Page 84 of A Reign of Embers

Marc’s next laugh comes with a brief hitch. “And I’ve been waiting more than a year to properly understand what it should mean to be your husband. I’ll satisfy you every way you need, wife. And not just in this bed.”

The promise brings a lump to my throat. He’s already made good on it in so many ways.

The last lingering doubts I’ve held on to crumble away.

As he fumbles with the fastenings on his slacks, I touch the scarred side of his face. Marc pauses to glance up at me.

The words catch for a second before they spill out, propelled by the swell of emotion inside me. “I love you.”

They come out so quietly that at first I’m afraid he didn’t hear me. He stares at me, his expression blank.

Then the most brilliant smile I’ve ever seen from him stretches across his face. He draws my face to his and claims my mouth, long and lingering, until every part of me is trembling with anticipation.

When our lips part, his head stays bowed over mine, our foreheads brushing. “Then I’ve done one thing right with my life, no matter where else it leads me.”

He kicks his slacks the rest of the way off. I open myself wider with a gasp as he slides his cock over my folds.

As Marc lines himself up, he holds my gaze, one elbow propping him over me, the other resting on my thigh. I raise my knees instinctively.

He presses in with a catch of his breath and a dip of hiseyelids, but his eyes stay locked with mine. He slides into me torturously slow, drawing out the sensation until all my nerves are tingling.

When I’m full of him, Marc stops as if he’s absorbing every sensation of the moment. Gazing up at him, I’m hit by a smack of emotion—the knowledge that I resisted this act for so long, that I never believed I could possibly want it, and yet here I am.

Somehow the husband I reviled has become an irreplaceable part of my life. To go forward without him feels as wrong as losing any of my princes.

Something must change in my expression. The haze of pleasure on Marc’s face fades with a frown. “Are you all right? If you don’t?—”

I grasp his arm before he can retreat and beam up at him. “No. I want this. So much. I was only thinking about how far we’ve come.”

He catches my lips again with the tenderest of kisses. Just when I think I might die from waiting, he starts to move.

He eases back and plunges deeper, again and again, bringing a fresh surge of bliss each time. Delight radiates across my skin and breaks my breath into panting.

My thighs press around his hips. My arms loop around his shoulders, locking him with me. Our lips part and collide, more kisses smattering across cheeks and jaw and neck, wilder with every passing minute.

I’m already primed after my first orgasm. It only takes a few more slams of his cock against the giddying spot inside me before another wave of ecstasy wracks my body.

I muffle my cry against Marc’s shoulder. He keeps pumping into me, urging the wave onward.

Then, as I start to come down, he flips us over so I’m lying atop him.

When I blink down at him, his grin returns. “I’ve found Ihave a taste for being conquered too. Why don’t you ride me like you did Bastien so well last week, my empress?”

I don’t know what sends more of a thrill through me—his request or the fact that he can refer to my intimacy with one of my other husbands so fondly.

I shift my weight over him, adjusting his angle inside me, and the groan that tumbles out of him inflames me even more. I’m so sated, but I have even more capacity for pleasure I haven’t unearthed.

Bracing my knees on either side of him and my hands on his sculpted chest, I rock up and down. It takes a minute to find the right pace, to hit all the spots that set off the hottest sparks inside me.

Marc reaches up to fondle my breasts again, adding more spikes of delight to the mix. When I start to buck faster over him, his eyes roll back.

“Fuck. I don’t know how I ever thought I had you before. This is everything.”

All I can manage in response is a wordless murmur of agreement.

Marc’s breath turns ragged, but he trails his hand down my body. “You need to come with me.”

He strokes his fingers over my clit, and I bite my lip against a sob of pleasure. The jolt sets me bobbing even faster, taking him as deep as I can bring him.

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