Page 49 of Prize of the Warlord
“Zeha was right,” he whispers hoarsely. “I can’t be trusted with you, not when your body begs for me like this.”
“Please,” I breathe. “Don’t stop. Please touch me.”
Licking his lips, he grasps my bare hips and tugs my mound nearer to his face. “Spread your legs a little wider then, treasure,” he says. “And don’t make a sound.”
His tongue plunges between my legs, stroking along my folds. Each pass of that silky wet tongue sends a shiver of sparkles through my entire body, so intense I can barely stay upright. My knees weaken under the onslaught, ripple after ripple of glittering pleasure, building toward a single shining point.
With tender lapping and gentle sucking kisses, he works me toward the peak, and when I’m nearly there he swirls a broad fingertip in just the right spot, until I burst, shaking, arching against his hand. The pleasure floods through me in waves of pulsating glory, while I clutch the Warlord’s hair and breathe, sharp and shallow.
With a final kiss and a cleansing swirl of his tongue, he withdraws and pulls my clothing back into place. I collapse against his chest, boneless with bliss.
But my hand brushes the front of his trousers, and through the thick material I feel the straining heat of his need for me.
“Your turn,” I whisper.
I’m half-afraid he’ll jump up and storm out into the cold, to spew himself on the snow as he usually does.
But this time, he tenses briefly. And then he nods.
Heart thundering, I release the laces of his pants and wriggle my fingers into the heated space. He inhales a sharp breath when my fingertips graze his hardness, and he seizes two great fistfuls of the blankets.
Cautiously I ease out his length—thick and solid and smooth. I run two fingers along the soft skin experimentally, delighting in the twitch that results. Another long stroke of my finger to the underside of the shaft, and the Warlord’s whole body jerks. “We have to be quick,” he gasps. “For the gods’ sake, mouse—faen!” He crushes a hand over his mouth as I slide my lips over the head of his cock, savoring him with my tongue. I push forward until I can’t take any more of him.
I suck him gently, while my tongue caresses the thin sensitive skin, and I clasp my fingers around the part of his length that won’t fit in my mouth. His breath cracks from his lips, heavy and ragged—he’s writhing, desperate. Then he gives in to his lust and seizes my hair, bucking his hips upward, thrusting himself through the channel of my mouth and hand. With a final hard roll of his body, he explodes, a geyser worthy of the Bloodsalt. And like the Bloodsalt, I manage to take it all down, leaving him clean, without a trace of what we’ve done.
“Did I do it right?” I whisper, wiping my lips.
He brushes my hair back with a shaking hand. “No woman has ever done that for me. I can’t imagine it being any better. Unless—”
“Unless?”
“Unless I could be inside you. Which I never will.” He puts himself away and relaces his pants. “And you? You are—pleased?”
“My craven lust is well satisfied, thank you,” I whisper back.
In the dim glow through the tent flap, I see him wince. “I’m sorry I said that to you.”
I plant a forgiving kiss on his mouth. “I should go back to Zeha’s tent before she wakes.”
“You should.” But he holds my hand in his, stroking the backs of my fingers with his thumb.
Warmed all the way to my soul, I give him a bright smile and pull away.
When I sweep aside the tent flap and step out, I come face to face with ajäkel.
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Thejäkellooks just as startled as I am, interrupted in the middle of its investigative prowling. But it recovers before I do. With a snarl, it leaps at my face, mouth wide.
The Warlord’s huge forearm is there, slamming between the beast’s jaws. Thejäkelchomps, and the Warlord’s bone cracks through. His roar of agony wakes the camp.
The Warlord pushes me back and shoves thejäkelaway, his forearm still lodged between its teeth. He’s bellowing with pain and rage. The agony must fuel him, because he catches the scruff of the beast, whips it around, and slams it onto the hard-packed snow with immense force. There’s another snap—thejäkel’s neck this time—and the creature lies broken, with the Warlord seething and panting above it.
Zeha races up to him, knives clutched in both hands. She lets loose a string of scared, angry words in their language, all the while examining his arm and gesticulating at me and thejäkelby turns.
Other warriors approach, woken by the noise.
Olsa is there too, and she casts a baleful look at me, as I sit shaking in the entrance to the Warlord’s tent. But she only says, “I will find something to splint your arm, Cronan.”
