Chapter 1

1

NEPHELE

“ P leeeeease? You’re making me beg for something I shouldn’t have to beg for.”

Colden glances up from his book. He’s lying in bed, already undressed, and tucked under the covers for the evening, as though it isn’t barely after dark on my favorite night of the year here at Winterhold: the Midsummer Festival.

He drags his hand from beneath the covers and arches a brow, skimming his dark gaze over my red gown. His attention lingers for the briefest moment on the small swell of my breasts peeking from the scooped neckline before quickly slipping back to my face.

“I’m sure you’ll catch the eye of some lucky lad tonight, especially wearing that . You don’t need me tagging along, spoiling your chances.”

As if I’m looking for a lover tonight. I can’t say I’d be against it, but no one in the village has captivated me enough that I would willingly let them take what I have to give. Except for the king lying before me, and he isn’t the slightest bit interested.

I sit next to him on the edge of his bed and examine the book clasped in his hands. There’s no title on the worn, red cover. “What is that?”

He snaps the book shut and smirks. “A dirty book. That I rather enjoy reading from time to time.” He taps the tip of my nose. “But not when pestering little girls are in the room.”

I return his raised brow and push my chest out a little. “I’m far from a little girl. Or have you failed to notice?”

“Apparently so. Perhaps because I’m approximately twelve—or is it thirteen?—times your age. Math never was my strong suit. You may be twenty and five and feeling older and wiser, but you’re still a youngling to me.”

“As is everyone else in the world!” I throw up my hands. “That’s not the point right now. The point is that I have no one else to go with me, Colden, and you’re the king, for gods’ sakes. Everyone would love to see you.”

He groans and drops his head against the mounded pillows behind him. “If you had any notion how many of these parties I’ve attended. Can you not take Alexus?”

When he looks at me again, I make the most awful face. “Alexus is not fun at parties, and you know it. He sits with his beer in the shadows and broods. Broodingly . You know he won’t dance with me either.”

Colden laughs. “He can dance. Slowly. He just won’t.”

“Yes, well, I’m not looking for anything slow tonight. I need…” I take a deep breath and blow it out. “Fun.”

“That new bowyer from the plains seems to fancy you. He keeps coming around. Perhaps you should go find him.”

“Joran Dulevia? No, thank you. He’s handsome and all, but the ladies say he’s a horrible prick. Besides, I don’t want to go with him. I want to go with you.”

I take his hand between mine. Sometimes it strikes me that in three short years, this deadly hand I loathed when I first came here is now the hand that I constantly find myself reaching for, sure and comforting.

Again, I say please, but this time I draw his hand to my chest.

A sigh of relent leaves him as he tosses his dirty book aside and stares into my eyes in that easy way of his. He shakes his head. “Godsdamnit, you hold far too much power over me, Nephele Bloodgood.”

I squeal and bounce on the edge of his bed before hurrying to his oversized wardrobe where I swing open the carved doors. “I’ll find you something lovely to wear. Silver, maybe? Purple? No. Blue .” I reach for a blue satin dress jacket and black pants I’m not sure I’ve ever seen him wear. “Blue is definitely your color.”

“Whatever you think. So long as I’m more comfortable than I am pretty.”

When I look over my shoulder to say something snarky, he’s standing from the bed, his back to me— completely naked.

I can’t look away.

He’s beautiful, of course. I’ve thought that since I first met him. I’ve seen him shirtless a time or two in training, which was breathtaking. But this … The long, lean muscles stretching down his tapered back. The tight curve of his perfect ass. The soft, golden hair on his long, muscular thighs. He seems more powerful like this than any other way I’ve ever seen him, even sweaty and half-naked, with a glint of mischief in his eyes on the training field, bearing dual swords.

It’s… overwhelming. Enough that not only does my pulse pound but my mouth waters, too.

Colden opens a drawer beside his bed and slips his book inside. I gulp when the way he’s angled affords a glimpse of even more of him, certainly more than I’ve seen before tonight. It’s a side view, but I think… I think he’s half-hard.

Something clicks in my brain. He was in bed and undressed when I came into his room unannounced. Reading a dirty book. With one hand beneath the covers.

I interrupted him.

“It’s not polite to stare.”

His voice rattles me out of my daze. Startled, I blink up to meet his eyes, my face burning. “I… I wasn’t?—”

“Yes, you were.” A sly grin curves his lips as he grabs a shirt from another drawer and holds it over his private parts before strolling toward me. He stops only inches away, and suddenly there’s simply too much of him in this room. He takes the suit from my grip. “I’ll get dressed and meet you in the south garden in half an hour?”

I clear my throat, paint on a fake smile, and pray my face looks a little less than utterly mortified. “That sounds perfect.”

The moment I skirt around him, I groan inwardly and roll my eyes at myself. Who stares at the king’s cock? Me, apparently.

“Oh, Nephele.”

With my hand on the doorknob to his room, I turn back. “Yes?”

He’s already slipped into his trousers, though they remain unlaced, hanging low and loose on his hips. The blond trail of hair from his navel to his… pretty bits… draws my attention, but I force my stare to remain on his face.

“I lied earlier,” he confesses. “I haven’t failed to notice anything when it comes to you.”

My heart trips over itself, and my blush grows even hotter as I smile, this time genuinely.

“I’m glad,” I tell him.

Then I slip out into the hall.

I cannot stop laughing.

By the time Colden and I make it to the top of the stairs leading to his chambers, I have to pause to catch my breath.

I grip my side, tears in my eyes, my cheeks aching. “Gods’ death. It hurts.”

Colden slings his jacket over his bare shoulder and wipes at his eyes. He’s still laughing, too, even as he leans against the balustrade, his muscled torso shadowed by the dim light. His tunic was discarded and left behind at the festival, with good reason.

“Payback is going to be brutal,” he warns. “Alexus Thibault will undoubtedly make us pay for that.”

“His face when you rubbed your nipples. He was half-livid and half-horrified.”

“You’d think he’s never had a lap dance before, and I know better, believe me. I was there.”

“Just never one from you!” I try to walk down the hall, but I can’t see because my eyes are squeezed tight from laughing so hard. I bump into the wall next to Colden’s door, and then he’s there, too, pressing his hand above me, his face flush with humor, his black eyes bright in the candlelight illuminating the darkened corridor.

“Shhh.” He presses his finger to my lips, making me shiver when he pulls away. “Someone might be sleeping.”

Though I doubt that’s the case since most everyone is still at the festival, I take a deep breath, press my lips together, and try to calm myself.

As our hysterics quiet and our breathing returns to semi-normal, I become aware of Colden’s nakedness again, his crushing nearness, the delicious scent of him, wild winter laced with summer’s musk and blackberry wine. I suppose, in the end, that’s what’s to blame for what I do next— the wine . Because I did have a few glasses at the festival, making me a little more relaxed than usual, a little braver. Certainly bolder.

I arch off the wall. Just enough that Colden’s knee slips between my legs.

His smile falls into a more serious mask, his gaze locked with mine as he tilts his head. “Careful, love. That’s a dangerous look you’ve got in your eyes.”

His voice always sounds rich and wonderful, but tonight, it’s dark and smooth, sex on velvet.

Taking a chance, I press my hands to his bare chest, feeling, for the first time, the curve of muscle there, the smooth, cool-to-the-touch skin, despite the summer night we just abandoned. He doesn’t stop me.

Daring to take even more liberty in the moment, I slip my hands up to his shoulders and thread my fingers into his blond hair. “Dangerous, how?”

He leans closer, licks his pretty lips, and presses his knee against me, making me gasp. “Oh, I think you know.”

I don’t give myself a second of deliberation to do anything in that moment except kiss him.

He flinches when my lips collide with his. Shocked, I’m sure. But then his mouth begins working in tandem with mine, our lips and tongues learning a new dance that sets my blood on fire. It doesn’t matter that we’re in a hallway with more bedchambers nearby, including Alexus’s. Nothing matters in those minutes, save for the need to get closer to one another, a need to feel skin on skin.

I rub against his leg, the sweet friction causing a deep ache to stir and build. In response, Colden runs his hands up my arms and over my shoulders, drags them across my breasts and up to my throat, and cups my face.

He pulls back from our kiss, leaving me breathless all over again. “Birthbane?”

“Yes. Always.”

“Me, too.” He runs his thumb over the shape of my lips. “Tell me what you want from me tonight, Nephele. Tell me, and I’ll do my best to give it to you.”

“Isn’t it obvious?” I ask with a small smile, stroking myself once against his strong thigh. “I’ve never truly been with a man. I want my first time to be you.”

Colden shakes his head as if to clear it. He then drops his knee and looks at me as though I’ve sprouted a horn from my chin. “What did you just say?”

Voices echo from the stairs. Colden snaps his head that way, then looks back at me, a decision hovering between us. Quickly, he opens the door to his room, takes me by the arm, and drags me inside.

I press my back against the door while he tosses his jacket on a nearby chair and stares at me with wide eyes, hands resting on his narrow hips. “You’re a virgin , Nephele? I already felt like I was committing some horrible wrong by desiring you. This makes matters so much worse.”

I frown, remembering what he said earlier tonight about our ages. “First of all, you’ve slept with other people, Colden. Did their age matter? Why am I any different? And secondly, I know I mentioned that I have never been with a man. It was this past winter, in fact. We were in the library. You were telling me that I should give Lorance the groomsman a chance.”

He screws his face into a scowl. “The difference is that none of those other people have been you. A Witch Walker under my care. And… I don’t recall any talk about you being a virgin.”

“I told you that I had never lain with a man, and my first wasn’t going to be Lorance who perpetually smells like horse!”

A blank look takes over as I watch his mind working, trying to remember. “I suppose what I heard was I’ve never been with a groomsman. Not I’ve never been with a man. You’re twenty and five and fucking beautiful as the day is long. How, in Loria’s name, has no man wooed you to bed by now?”

My brows dart up. “I never said that none had wooed me to bed. I said I’ve never truly been with a man, and I want the first to be you.”

He looks utterly perplexed by this. “But… why?”

“Again. How is this not obvious? You’re…” I gesture at him, standing there like a half-naked god. “You!” “I take a deep breath and sigh. “And I don’t know what I’m doing in the least when it comes to sex. But I know that if my first time is with you, you’ll make certain it’s a night I will never forget, unlike anyone else in this village.”

He drops his head, rubs the bridge of his nose, and mutters something mostly unintelligible. Something like… Oh gods, this again.

When he looks up, his mouth curves down at one side, and one sharp eyebrow raises. “Playing to my ego, I see.”

I shrug, pinching my fingertips together. “Perhaps a bit. Is it working?”

“Of course not.” He narrows a look on me. “All right, maybe a little.”

After too many moments of awkward silence, he reaches out and takes my hand. “Come here.”

I let him guide me to a chair by the fireless hearth where he sits and tugs me into his lap, which is absolutely all right with me.

“Listen. I am beyond honored that you would want me to be your first real experience,” he says, sounding so polite. “But perhaps you need someone with a bit more—” he glances around the room as though lost and looking for an exit “— stability .”

“Oh, yes. Because Winterhold is ripe with unattached, stable men. It’s practically overflowing with them.” I lightly smack at his chest. “Like who? Trei the greasy bookmaker? Sam the butcher, with blood under his fingernails? Varin, the bladesmith’s apprentice? He pets his sword and his cock more than he would ever pet me, and that’s the opposite of what I need.”

Colden laughs. It’s a quiet laugh, but a laugh, nonetheless.

I push a lock of hair behind his ear and gentle my voice. “I told you. I need a man who will make my first time memorable. Who will be patient and teach me and pleasure me and prevent it from being something I will forever regret.”

He takes his hand from the arm of the chair and places it on my hip. “You assume I’m a grand lover, then.”

“I know you are. Word spreads. From people of all stripes. And I know you . I know I won’t be fucked and forgotten. I know that it will matter that it’s good for me and that I’m happy afterward.”

“But why tonight?” he asks. “Why have you said nothing before now?”

I shrug. “I don’t know. I’ve thought about it before, far too many times. But in all honesty, tonight is the first time I felt like you really saw me. Saw me and wanted me. I felt it, and so I kissed you and hoped you didn’t scold me and send me to my room like the little girl I am not.”

He touches my face, trailing his fingertip along my jaw. “I just need you to understand that this … This is…”

“Not love,” I say.

He slips his hand into my hair, his long fingers curling around my neck. “No, I do love you, Nephele. You have become a best friend over these last three years. A confidant, like no other. I trust you as well, and that is rare for me. Yes, I’ve had my affairs, but other than Alexus, there’s been one other person before you in the last century who I trusted as much.” A shadow passes over his face. “But beyond casual intimacy, fun sex, and friendship, I am not capable of giving you what you deserve. I haven’t been capable of that in a very long time.”

“And what do I deserve? A husband? Ten children running about? A cottage to care for and fields to harvest? What if I don’t need or want any of that? What if all I need is someone to be a comforting set of arms when I’m sad? Someone to listen when I need to talk? Someone to laugh with, and someone to take me when I need to be taken? A settled, domestic life is good for many, Colden, but I don’t know if my mother raised me to be one of those women. But what’s more… I’m lonely.” I rub my fingertips over his brow. “Like you. I search for any joy I can find, even in a drunken festival. I want to feel something deeper, to be wild with bliss, to share what I’ve only ever given myself with another. And I want that person to be you.”

He looks sad. Not the reaction I meant to provoke.

“You know I want you,” he says. “I don’t know how anyone could be in your presence for long and not want you. But I need to know that I won’t hurt you. I would never forgive myself.”

“I’m not fragile. And I know what I have with you. Your friendship is precious to me. I’m aware that your heart isn’t part of the deal. Mine isn’t either if I’m honest. But you do make me happy, in our own special way. And if I must get naked in front of a man and bare my all, I fear I can only do it in front of you.”

He smiles. “That comfortable?”

I nod. “That comfortable.”

He frowns again. “Have you ever seen a man fully naked?”

I roll my eyes at him. “Yes. Of course.”

His shoulders scrunch up. “I didn’t know. I’m confused by this entire situation.”

I can’t help but giggle. “Then ask what you need to know.”

He lets out a huff of a breath. “Have you ever even touched a cock?”

“Yes.” I smile and waggle my brows. “A handful of times.”

“Oh, you’re clever. I see what you did there.” He winks. “Tell me what it was like. What did you actually do? ”

He says those words as if he isn’t sure I know what I did at all.

“Well, the first was awful. I was a young girl, maybe fourteen. I touched him and ran away, horrified. The second and third… I was still a girl, but a bit older. One was in the dark behind a barn, so you have me there. I don’t really know what happened. I touched him, he grunted, and then we got scared and ran. The other, well, my mother caught us behind a tree just as he was about to gasp for glory, and that was that. He never looked at me again. The fourth, however, was when I was twenty. We were watching the stars and one thing led to another. He liked my breasts and touched me through my pants. I stroked him until he spilled in my hand. I rather enjoyed that one.”

Colden blinks at me, most likely at my forthrightness, biting into his lower lip. “And the fifth? Was there a fifth?”

My cheeks heat as I summon honesty. “Yes. It was Varin. Two summers ago. He brought Alexus a new sword. I saw him and we chatted, and he came to my room. Talking led to drinking which led to kissing that led to touching, and touching led to more kissing on my part. Just not with his lips. I let him finish, but not in my mouth.”

“Where, then?” he asks, his voice a bit huskier than before and thoroughly interested.

I drag my fingertips down my chest, touching the line of cleavage between my breasts. “Here.”

Colden arches a brow and takes a deep inhale, the hand at my hip tightening. “And did he bring you the same pleasure you brought him?”

I shake my head. “It was as though he didn’t know how. He touched me, inside and out, but in all the wrong places and all the wrong ways. I grew tired and wasn’t going to instruct him, for gods’ sakes. He was a grown man.”

Colden laughs a little at that. “But you have also pleasured yourself, yes? You said before…”

“Oh, yes. Of course, I have.”

I swear the midnight in his eyes darkens at the thought.

“And did you make yourself…”

“Come?” I whisper close to his lips, leaning into him as my heart starts beating harder. “Many times.”

A low groan leaves him. “Godsdamnit, Nephele. You are far better at this than you believe.”

I tighten my hand in his hair. “Reward me, then,” I whisper. “Show me what you do to good girls.”

He grips my chin and looks into my eyes. “I do vile things,” he says. “You might not be quite ready for all that yet.”

“I’m ready for more than you know.” My blood hums and I raise a taunting brow. “Defile me, my king.”

Eyes sharp, he reaches for the laces tying my bodice and unthreads them, one by one. When the pressure releases, I remove my stays, and Colden helps me pull my dress and smock down around my waist.

“Come here, you vixen.” He draws me close and kisses me, his lips cool and wonderful, his tongue gently exploring, tracing and tasting every curve and line. It’s simultaneously the most arousing and most tender kiss I’ve ever experienced.

I’m already swooning and breathless when he pulls away and cups my breast, studying me and touching me like something he’s never before seen. Then his mouth is on me, sucking, biting, and licking my rosy tip in a rhythm I swear tugs on some invisible string that leads straight to the bud between my legs.

As though he’s fully aware what sensation he’s inspiring, he slips his hand beneath my skirt. I drop my head back as he caresses me through my undergarments, teasing and tugging, rubbing and flicking. It’s torture, that thin layer of fabric keeping him from me.

I lift my head, watching with eager wonder as he swirls his tongue around my nipple. “Colden.”

“Mmm?” He drags his teeth over the tip, making me whimper with want.

“I desperately need you to touch me.”

“I am touching you,” he says with a wicked grin. “Quite scandalously.”

“You know what I mean.”

“I do. And I can tell.” His strokes between my legs grow rougher. “Your sweet little cunny is soaked for me.”

My core clenches, and I tighten my thighs around his hand, gasping from the shock of pleasure that bolts through my clit.

His hand stills. “What’s wrong?”

“Nothing,” I reply on a rushed breath. “It’s just… No one has ever spoken to me like that before.”

He arches his brow. “Oh my. That one little word made you bear down? Then you’re in for quite the fun tonight.”

He withdraws his hand from my skirts and stands, sweeping me up with him. He carries me next to his bed, where he sets me on my feet. Unexpectedly, he pulls up a chair and sits down.

“Finish taking your clothes off for me,” he says. “Slowly.”

Oddly, I find it ridiculously erotic being told what to do. Obedience and submissiveness are not parts of my nature, and yet I have no resistance to Colden Moeshka. He could demand anything, and I believe I would do it.

I reach for the sash at my back, untie it, and begin peeling off my skirts and other layers. It takes the time it takes, which is, I realize, part of the pleasure, so I draw it out with certain movements. Curving my spine. Running my hands over my breasts, my hips. Colden watches every second, stroking the erection hidden in his black trousers, though I can see the firm outline, the way his hand slides up and down that impressive length.

When I go to remove my lace undergarments, Colden says, “Turn around when you take those off.”

My face heats. I’m slender and strong, but I carry weight in my backside, an asset that has spurned many lingering looks, crude comments, and sneaking slaps over the years. For the first time, though, I actually hope it spurns all those things.

I turn and decide to make a grand show of it. Slowly, I slip the lace over my curves, dragging them down my legs, and kick them away when they reach my feet.

Colden’s hands are on me in a heartbeat, skimming up my thighs. “This ass does wicked things to me.”

He cups my bottom and squeezes, making me blush and throb all at the same time. The cool press of his lush lips kissing my lower back makes my nipples harden.

Tenderly, he trails his mouth down my curves and gently bites my ass, slipping his fingers between my legs, stroking my ache. “I want you to show me how you touch yourself,” he says. “Exactly. So I know what you like.”

In truth, though I feel so at ease with Colden, this gives me a moment of pause. It seems so salacious, and yet something about the indecency of it all gives me a thrill, a sense of power I haven’t experienced before.

I crawl onto the bed, providing a view that makes Colden groan deep in his chest. Gods. I’m naked and exposed before the Frost King’s hungry eyes, longing for him, my body pleading for his touch. After a lifetime of imagining anything other than this when it came to him, the last few years—and tonight especially—feel like a strange dream.

I sit facing him and spread my legs for my king anyway. He shakes his head as if in awe. “Fucking devils, Nephele.”

“Now it’s your turn,” I tell him, loving how enthralled he seems.

He unlaces his trousers, taking his time as I tease him, touching only my thighs and the small tuft of hair at my apex. When he finally frees his cock, I swallow hard, desiring it instantly.

Need coils tight in my core as I begin working my body, rubbing my fingertip in quick circles over my clit.

“I usually have my crystal,” I admit.

All of us women in the castle, and many others, purchase rose quartz crystals from a lady who lives near the Mondulak Range. She journeys here once a year with her smooth-as-glass stones, honed into pleasurable shapes and sizes.

Colden rubs his thumb over his tip. “Mmm. I would love to watch you fuck yourself that way. Do you ever ride it?”

I dip my fingers into myself and begin shifting my hips, fucking my own hand, feeling suddenly empty and needing relief. “Yes,” I breathe. “Often.”

With that, Colden stands and strips off his pants. It’s as though the knowledge that I’ve certainly fucked—just not a man —alleviates any fear he might’ve had about being my first.

A moan leaves my lips as he kneels on the bed. “Thank the gods.”

He chuckles. “I’m still not done.”

Eyes locked with mine, he lifts my hand and sucks my fingers into his mouth, cleaning both that were inside me just moments ago. Another zing bolts straight to my clit, my blood burning. He looks starved, like my taste is the sweetest nectar.

When he finally lets go, he leans down and kisses me. I tangle my hands in his hair, suck on his tongue, and arch my hips.

“Please,” I whimper. “I need you inside me, Colden.”

“Mmm. What do you need inside you?”

He lowers himself, resting some of his weight on me, and I finally feel him, so hard, nestled right between my legs.

I know what he wants to hear. I just don’t expect saying it to make me mindless.

“I want your cock,” I answer, writhing, trying to reach what he’s keeping at bay. “I want it so much.”

He shifts to the left, leaning on his elbow, and trails his other hand down my body, pushing my knee up. After opening me to his eyes once again, he flicks his fingers over my clit and then pushes one inside me.

I gasp at the feel. He has such lovely, strong hands. The hands of a lover and a fighter. I clench around him as he strokes me, making me breathless.

Colden leans down to my ear. “One finger. One truth. I’m going to come inside you tonight. Right here, in this pretty little cunny.”

I make a small mewling sound, a weak whimper that doesn’t feel like me at all. Yet I can’t do anything else.

Colden pushes a second finger in and begins a steady thrusting, in and out, curling his fingers at just the right spot to make me quiver. No instruction necessary with this man.

“Two fingers, two truths,” he says. “The first one… When I’m done coming inside you, even after you’ve already orgasmed until you can’t think straight, I’m going to fuck you again. In some incredibly obscene manner.”

“Promise?” I move against him, sliding up and down his fingers, matching his tempo, wishing he would just touch my clit. That’s all it would take for me to shatter.

“I swear,” he answers.

“What’s… the second… truth?” I manage to say.

He nips my ear with his teeth. “You still have a crystal?”

I bite my lip, my skin growing hotter and hotter against Colden’s cool body. “Yes. In my room.”

I feel him smile against my neck before he looks down at me. “Wonderful. Because one day, when you’re ready, I’m going to watch you ride it, then I’m going to kneel behind you, and I’m going to fuck you in that stunning, tight little ass while your pink crystal is buried in your cunny. Would you like that?”

Gods above and below.

“Yes,” I groan. “Yes, yes, yes.”

He brushes his thumb firmly back and forth over my clit, my flesh all but preening for his attention. At the contact, I instantly orgasm, arching off the bed, tilting my head into the pillow, screaming out as he flicks his thumb faster and leans in, swallowing my cries with his mouth.

I grip his wrist, sure that this pleasure pulsating through me will end any moment, but it doesn’t. It’s brutal and unrelenting under Colden’s expert caress, an ongoing destruction that I want to happen over and over and over again.

Eventually, his thumb slows, and the quaking and quivering inside me ease. When I float back down from the high of his touch, I’m panting as though I’ve been fighting for my life.

“I’m…” I scrub my hand through my hair, searching for words that won’t seem to find me.

“Delicious,” Colden finishes for me, licking his fingers again. “Beautiful. And so fucking tempting.” He kisses a chilly trail up my throat, making my nipples peak so hard they hurt. “I think this might’ve been a very wise arrangement.”

I angle my hips toward his, desperately needing him buried inside me. “Please, Colden. Stop making me beg. I’ve been begging all night.”

A small laugh trips off his lips. “Patience, love. Lingering makes it all the better. The torture is half the fun.” He kisses me again. His mouth moves languidly, as if we have all the time in the world. I suppose to an immortal man, we do. “I would very much like to put my tongue inside you. Do you want that?”

“Gods, yes.” I don’t mean to reply so quickly or with such fervor, but he meets my eyes and smiles when I do.

“Eager little thing, aren’t you? If you want something, all you must do is say it.”

I have said it, I think to myself. But I decide against complaining when he sucks my nipple into his mouth, his talented tongue teasing me.

“I like to hear you say filthy things just as much as you like to hear me,” he adds.

He kisses his way down my body, making my pulse quicken. I rise on my elbows. I’m not sure if there’s etiquette to this, but I want to see him if I can.

Colden looks up at me. “You like to watch?”

“I’m… I’m not sure. I think maybe I do.”

His smile grows, and he kisses the inside of my thigh. “I think maybe you do, too.”

Gently, he tugs my hips forward, tilting my pelvis upward, angling me better. We lock gazes for a long moment, then he lowers his head and drags his tongue up my center like he’s licking melting cream from a cold treat, pausing at my clit. The groan that leaves him as he slides his tongue back and forth over that bud of pleasure makes my body tighten in response, the sound and feel of his needy moans so erotic. So hungry.

He licks lower and pushes his long tongue inside me, fucking me in a way that is better than I ever imagined, and with far more skill than I might’ve ever hoped for.

I’ve never felt like this. Never felt so entranced as I am by watching Colden feast on me like I’m the last meal he will ever know.

I thread my fingers into his hair and clutch his head, pressing him closer. It bends my mind that I’m already so close to release again, that I can’t control anything about my body as I grind shamelessly against his mouth, loving the way it feels to have his face between my legs, the sense of dominance it gives me.

“Don’t stop,” I plead, but the moment I say those words, he looks up and lifts his head, his red lips glistening in the candlelight.

“I want to make sure I get to feel you come on my cock. We must be a little sparing with the orgasms until I know how many times I can set you off in a night.”

That sends a thrill up my spine. I’m both excited and a little scared to think about what that might be like, learning how much my body can take when it comes to Colden Moeshka.

I drag him back up to me and manage to flip him to his back.

“My, my, I like it when you’re rough.” He grins, big, as do I, just before I kiss him, sucking my own pleasure from his lips.

This kiss is just as feverish as when he was between my legs, but everything seems to shift when I finally slip my hand down and close my fingers around his cock.

“Fuck,” he groans, clasping my face. “I didn’t realize how badly I needed you until tonight. How much I’ve ached for this.”

With that confession, I stroke him, hoping that I’m pleasuring him. I’m assured when he curses again and closes his eyes, biting down on his plump bottom lip.

I glance down. Varin is a lovely man, physically, but Colden is an entirely different creation. He has a pretty cock, plush and pink, the skin unbearably soft, covering inches and inches of rigid delight.

I find that I rather love it. That thick vein running up the underside of his shaft. The swollen head that looks somewhat aggressive. The impossibly stiff nature of it, the way it curves so slightly you could almost miss it, how it looks a tad bit threatening. Something in me comes alive at the sight, wanting to be fucked with that cock until I forget my name.

As I stroke him, a pearl of cum slips to the slit of his head. It’s shocking how that one little drop of pearly white liquid can make my mouth water again, and even more bizarre, compels me to slip down between his legs and take him into my mouth.

“Oh, fuck, Nephele.” He, too, rises on his elbow to watch, pushing my hair back for a better view.

I can’t say that I know what I’m doing, but instinct takes over quickly, as does the deep hunger I feel for this man and his body. I take him as far into my throat as I can, then I pull back out and stroke him, swirling my tongue around his engorged tip.

“Fuck, that feels wonderful,” he whispers, watching closely, his voice suddenly ragged as I flick my tongue over his firm head, tasting the salty proof of his desire.

“I want you to come in my mouth,” I tell him, sucking the tip.

I’ve heard tales. Some women love it. Others do not. I wasn’t sure about myself, especially after feeling the need to pull away when I was with Varin. But Colden? I want it. I crave it.

“Believe me.” He traces his thumb over my lips as I suck and lick him. “I would love nothing more than to fuck that pretty mouth until cum spills down your chin. And I will. In time. But tonight…” He curls his finger at me. “Come here, little vixen.”

Obediently, I crawl up his body, straddling him.

“Is this what you want our first time to be like?” he asks with a smile. “You get to choose.”

I think about it. I’m sure there are many ways to have sex. I know of some, of course, and I want to try them all. Eventually. But tonight? Tonight I need release, and I know exactly how to chase it down when I’m riding my crystal. I have a feeling that riding Colden will make my orgasm even easier to claim.

“I do want it like this,” I tell him, leaning down, pressing my naked body against his. “I need you deep.”

He slides his hands down my back and over my ass. “Put me inside you, then. Fuck me the way you wish.”

I reach between us and find that angling our bodies is far easier than I imagined. In seconds, I’m sinking onto him, the throbbing head of his cock opening me.

We both sigh at the joining. I rise on my hands and arch my back, rolling my hips, taking him inside of me inch by delicious inch. He teases my nipples with his tongue as I work around his hardness.

“Look at you taking all that cock,” he says against my skin. “Stretching that sweet little hole so I can fuck you so very hard.”

I quiver down to my toes. “I’m going to need you to talk to me like that every day.”

He laughs. “Like at breakfast? You want me to lean over and whisper filthy things in your ear? How I’d like to spread you across the table and tongue fuck you? Stick my cock inside you and fuck you in front of everyone?”

I take the last inch of him, filled to the brim, and I swear, I cannot think of anything else than the image he just placed in my mind, seeing him pinning me to the table, his beautiful cock thrusting in and out of me while everyone watches with lust in their eyes.

“What are you doing to me?” I whisper, my voice rough and trembling with need. “I feel ravenous.”

“Good.” He pushes his hands into my hair and kisses me. “Because I’m not going to stop until you’re thoroughly satisfied, which means we could be at this for a while.” He thrusts his hips, making me cry out. “I have no complaints,” he adds.

Again, he slides his hands down my body and grips my ass. I’m unprepared for the onslaught he delivers, the way he begins with a shallower assault that steadily deepens and quickens, each resulting thrust reaching the deepest part of me, a part I’ve never reached. It comes alive when the gentle curve of Colden’s cock strokes it.

He sucks my nipples, too, and dips a fingertip into the wetness we share before dragging that same finger up and over the hidden part of me that no one—not even me—has ever entered.

He pauses for a moment, rubbing the slickness onto me, and then pushes in. “Just a little,” he says. “Just to give you a taste. I couldn’t resist. Your ass is a temptation all its own, Nephele.”

I gasp for breath, my pussy clenching his cock, stimulated by an intrusion that doesn’t even involve those parts of our anatomy. There’s no pain, much to my surprise, but there is torture. Because I’m already coming undone, becoming malleable and compliant under his talented care as he fucks me in two different ways, teasing with his finger and thrusting his cock in the most sensual rhythm.

“I think you like it,” he says. “I think you like your king fingering your tight little ass while he fucks that perfect pink hole, making you his plaything.”

I shake my head, feeling half-wild, feral. “I love it. I’m yours, Colden. Make me your whore.”

Colden looks into my eyes, and though I see a glint of deepest lust shining there, he says, “Never a whore. But you can be my paramour if it suits you. The secret can make it feel all the more exciting. Especially when I bend you over and fuck you spontaneously in the middle of the day, when anyone could walk in and see how thoroughly I’ve corrupted my favorite witch. Would you like that, Nephele? My cock in your cunny and my thumb hooked in your ass while you come all over me in the library? I would make you lick me clean.”

A sound leaves me that I don’t recognize, a guttural moan saturated with unquenchable longing. In response, Colden sucks my nipples again, flicking his tongue and biting harder this time, until my clit stiffens and throbs, pleading for the violent release I know lies ahead. It’s as if my body and mind are pleasure troves and Colden Moeshka knows exactly how to explore every nook and cranny.

“I’m going to come.” The words rush out of me, and for a moment, I wish I could suck them back in. I fear he’ll stop, and my orgasm is right there. I can feel it teetering, just waiting to obliterate me.

“Mmm, fuck me, then. Punish your cunny on my cock for waiting this long to tell me that you’ve desired me. Then I’ll punish it some more.”

The next few minutes feel like an out-of-body experience. I do fuck him, so hard, rocking and grinding on his dick until pleasure rips me apart.

I gasp around the sensation, my entire body seizing from the intensity. This orgasm is cataclysmic, more than anything I’ve ever been capable of giving myself. It’s as though nothing else exists but us, like I can pinpoint the height of every known desire to this brutal, pulsing pleasure, like the universe’s heart is pounding between my legs.

When it ends, I can barely hold myself up. I can feel Colden smiling, feel his hands soothing me, hear him praising me— good fucking girl, my sweet little vixen, my precious little witch.

I’m so lost in bliss that it takes a second to connect what he’s doing when he gently turns me onto the bed, on my stomach.

“I just need a few more minutes,” he says, hovering over me, rubbing his cock between my legs. He leans down and kisses my ear. “Can you take it?”

I feel like I’ve been turned inside out, my muscles lax, but I push myself up to my knees, dragging a pillow under my breasts so I can keep my upper body on the bed. “Always.”

Colden follows and rubs his hands over my hips. “Fuck, Nephele. Your ass is going to consume my dreams, I swear it.”

I gasp as he gently hooks his thumb inside me, just the tip, his fingers splayed across my lower back. Then he pushes all that cock inside me, dragging it out to the tip before slamming back in.

I grip the covers in my fists. He’s so impossibly hard. I feel every inch of it like this, every thrust forcing my mind to memorize the length, the girth, how long it takes for his head to slide over that sweet spot inside me. His thrusts turn to pounding, his balls slapping against my clit, awakening new need in me all over again.

Suddenly, Colden wraps his free hand in my long hair and uses it to tug me up from the bed, angling my head back, trapping me in his hold. I rest my weight on my hands and let him have me.

“Touch yourself,” he orders, pushing his thumb in a little deeper. “Let’s see if you can come one more time for your king.”

Gods’ death. I wouldn’t have thought it possible, but as I touch myself while he rides me hard, pleasure builds. I feel it building in him, too, swelling inside his cock, making every thrust tickle me from the inside out.

His tempo increases until he’s slamming into me so hard and fast the heavy bed knocks against the wall, over and over. I can do no more than utter unintelligible sounds as my body spasms and clenches, squeezing him through an orgasm, wrenching his own release from his body.

“Fuck yes, Nephele,” he cries out as he pumps into me. “Fuck, you’re making me come so hard, love. Gods. Fuck, fuck, fuck .”

I can feel the warmth of his spill, the way I grow wetter between my legs, slick on my inner thighs. I writhe and whimper in his hold, tears breaching the corners of my eyes as everything slows and his hold on me gradually relents.

Afterward, Colden cleans us both in lavender water from the wash basin, then tucks me into his comfortable bed, lying behind me, holding me in his arms.

“Are you all right?” he asks.

I smile, though if he could see my face, I’m sure he would see the disbelief there. “I’m blissed out of my mind. So yes, I’m all right. Are you?”

He laughs against my ear, that same quiet chuckle from deep in his chest that I’m beginning to familiarize with his intimacy. “Of course, I am. My body wasn’t the one being defiled. Though you are always welcome to try, if you’d like. I’m a good sport. I take as good as I give. Always up for the task of pleasure.”

“Why is that?” I inquire, suddenly curious about this man that I know but feel like I’m only truly beginning to understand. “I mean, outside of the obvious.”

I feel him shrug. “Three centuries of living can get… boring. Time becomes trivial. You begin to feel a great distance from your fellow man. And the normalcies of life that can feel new and comforting to most people simply lose their novelty. A sunrise is nice, but when you’ve watched thousands, it just isn’t the same. You are always looking for something special on the horizon.”

“But sex?” I ask. “Why doesn’t it lose its novelty?”

“Because an orgasm is an orgasm. It transports me to a place that nothing in this world can touch. For those far too brief yet somehow eternal minutes, my mind carries me to a paradise where euphoria reigns. I think of nothing else but that— euphoria . Immortality is even momentarily forgotten, chased away by a rapture so true it’s as though I’ve entered another realm.”

Damn. I understand that now. I felt it tonight. Truly.

“So it feels like an escape,” I reply.

“Most of the time. It allows me to forget, for a short while, my circumstances. It’s a balm to a never-ending life. So yes. I reach for it often.” He kisses my neck sweetly. “But tonight didn’t feel so much like an escape as it did an arrival. Like I’ve found a safe place that makes me feel things I’ve forgotten how to feel. It’s been decades since a kiss made me imagine a different life. But tonight, your kiss did that.”

I perk up at that and turn over to face him. “Whose kiss did that to you?”

He lifts a brow, and one side of his mouth quirks up. “I’ll never tell. Just someone I shared a long night with many years ago in a faraway land. His smile made my stomach twist with far too many feelings. And his laugh… it hummed in my bones. He felt like home, which was strange, because I hardly knew him. And when we parted, I felt nostalgic for a thing I never even had. I think because I allowed myself to dream of what it would be like to take him and run away from everything. But it wasn’t meant to be.”

I can hear the sadness in his voice, and it breaks my heart. “I’m so sorry you lost him.”

Colden pushes a lock of hair off my forehead. “It’s all right. I’ve survived this long.”

“I want to ease that pain for you. I can be your home if you’ll let me.”

He smiles softly. “I’d like that very much. But I want you to understand something.”

I run my hand over his shoulder. “I already know, and I feel the same way. This isn’t romantic love. This is friends with very nice benefits.”

He chuckles. “Yes, as I said, it’s a wonderful arrangement. But that’s not what I meant.”

I frown. “Go on, then.”

He grazes the backs of his fingers across my cheekbone. “One day, you’ll meet someone who turns your world upside down. He’s going to walk into the room and alter everything about your world with his mere presence. You might want to hate him, but his smile will eventually thaw your icy heart. And you might want to kill him, but his kiss will set you on fire in a way that leaves you ready to burn down anyone who threatens him. He will change you, and you will fall in love with him. And when that happens, I don’t want you to fear anything when it comes to me.” He takes my chin in his hand. “Don’t ever give up on someone you feel that kind of spark with because of me.”

“That’s how the man you spoke about made you feel?”

“Yes.” Sorrow fills his dark eyes. “Much as I wish otherwise, no one has ever felt like him.”

I say nothing more. Colden said many years had passed. His love could be gone now, taken by time that is a cruel dictator over Colden’s existence.

I reach for him and pull him toward me. He puts up no fight, even smiling as he slides atop me, resting on his forearms.

“My paramour.” He kisses the tip of my nose. “Thank you for this. For tonight. And any other night you choose to give me.”

I slip my hands up and tangle them in his hair. “Many. I choose to give you many .”

He arches a brow. “Until you meet The One. When he arrives, you’ll walk away from me with no guilt and live a happy life. Swear it.”

I don’t know love like that. The closest I’ve ever been to it was seeing the relationship between my parents. It feels like a far-way thing for me. An impossibility. But I give Colden what he needs anyway.

“I swear, my king. But for now, you’ll swear to defile me often and vigorously, in the most daring of places.”

A delighted grin spreads across his handsome face. “I swear it.”

He presses his erection between my legs and winks, then he rips the covers off us and grabs me, whisking me across the room, carrying me like a child, my legs wrapped around his waist, my arms around his neck. When he opens the door to the balcony that overlooks the south garden, where people still mill about, and beyond to the dwindling festivities, a swift, cold breeze rushes past, blowing out the lanterns hanging on either side of the door, casting us in shadow.

I let out an uncontainable squeal at his magick, and his choice for our first lewd act.

Colden laughs but covers my mouth. “I can’t fuck you in the wide open if you howl like a wolf, woman,” he whispers. “Tame yourself. We’re going for clandestine sexual acts in the vicinity of the public, not everyone thinking I’m murdering you.”

I giggle against his hand, and he uncovers my mouth before setting me down on my feet. Gripping my waist, he spins me toward the balcony wall and the gardens.

My eyes bulge. “Like this? Here?”

“Oh yes.” He lifts a hand and caresses my nipples, while the other grabs a handful of my hair. “Lean forward, hands on the wall. Hold on as best you can. You’d better be quiet, too, or I’ll have to spank you.”

The next thing I know, he’s rubbing the tip of his cock up and down my slit. I gasp when he enters me in one brutal thrust.

Colden lowers his fingers to my clit as he begins fucking me in the balcony shadows, all while villagers and servants linger two stories below.

“Let’s give the night our first show, Miss Bloodgood,” he whispers against the back of my neck.

I smile and spread my legs wider for him.

And we do.