Chapter Twenty-Eight Amunet
TWENTY-EIGHT AMUNET
The world melted away under that tender kiss. The itch disappeared. King Zaid’s voice faded into oblivion. Finally, after days of endless racket, there was nothing but blissful silence.
A whimper of relief slipped out of me.
“Amunet,” he whispered, his own broken plea.
I wrapped my arms around his neck and hauled him against me, molding our bodies together. My tongue darted out, coaxing his lips apart. He immediately parted them, and the moment my tongue touched his, he groaned softly and the tenderness vanished.
He walked me back until my spine pressed against the wide beam holding up the tent, one hand splaying by my head while the other rested low on my hip.
His mouth consumed me, tongue tangling with mine.
His taste was warm, familiar, safe. His hand on my hip slid to the small of my back, pulling me against him, while one of his muscular thighs slipped between mine.
Heat pooled low as my senses came alive.
He drew back, breathing heavily. “If you want to stop—”
“Don’t stop.”
He looked at me, those brown eyes heavy-lidded with desire yet making certain I knew what I was asking. “Don’t stop,” I repeated firmly.
And like the loyal soldier he was, he obeyed.
His lips were on mine again, one hand going to my jaw, tipping my head back to better plunder my mouth while his other held me close. His tunic was thin, and through it, I could feel all of him. Every toned, muscled inch. Could nearly feel his heart thundering, just as mine was.
Jasim’s lips were hungry, his touch greedy, as his hands smoothed down my shoulders, my back. He abandoned my mouth for my jaw, my throat, beard scratching deliciously as he went. I buried my fingers in his silky black curls, clutching him as his lips trailed over my skin.
He nipped at the juncture between my neck and shoulder, and I gasped as he soothed over with his tongue. Jasim hooked a finger under my dress strap and pulled it down. My neckline sagged, and his lips followed it, tasting down my collarbone, my sternum, pausing just above my chest wrap.
My breasts heaved over the fabric. His eyes met mine as he pulled my other strap off. The whisper of my dress hitting the ground seemed to echo around us. He reached behind me for the knot of my chest wrap.
I relished the simplicity of the sounds around me. My galloping heart, our panting. All so mercifully normal. So blessedly familiar. My world narrowed down to Jasim and only Jasim.
My chest wrap landed beside my dress. Jasim’s callused palm cupped my breast. Just coarse enough where it ran over my sensitive flesh that my breaths turned ragged, my skin hot.
His thumb brushed over my nipple before he rolled it between his fingers, making me suck in a breath, but his lips were there to swallow the sound.
Hot and demanding, as if he wanted to devour me.
His hand at my back trailed down, smoothing over my backside, my thigh, stopping to grab my knee and hook it up around his hip, opening me up to him.
When he pressed into me again, I moaned.
He was hard, his hands rough against my bare thigh.
This. This was why I always came back to him. He consumed me like he wanted all of me. Not just the queen. Not just the Gods-Chosen. Me. Heady and addictive, and an utter relief.
His mouth left mine in favor of my breast. Tongue circling, teeth scraping over the hardened peak.
I arched against him and dug my heel into the top of his thigh, pulling him impossibly closer.
He groaned against me and rolled his hips into mine, his hard length rubbing against my core and dragging a gasp from my lips.
I reached for the hem of his tunic and wrenched it over his head, revealing the expanse of his beautiful tan skin.
A constellation of scars crossed his chest and stomach, bumpy beneath my fingers, my lips.
I kissed each mark, hand traveling down.
His stomach muscles tightened against my palm, his arousal straining beneath his trousers.
“Amunet…” His fingers flexed on my upper thigh, pausing centimeters away from where I ached.
“Stop now and I’ll kill you.”
His laugh was gruff. “Yes, my queen.” And he slowly sank to his knees.
My pulse ratcheted higher as he eased my undergarments down and tossed them aside before guiding one of my legs over his shoulder, eyes never leaving mine. Soft lips pressed kisses above my knee, moving higher at an agonizing pace. I groaned in frustration.
Jasim’s breath was hot against my center as he chuckled, sending a shiver ricocheting up my spine. “Always so impatient,” he murmured before his tongue parted me in one long swipe.
He and I swore in unison, and my head fell back against the post. He moaned, “Amunet,” into my flesh before he set to devouring me.
A breathy sound fell out of me. My fingers found their way into the soft locks of his hair, gripping tightly as he reached the bundle of nerves at my apex.
A flick of his tongue sent sparks spiraling through my body, and my toes curled.
He took hold of my bucking hips and forced them still as he repeated the gesture and then sucked.
“Fuck,” I burst out, straining against him.
He slid a finger into me, and my knee nearly gave out.
Jasim supported me, as he always did, and hummed in approval against my folds, the sound vibrating through me.
There was nothing but Jasim and his tongue and his finger—gods, fingers—as I squirmed and liquid heat rose and I—
I resisted. Tried to focus on the roughness of the pole behind me, the discomfort of dirt in my sandals, anything but the—
Jasim crooked his fingers inside me, and lightning zipped through my veins. A broken sound escaped me. He commanded, “Stop fighting me, Amunet,” before he sucked again. Hard.
I had no choice but to obey. My body tightened and the world fell apart in a burst of stars that robbed me of breath.
My knee buckled. Jasim caught me before I collapsed, guiding me down slowly until I straddled his lap, shaky and dazed.
His arousal was hot against my stomach, kept away from me by his infernal trousers.
“Gods, you’re so beautiful,” he breathed, and kissed me. I tasted myself on his tongue, but I didn’t mind. My insides felt unsteady, fluttery, my mind was utterly blank. Jasim broke from my lips to kiss his way to my ear, where he panted in a raspy voice, “I need to be inside you.”
My voice was gone, but I nodded instantly. I’d agree to anything that kept this moment suspended in time. Anything to keep him touching me, kissing me.
I reached for his trousers, but he was already there, fumbling with the ties.
With some maneuvering, he managed to slide them down without removing me from his lap and his length sprang free between us.
My hand drifted to it of its own accord, my fingers wrapped around the hot flesh.
I squeezed the way he liked it, stroked the way he’d taught me years ago.
Jasim hissed, and his eyes wrenched shut as liquid beaded the tip.
I smiled.
“Evil woman,” he groaned. My grin spread.
We both held our breath at that initial stretch and then let it out on a sigh as I sank down onto him.
Jasim had fucked me many times over the years, but it felt different tonight.
Maybe my mind was just adrift on pleasure.
But when he gazed up at me, eyes twin pools of black, reverent and worshipful, I did not revile it; I reveled in it.
I didn’t look away as I lifted and then slid back down, admiring the way his face slackened, the flush that stole over his dark cheeks, the dangerous clench in my stomach that warned another tailspin would take almost no effort at all.
Jasim gripped my hips, my backside, as I moved. I tangled a hand in his hair while I dug my nails into the skin of his shoulder blades with the other, burying my face in his neck as I moved faster, harder. My eyes slid shut as sensations passed through me, fluttering and light and—
“I love you,” Jasim breathed.
I froze.
A beat later, he tensed, too, realizing what he’d said.
Slowly, I pulled back. His chest heaved, but his eyes flicked over my face fearfully. His fingers tightened on my hips. Jasim shook his head. “I didn’t mean it,” he rushed breathlessly. “It just slipped out. Forget—”
“Tell me again.”
Jasim blinked. Later, I might call myself stupid or selfish or any number of horrible things.
And they might all be true. But in that moment, my insides lit up in a way I had never felt before.
Those three words—such simple ones, and yet I had not heard them in a very long time, couldn’t remember ever hearing them.
I wanted to hear them again. I wanted them to be true.
My hips resumed their rhythm. “Tell me again,” I whispered.
Jasim’s lashes fluttered. His arms banded around me, holding me so close I almost couldn’t breathe. “I love you.”
My lips brushed his. “Again.”
“I love you, Amunet.”
“Again.”
We moved faster, and he breathed his love into my neck, my shoulder, my breast, my lips.
Emotion swelled in my chest, blooming into something I did not recognize but made no attempt to stop.
It made me feel weightless, thrilled me, brought a smile to my face.
And when I went over the edge again, it was so much more intense.
I clung to him, arms tight around his neck, face buried in his hair, as it pummeled me.
Jasim trembled through the last of his pleasure. His hands were gentle as they stroked up my spine. He could sense that something had happened, and he was trying to soothe me, holding me as if I were delicate, precious, lips peppering soft kisses up my neck.
I couldn’t lose him.
The thought blossomed in the pit of my stomach as we sat there, breathing hard. More than that, I didn’t want to lose him. My only friend. The only person to love me in years, besides Shaya. And where was Shaya? My mind was fracturing, and he was nowhere to be found.
But Jasim was right here. He loved me. He’d watched me, he’d learned me, he knew me, and he was still here. He loved all of me.
“Jasim,” I said, voice hoarse, “there’s something I have to tell you.”
He shook his head as he pulled back, eyes gleaming. Gods, the look. So much stronger than before, kicking up wings in my stomach. “You don’t have to say it back,” he said.
“No, that’s not— When we reach the temple… I—”
Thunder rolled outside. Loud. Insistent.
And getting louder.
We stared at each other, lips swollen, bodies glistening with sweat, and listened.
Jasim’s brow creased. He pecked my lips before gently guiding me off his lap and yanking up his pants. Unsheathing his scimitar, he parted the tent flaps and peered outside.
Flames of irritation melted down my skin, begging my nails to scratch, and King Zaid’s voice surged back into focus. A cacophony of beratement, of laughter, of blame. A sob crawled up my throat.
Jasim’s face went bone white.
“What is it?” I ignored all my discomforts as I pulled my dress back on, grabbed my undergarments, and hurried to his side. Then my heart dropped into my stomach.
Small circles of light bobbed against the black night sky. Torches. So many of them. And they were growing larger with every second, moving too fast.
Rolling toward us in the darkness was the rapid pounding of hooves.
“Horses,” I said. Not camels, not merchants. Horses. Running full sprint at our camp.