A dense, primal sound rattles in his chest, threatening to rip it to shreds from the inside out, his entire body locking around me like a shield as warm, milky ropes spurt all over my heaving breasts and dribble over my fingers still clenched around his manhood.
Gasping for breath, I gulp down the potent scent of his pleasure as those teeth pull back, replaced with the cool press of his lips—so soft.
A toosoft strike to the soul.
His kisses sow a tender trail up the line of my throat to my ear, along my jaw, his grip loosening on my weapon-wielding hand as he rumbles—like a deep purr. Rough fingers graze my breasts, painting me in himself,smearing it across the firm peaks of my nipples, making them tingle with a delicious spike of rapture while I try to soothe my ragged breaths.
He’s trembling, water pouring down the savage planes of his beautiful body as I look up at him from below my lashes, delving into the swirling pools of his unguarded eyes. Impossible to appreciate when my reflection is all I can see.
That well of self-hatred bubbles.
His thumb skims my lower lip, water dripping from his hair and beard, stare dipping to my mouth. Curled over me like some great beast, he drops his head, chilled lips grazing mine—
I jerk from his grip and shove to the side, walking backward as he spins—heaving, his heavy cock impossibly hard between his thighs and pointing straight at me.
I have a moment to take him in; stripped of his walls, muscles bulging as that knot of tension that’s always held us together is stretched to its limits. Or perhaps it just makes it more difficult to untangle.
I lift my chin.
“Milaje—”
“Consider my debt repaid for the time you pity fucked me with your fingers. This won’t happen again.”
I snatch a towel off the rail and spin on my heel, breaking from his sawtooth stare and stalking from the room, wiping myself clean of the mess he made across my chest. It’s only once I’m free of the thick, intoxicating aroma of our actions does realization sink in.
I just taunted the beast.
Snagging my bag and clothes, I dig my feet into my underwear, then my pants. I don’t bother wrapping my breasts before swiftly pulling my shirt on and fumbling with the buttons.
Shouldering my bag, I flip my sodden hair out from under my shirt and storm toward the window, hand planted against the pane to shove it open when Rhordyn’s fingers wrap around the handle. He pulls it forward, slamming it closed.
The windowpane rattles in synchrony with my thundering heart.
“Let me out,” I snarl, refusing to turn. Knowing that if I do, part of me might shatter. “I need to get back to my promised.”
“You’re showing him more respect than he deserves,” he booms, his energy a violent static battering my back. “Hisloveis driven by agenda and greed.He’s not good enough for you. Far from it.”
“You don’t get to tell me who I will and will not love,” I snap, and the air chills so fast my breath turns milky white.
He steps closer, his wet, naked body aligning with my back. Stilling my breath and my heart and grinding all my thoughts to a crashing halt. “No. And I won’t. But I will tell you this,” he growls, digging his face into my neck and almost buckling my knees. “I’m getting those ships before the full fucking moon, and then you can decide if you still want to be with that man.”
No.
I whip around, heart in my throat, head tipped as I look up at him poured over me like a shield. “You’re going to go to war with him? Overme?”
He doesn’t blink or flinch. “I’d strike the fuckingworlddown for you.”
All breath escapes me.
“Rhordyn, no …”
“I told you I won’t let you fall, and I’ve drawn that line in the stone,” he growls, warfare waging across his savage expression.
My entire chest aches, as if he just busted his hand through it and drew that very line with one of my cracked ribs
“You’re going to leave Parith without the ships. You’re going to leave the sailors and your pretty drawing over there,” I say, stabbing my finger at his map with fierce determination, “and you’re going togo.”
He laughs, but it’s all teeth. “Not happening, Milaje. Not in a million years.”
