18

I’m so lost in the magic of her mouth that I barely have time to douse the little orb of light, remind Feather to retrieve the stone she dropped, and subdue the glow in my eyes before the carriage driver opens the door for us.

We’re at the inn and tavern where I rented our transportation. It will look odd if we go walking off into the night in our party clothes, so for the purposes of our cover, we go inside and I pay for a room.

Originally, I had intended to draw my geistfyre circle in the room and take us home at once. But the moment we enter the chamber and I close the door, my plans change .

Feather wastes no time removing all the objects we stole from her garments and laying them on top of the bureau. “That feels so much better,” she sighs. “They were poking me. And this is poking me too.” She lifts her arms to adjust one of the pins in her hair.

I reach for the pin, and instead of helping her reseat it, I pull it free and fling it aside.

Startled, she looks up at me.

My heart is swollen full with everything she said to me, words I never expected to hear from another living creature. I didn’t realize how deep my own feelings were until I spoke them aloud and discovered the raw truth of them in my soul. And now, I intend to offer her another kind of proof of my affection.

I trace my fingertips along the curve of her face. “If we had just been fucking in here,” I murmur, “your hair would be unbound.” I pluck out another pin, and another, discarding them one by one until her brown hair tumbles around her shoulders.

She blinks up at me, her eyes wide with panicked excitement.

I cup her chin to confirm her attention. “This is not a game, or a role you must play,” I tell her. “My feelings for you will not change if you deny me, or if you speak your own will. Do not go along with this unless every part of you desires it. And if you feel uncertain about anything, tell me. I will yield to your wishes immediately. You have only to speak, and I promise to listen.”

The panic recedes in her eyes, replaced with bright confidence, and I smile, adding, “There is nothing so beautiful as a woman with power.”

She collects the hand that I curled around her chin, and she kisses my fingers. “I love you.”

That phrase is a blade of light through my heart, flooding my chest with a blaze of wondering joy.

“Not lightly do the Fae say those words,” I whisper .

“I’ve only said them to two people, and with one of them I didn’t mean it,” she replies. “But I mean it now.”

“And I mean it when I say that I love you recklessly, foolishly, beyond logic or hope.”

Feather unclasps her cloak and lets it fall. “Show me, then.”

I want to leap on her, throw her down, tear her clothes off her back. My entire body is shaking with my need to consume her, to be inside her. But I force myself to move slowly, so as not to frighten her. She’s been naked in front of me before, but this is a different kind of unveiling.

I’m halfway through with the buttons on her dress when she says tersely, “Is there a reason you’re taking so long?”

“I want to be sure you’re comfortable, that you feel safe…”

She jerks free and spins around, her brown eyes afire with a ravenous hunger. “If I want you to slow down, I’ll tell you. But right now, stop asking. Stop hesitating. Be the predator you were in that room, when you said you would chase me if I ran.”

I stare at her, and she blushes deeply, biting her lip. “Maybe it seems strange to you that I would want that, after the way I lived for so long. I don’t understand it myself. But I know what I need, and it’s not this slow, painful process—”

Her words break off in a squeal as I lift her bodily and fling her face down on the bed. My claws rip through every button on the dress—they can be repaired. I drag her lithe little body out of the gown, throw the dress aside, and toss her on the bed again, this time on her back. I crouch over her, letting my glamour fall away, revealing my horns, fangs, pointed ears, and all. Nestling my face between her breasts, I bite through the corset with my teeth and tear it away in ragged strips. Her breasts quiver with her frantic gasps, but she doesn’t stop me.

My tongue snakes out to curl around one of those charming breasts, and as it slithers across her nipple she tilts her head back and releases a faint moan. My cock was already stiff, but at that sound it hardens so violently that I cry out with the pain of it. I have not fucked a woman in far too long.

Reeling, dizzy with need for her, I step back and strip off my own clothes while she shimmies off the crinoline, stockings, and panties. I lunge for her, my bare body settling on top of her slim one. She seizes my hair, pulls my face down to hers, devours my lips with urgent kisses. The kisses melt into each other, sugared and decadent, a languid blaze, a temporary indulgence amid the torment of need.

I’m leaking arousal onto her smooth stomach as I kiss her. When she reaches down, tentatively, and runs her fingers along my aching length, I almost come.

“Stop!” I cry out, agonized. “Have some fucking mercy.”

She meets my eyes, startled, but there’s a wicked gleam in her gaze. She likes that I’m so helpless to a mere graze of her fingers.

I grip her face with my hand. “I’m coming inside you, not on you, do you understand?”

“Yes,” she breathes eagerly. “Yes.” And with the natural instinct of a sensual being, she lifts her hips and opens her thighs to me.

I grasp the base of my cock firmly and nudge the head into her soaked slit. Her small pussy, unused to cock, can barely accept my girth, and she gasps at the stretch as I enter her slowly. I feel her muscles tighten, her breath taking on a shrill note of pain.

“Relax.” I grasp her thigh and squeeze gently. “Don’t tighten up. Breathe, and feel your muscles loosening. Take me in when you’re ready.”

I’m gritting out the words between clamped teeth, fighting every second not to spill inside her immediately.

Feather inhales. Exhales. Relaxes her thighs and her pussy, and shifts forward to take more of me inside her .

I groan loudly at the torturous delight of it, my sensitive length squeezing deeper into the delicate wet center of her. She shifts her hips, accepting me, and I move in until I’m fully seated, sunk to the hilt in the pussy of the girl I’ve been obsessed with for weeks.

“Is that it?” she whispers.

I laugh raggedly. “No, precious. Now be still, if you love me, or I’ll come too soon.”

“I like you inside me,” Feather says softly, with those lush rosy lips of hers. “You’re so big and warm. You fill me right up.”

“Fuck…” My cock throbs heavily, and it’s agony to hold back. “Stop talking, I beg you. Give me a moment.”

Holding as still as I can, I reach down and rub my thumb right above where we’re joined. At the first caress of her clit, Feather gives a breathless little shriek and trembles all over. Her tits are peaked and rosy, and I fill my greedy soul with the sight of them while I stroke her clit with the pad of my thumb. I toy with her, circling and flicking, watching her reaction, smiling as the caution and cleverness fades from her gaze, replaced by the blank hunger of pure carnal need. Only when she has fistfuls of the sheets in her hands and she’s squirming beneath me do I pull slowly back, partway out of her, and then thrust firmly back in.

“Oh!” she exclaims. “Oh fuck… do that again…”

She’s glassy-eyed, flushed, utterly fucking beautiful. She deserves every bit of pleasure I can give her. I’ve pleased other women as a matter of course, as a polite courtesy in return for the use of their body. But with Feather, I find myself more obsessed with her climax than my own.

“Come for me,” I tell her. “Come on my cock, precious. I feel how slick you are. You’re ready to come so prettily for your master. ”

Her pussy flutters around me, and I’m so startled by the rush of pleasure along my nerves that I thrust deeper and harder than I meant to.

“Oh gods, yes!” Feather exclaims, and I thrust again, a forceful rush through her pussy. I ramp up the pace, losing myself to the rhythm, to the expression of tortured intensity on her face, to the increased frequency of her tiny, breathless shrieks.

Her eyes fly open and she gasps. Her pussy squeezes compulsively around my cock and I let out a harsh, savage groan as I come inside her. I flood her with my cum, great spurts of it, pent up for days. My arms are shaking as they hold my body above hers. She lets go of the sheets and grabs hold of me, shrill breaths still bursting from her lungs as she keeps spasming, keeps coming around my hard length. The thrills rocketing through my whole body are like nothing I’ve ever felt before.

“Oh gods,” she whimpers, her fingernails digging into my biceps. “It’s happening again… ahh—” And she comes a second time, with a rushing intensity that I can feel through every nerve in my body. I come with her, helplessly, violently, my balls tightening as they spill more cum into her belly.

“What the fuck,” I gasp out, trembling from the force of the pleasure.

Feather’s arms slip away from me and she falls back, barely conscious, blissed out on the bed. She’s panting, eyes half-closed.

When I start to pull out of her, her eyes fly open, stricken with ecstasy. “Fuck,” she whimpers. “Stay right there for a minute. Oh…”

A thrill traces through my cock as it hardens again, synchronized with the impulses of her body. I roll us both over so I’m beneath her and she’s on top, still impaled on my cock. I tuck two fat pillows under my head to prop myself up, so I can better enjoy the sight of her .

Feather plants both hands on my chest and lifts herself experimentally. She fucks herself on me slowly and clumsily at first, then faster, more smoothly.

It’s beginning to register in my mind that this isn’t possible. This isn’t normal. Even among the Fae, it takes a little time for a male to be hard again. I’ve never come twice so strongly in such close succession, and if she keeps riding me, I’m going to come a third time.

Vaguely a concept nags at the back of my mind… something I heard about during my time with the Seelie Fae. The idea of a mate bond. But that sort of bond was only possible among royalty, or so I was told. Neither of my parents were of royal blood. Besides which, I’m an outcast wretch bound to the Wild Hunt. The privilege and pleasure of a mate bond would never be permitted for someone like me.

“Krael.” Feather leans forward, one hand planted on my breastbone, the other cupping my face. Her long brown hair swings softly against my chest. “Am I doing it right?”

I’ve never seen such a glow on her face… on anyone’s face. No one has ever looked at me with so much trust, delight, and love. It’s enough to break my heart.

“You couldn’t do it wrong,” I assure her. “But you should stop being so fucking beautiful.”

She smiles, bright as the stars in the Void. “I love this. Don’t you?”

“Fucking come here.” I reach up and pull her down to me, her soft form pressed to my chest, her hair cascading over my ribs and my arm. I’m still deeply lodged inside her, tendrils of my pleasure still twined with hers, still sending shivers of delight into my belly. She kisses my mouth, slipping her tongue over mine. Her hands find my horns and she uses them for leverage as she begins to move her hips again, slicking my cock with her arousal .

“Krael,” she whispers, blinking pleasure-dazed eyes at me. “Krael…”

“Ride me, sweetheart,” I urge hoarsely. “Ride me until you come.”