rhythm our bodies move to making both of us pant, and when his thumb finds the sensitive bundle of nerves at my core—
“Please don’t stop!”
I can’t believe I’m shamelessy begging for something like that.
“P-Please!”
But I just can’t help it, with how that touch of his has the pressure building to exquisitely unbearable heights.
“Never.”
And of course he keeps his promise.
His fingers moving as relentlessly as the pleasure that’s making my belly tighten and tighten and tighten until—
“H-Hexius!”
I come apart with a cry that echoes off the marble walls, but it’s not enough. I don’t know why, but it’s not. Something’s missing. Something important. And when I lift my gaze helplessly to his—
“Tell me what you want.”
And just like that, I realize what it is.
“P-Please.”
“You have to say it, Samira.”
My leopard king is purring, the sound of it burning through my inhibitions, so that even though I still feel shy, it’s my need of him that eclipses everything—
“P-Please,” I hear myself choke out. “P-Please come inside of me.”
It’s the most shamefully embarrassing thing to ask, but oh!
The words seem to unlock something primal in him, and when Hexius thrusts back into me, it’s as if he’s more beast than man, and all I can do is cling to his shoulders as he drives into me faster and faster, harder and harder, and so, so deep that it’s almost like he’s reaching for my very soul—
“Samira.”
He grits my name out as he explodes inside of me, and the moment I hear this—
The moment I feel it—
I just can’t believe this, but his climax restarts mine, and I’m a sobbing and shuddering mess as pleasure rushes through my body like the most violent of storms.
“H-Hexius...”
I’m not sure how much time passes after that, with my body still trembling with aftershocks, and my mind still incapable of functioning. But just when I think it’s over, Hexius pulls out and gently guides me to turn around, positioning me on my hands and knees in the shallow end of the tub.
“Again,” he says, and it’s not a request.
W-What does he mean—
Ah!
He enters me from behind, the new angle making me gasp as he fills me completely. I’m oversensitive, every nerve ending alive with sensation, and when his hand connects with my bottom in a sharp spank—
“Hexius!”
But this only makes him chuckle, a dark and lazy sound that makes my body come alive in a completely and shamefully different way—
Spank!
What follows is a claiming in every sense of the word.
He moves with controlled power, each thrust hitting angles that make me see stars.
His hands are everywhere, one gripping my hip to hold me exactly where he wants me, the other finding my breast to roll and pinch my nipple until I’m delirious with the mix of pain and pleasure.
When he spanks me again, harder this time, I can’t hold back the cry that tears from my throat.
“Tell me you’re mine, Samira.”
This time, I don’t even think of denying it.
“Y-Yours,” I choke out. “I’m y-yours.”
When he slams into me one last time, it’s over for both of us, and oh, to feel him filling me with his heat—
I think I might pass out this time.
And so I do.
When I finally resurface from the haze of sensation, it’s to find myself back in bed, my body tucked protectively against his, and I...I no longer know what’s the right thing to think or feel. All I can do is look up—
I want to give you the words.
But I can’t.
Not just yet.
—before I start to cry.
Because those words that I hear in my mind...are all his.