Page 16 of Bought by the Broken Beast
I find what we need: an abandoned blacksmith’s forge, its door hanging off a single hinge, its interior a tomb of cold iron and forgotten fire. I shove her inside and slam the heavy wooden door shut, dropping the thick iron bar into place. The sounds of the hunt, of the city, are silenced.
There is only the sound of the rain drumming on the roof and our own ragged, desperate breaths.
We are both wounded, bleeding from a dozen minor cuts. We are soaked to the bone, our clothes plastered to our skin. The small, enclosed space is thick with the smells of rain, old smoke, wet wool, and blood. Our blood.
The adrenaline from the fight, the terror of the chase, the raw, possessive fury of my protection—it all crashes over me in a single, overwhelming wave. My control, the iron discipline that has been my shield for years, shatters.
I turn on her. I stalk toward her until her back is pressed against the cold, unyielding stone of the forge. I cage her in, my hands slamming against the wall on either side of her head. My shadow swallows her. Her eyes are wide, her chest rising and falling in frantic, shallow breaths. The scent of her fear is a heady, intoxicating perfume.
“You,” I growl, the word a guttural thing, torn from the very depths of my soul. My voice is thick with an emotion I no longer recognize as rage. It is something darker, deeper, more possessive. “You are mine to protect.”
It is not a promise. It is a declaration. A claiming.
My head descends, and I crush my mouth to hers. The kiss is not gentle. It is a collision, a brutal, desperate claiming. It is all the rage and fear and violence of the past hour, of the past three years, distilled into a single, desperate act. I taste the rain on her lips, the fear in her sharp, indrawn breath.
For a moment, she is frozen, a small, terrified bird in the claws of a predator. Then, a small, broken sound escapes her throat, a sob, a moan, and she is kissing me back. Her hands, small and trembling, come up to fist in the wet fabric of my tunic, pulling me closer. Her response is a fire, a fuel, and the last of my restraint burns away to ash.
My hands are on her, tearing at the wet, practical clothes that hide her from me. The sound of ripping fabric is a counterpoint to our harsh, ragged breaths. I need to see her. I need to feel her.
I push her back against the wall, my mouth never leaving hers, and my hands find the soft, pale skin of her stomach, her waist, her hips. She is small, so fragile beneath my hands. A wave of something akin to fear washes over me. I am a monster of muscle and bone. I will break her.
“Votoi,” she gasps, her voice a raw, fragmented thing, as if she can feel my hesitation. She pulls back, her dark eyes blazing with a desperate, wild light that mirrors the storm in my own soul. Her hands find the waistband of my breeches. “Please.”
That single word is my undoing.
My hands are on her, everywhere, learning the shape of her, the feel of her. Her skin is like silk, her body a landscape of soft curves and hidden hollows. She is nothing like the Minotaur females I have known. She is a creature of breathtaking delicacy. I find the wet, hot heart of her, and she cries out, her hips bucking against my hand. She is ready. She is more than ready. She is unraveling.
“Please, Votoi, please, fuck me,” she begs, her voice a raw, desperate prayer. “Fuck me until I can’t remember my own name. Fuck the fear away.”
A guttural roar rips from my chest. I free myself from my breeches, my erection thick, heavy, and aching with a need so profound it is a physical pain. I am massive, a beast, and she is so, so small.
“I will break you,” I rasp, the words a warning, a plea.
“Then break me,” she sobs, her fingers digging into my shoulders. She reaches down, her small, clever hand wrapping around my length, and a shock of pure, unadulterated pleasure jolts through me. She guides me to her entrance, her wet heat a brand against the tip of my cock. “I need you inside me. Now.”
I push. Just the tip of my cock. The sensation is a lightning strike, a fire that threatens to consume me whole. She is so impossibly snug, so hot, a velvet trap that promises oblivion. Her body is trying to accommodate me, to take me, but it’s not enough. I am too large. I feel her flesh resisting, the delicate barrier of her maidenhead a fragile gate against a siege engine.
She lets out a sharp, pained gasp, her eyes squeezing shut. “It hurts,” she whispers, a tear tracing a path through the grime on her cheek.
A cold dread washes over me, dousing the flames of my lust. “I am stopping.”
“No,” she says, her voice fierce, her eyes flying open to lock with mine. They are blazing with defiance. “Don’t you dare stop. Don’t you dare treat me like I am made of glass.” Her hips tilt, a small, desperate movement, trying to take more of me. “It hurts because I have never… because I need you to… to push. I need you to take me!”
Her courage is a thing of savage beauty. It reignites the fire, hotter this time, purer. I lean down, my lips brushing her ear. “Breathe with me, Bella,” I murmur, my voice rough. I push again, slowly, my muscles screaming with the effort of control. I feel the delicate tearing, and she cries out, a sharp, wounded sound that is immediately followed by a low, shuddering moan as I slide deeper and I brush against her sensitive clit.
“Votoi,” she breathes, her voice a prayer as every bit of her body shudders.
I am buried inside her, to the hilt. The feeling of her, surrounding me, clenching around me, is the most exquisite torture I have ever known. For a moment, we are both still, our bodies trembling, our breaths mingling in the cold air.
Then she moves. Her hips tilt, taking me deeper, and a low, keening moan escapes her lips. “Don’t stop,” she whispers, voice a raw, desperate thing. “Please, don’t stop.”
I don’t. I begin to move, my thrusts slow, deep, deliberate at first. I watch her face, watch the pain in her eyes dissolve, replaced by a dark, consuming pleasure. Her head thrashes against the stone, her moans growing louder, more frantic.
“Votoi! Oh, gods, Votoi!” she cries, her voice echoing in the small, dark space.
“You feel so good,” I growl, the words a guttural litany. “Fit me so good. So wet. Mine.”
My control shatters. The rhythm becomes frantic, brutal, a desperate, punishing pace that is more battle than embrace. It is the only language I know. I am trying to fuck the fear out of her, out of myself. I am trying to brand myself on her, to claim her so completely that no one, not Malacc, not the gods themselves, can ever take her from me.
