Page 160 of Between Fear and Favor

“Oh, I’ll still be making you mad. I’ll just get to kiss you after.” Her face softened, and she froze on me.

“You won’t disappear on me again, will you?” She slid her hands down my chest, and I couldn’t help but notice the pain in her eyes as she looked at my scar. It was a painful memory, for both of us, and I wanted to burn it off me. My heart sank into my gut, knowing she feared my mind would change. She didn’t trust me to be permanent.

“Never.” I wrapped my arms around her, laying her down on the shirt I’d spread out on the floor. She frowned as I slipped out of her, but I had to ensure she understood. “I thought I made it clear I’m not going anywhere.”

“No, you did; I just wanted to make sure. I’m glad, for a few reasons.” Her face took on a serious expression, and I couldn’t help but laugh. Her hair was spread out on the floor around her. A gods damned vision. She laid there with her knees up and her hands lightly resting on her stomach. She looked so proper even when naked and waiting for my cock, and I felt my heart speed up.

I crawled over her, bracketing my hands on either side of her head. “What are those reasons, Honor?” I grabbed myself, notching my dick at her entrance, slippery with need.

“Well, for one thing, it would have been a torment to see you after. I wouldn’t have been able to look at you again without thinking about how you kissed my bottom. I can’t wait to tell anyone who will listen, honestly. Perhaps I’ll write Thyra.”

“I swear, on the old gods and the new, if you?—”

Her laugh was everything I’d ever dreamed of, and I bent down over her. Peppering her neck and chest with kisses meant to tickle, she started squirming, and I’d never been so happy in all my life.

I slid into her on a sigh, and she arched up into me. Gods, I wanted to pound into her, but I knew I’d be finished far too soon if I let myself move the way I wanted. Besides, she deserved slow, aching perfection for her first time. I kissed her deeply as I pushed inside her. She spread her legs farther apart, making it easier on me, and I set a steady pace, trying to stay gentle.

“There is no going back, Nor. It’s you. It’s only you.” I buried my face into her neck, feeling more emotional than I’d have expected, and when she gently played with my hair as I moved within her, I breathed her name in her ear. I whispered things to her I’d been wanting her to know for months. And when I told her I loved her, that there was no life for me without her, she adjusted so she could see me, tears lining her lashes as she said it back. The beautiful woman who pissed me off and still made me laugh like no one else, who had been through so much, loved me too. The woman who cried over strangers but never herself. The woman who had become everything to me.

I felt that tingling in the base of my spine, about to come so much faster than usual, overcome with the emotions I was feeling, and I slowed down, wanting to make it good for her. She reached up, tracing my face, my love and adoration reflected in her own expression. Her lips parted, her brows meeting and raising as her breaths hastened.

“I think—I think I’m going to—” I could feel her tensing around me, and I hoped to the gods she was right, because I knew I wasn’t going to last any longer with her squeezing me like that. I kissed her, stealing her words, sealing a promise to her lips. She broke from the kiss, panting and moaning, a high-pitched and delicate sound, as she came around my cock. Hearing her pushed me over the edge, and I thrust into her, motions jerky as I held back. There would be plenty of time to allow my passion to rule me, but it didn’t stop me from filling her so deep with me that she couldn’t deny I wanted this forever.

I collapsed on top of her, still inside her, as I panted. She traced her fingernails down my back, sending goosebumps over my body, and I shuddered.

“Your candles went out, Walt.”

I laughed, body shaking on top of her, and I pressed a kiss to those smiling lips. “I was a little distracted. How about next time, pigeon, I’ll light real ones?”

“Do you even own that many candles?”

“Nor, I don’t own anything. I don’t even own a home, but I suppose I’ll have to fix that now, won’t I?”

She nodded, tears in her eyes despite the smile on her face. “I’ve never really had one of those. But I’d like to make mine with you.”

Chapter 71

RAINIER

“Brother,”I said, circling Raj’s desk to give Dewalt a hug. He stood, taking a step to meet me, and I frowned over the motion. “Why have you not seen a healer yet?”

I’d been informed of the attack on Nara’s Cove when Lasu had met us in the morning. Having returned from locking the Supreme in the fortress’s meager dungeon, he’d been filled to the brim with information.

“I have,” Dewalt said, averting his eyes. “Nothing could be done.”

“Em will look at it,” I said. “She is probably more adept.”

My friend nodded, but he didn’t seem to care much. In fact, he was the happiest I’d ever fucking seen him, considering his injury. I narrowed my eyes. “You fucked her, didn’t you?”

He huffed a laugh.

“It wasn’t...that’s not the word for what we did,” he said, shaking his head. “I love her,” he said simply, hands spread in supplication. His dark brows lifted in the center, as if he was just as bewildered by the statement. Brushing his hair behind his ear, an open-mouthed grin spread across his face. “I fucking love her, brother.”

“And she loves you back?” I asked, hopeful that my best friend had finally found happiness after all these years. I couldn’t think of anyone better than Nor to handle him. She would push him and prod him to be the best person he could be—which he already was in many aspects—but Nor would challenge him in every sense of the word.

Dewalt only nodded, eyes wide and bright. “She loves me.”

I pulled him in for a hug once more, slapping him on the back, and used the moment to gather myself. Upon finding Em again, I’d been so worried he would suffer alone, locked in undying faithfulness to a woman long dead. The fact we’d both found happiness again meant the world to me.

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