Finaan #3
“My defiant skjaldmaer,” he murmurs, his gaze searing into me.
“You will listen to me. You’ll heed my commands.
Perhaps not today, but sooner than you realize.
And you’ll be grateful for the order, the balance I’ll bring to your life.
You’ll find it’s freeing to give yourself over to someone else completely, as you will to me. ”
“I’m not your anything,” I remind the asshole as his words drip into my core, waking up the depraved part of me that responds to him. “You need to stop with this bullshit. I’m here for information. Nothing more. And I will never kneel to you.”
“The first time will be to take my cock between those pretty lips,” he breathes as even more of me comes to life, “but that will be the first of many.”
“If your cock ever finds its way into my mouth,” I force out between clenched teeth, “I’ll bite the bastard off.”
“Don’t threaten me with a good time,” he responds with a wink. “I can be patient, but the image you’re painting is enough to rip away all of my restraint.”
I don’t know how the fuck to respond to that, so I don’t. Stalking forward, I set the tray on the table and sit down, glaring at him. He refuses to look up at me. Fine. But I refuse to sit on the ground with him. He’ll accept this compromise or he’ll go hungry.
“Will you dine with me?” Wregen asks as he takes a seat and reaches a hand out toward the tray.
“I’d love something different in my mouth but this will do,” he adds as he takes a piece of meat, chews and swallows it, and then places two fingers between his full lips and sucks, his smoldering gaze never leaving mine.
Dark hair falls onto his forehead, and it only adds to his appeal.
I was fascinated with Wregen in Helheim, but the tousled, relaxed male now sitting in front of me is sexy in a way that uptight, controlling bastard never tried to be.
My treasonous body has no fucking idea what to do with this image.
I’m as repulsed as I am turned on, the depravity of my attraction to him triggering something I refuse to acknowledge.
Shaking my head as I focus on keeping my expression flat—because I will not reveal my reaction to him—I grunt out a refusal.
He nods as his fingers slowly slide from his mouth and then reach for another bite.
Dragging my eyes down to look at the food instead of him, I will my stomach to stop tumbling. I’m not this elf. I won’t let an alluring male get into my head, and definitely not this male.
“Do you know how I found you?” Wregen asks, pulling my attention back where he wants it.
“You said you detected Helheim within us, followed that,” I respond. I detest the idea of any part of that accursed place existing within me, but something led him to us.
“That was not the complete truth,” he says, before moaning as he bites into a piece of cheese. “This,” he adds as he slowly chews and reaches for another piece, “is what I missed the most. Eating is a sinful pleasure.”
“One your mistress kept from us,” I remind him, the fucker. “You chose that. We didn’t.”
He shrugs, popping the next bite into his mouth with a slightly less enthusiastic moan. “I had no choice,” he claims. “You’ll understand in time. When you know me better.”
I lean back, shaking my head at the ridiculous statement. “No, I won’t,” I insist, “because I don’t plan to know you better. I’m here to get information. Nothing more.”
Now, he stops eating, relaxing into his own chair as his body mirrors mine. “You have no idea, do you?” he asks in a tone I’d call amused, if I believed this male capable of emotion.
“What are you talking about?” I demand. “No idea of what?”
And then he smiles, a cat who’s caught his prey. This isn’t amusement. It’s victory and hunger and dominance all rolled into one searing gaze. “I found you because we’re connected,” he tells me as his fingers steeple in front of him, a spire dedicated to his god rising between his eyes.
“But you said that was a lie. That you didn’t follow some link we still have with Helheim.”
“You misunderstand,” Wregen murmurs, forcing me to sit forward to catch his words. “I’m not connected to the other elves, worthless, pitiful creatures that they are. I’m connected to you, and you to me.”
His words wriggle inside, finding that place in my gut that measures truth and falsity, helping me know what’s real and what’s not. A ripple of knowledge peeks up in response, telling me what he’s about to say.
Telling me his words will be true.
“You’re my mate, Finaan,” Wregen rumbles in the low tone that digs into my soul to feed the roots planted there long ago by vengeful, capricious gods, or maybe the fickle fates.
“I followed you here because we are connected. You’re mine.
You’ll always be mine. And it’s time for you to return with me to Helheim. ”
My heart pauses as his words sink in. And then it stirs into a frenzy, the detestable part of me rejoicing at his claim before I can quash the desire I can never, ever let myself feel for this male.