Page 67 of The King's Man
With a startled groan, I dropped to brace on my elbows, cupping hands over her hair and staring deep into her eyes.
“Tell me if it becomes too much,” I rasped. “Donotlet me hurt you.”
She nodded quickly, and I felt a tiny flash of nerves in that part of my chest that sensed her—but as I gave a small, experimental roll of my hips and took her by a few small inches, her eyes hooded and her jaw went slack.
I pulled out all the way, then pressed back into her, taking another inch. Slowly, always moving, carefully but surely, I eased into her until her eyes rolled back in her head and she was shaking.
“Dee—”
“More,” she breathed, her jaw dropping when I clenched my teeth and gave her what she asked. And through it all, she watched me. Gasping, whimpering, pleading, she locked eyes on mine and somehow she reached into my heart as surely as I found my home in her body.
A strange, strangled cry broke in my throat when I finally reached my depth within her and felt her fingernails dig into my back muscles, her breath puffing under my chin. I dragged out of her, and this time slid to the hilt, groaning with joy and need.
Diadre gasped and trilled and shivered, her cheeks pinking beautifully as she met my gaze with hooded eyes and her body embraced me.
I fought to keep the pace slow, to let her body learn to take me. But as I braced on the pillows and drew my hips back, then took her again, her head fell back and her mouth made a beautifulO.
I held her there at the peak for a moment, just to take her in—her naked flesh so pale against mine, her breasts pressed against my ribs, her hair tangled over the pillow… there were still so many pieces of her I’d never touched, so many sounds she could make that I’d never heard.
But how could I tell her?
Her hand slipped up to my neck and her nails dug into my nape as I took her again, then again a little faster. And withan animal moan I hadn’t been able to contain, we began to move together. Lips hovering, breaths mingling, hands stroking, bodies writhing… she took me, over and over.
I spoke her name against her throat and tasted the salt of her skin as she tightened around me at the sound. And with every thrust, the coiled tension in my body drew tighter. And she gripped me harder until I was ready to lose my mind.
“Mine,” I whispered savagely against her neck, my teeth grazing her collarbone as she threw her head back, her breath tearing out of her throat. “You’re mine, Diadre—fuckingmine!”I hissed—fighting back my release as she tightened on me. I clawed one hand into her hair and kissed the goosebumps that rose on her shoulder as she began to tremble.
In the dim light left by my wings, her flesh seemed to glow. The tiny sounds she made, those little cries, threw fuel on the fire of my need. And every time I spoke, her body clenched and threatened to throw me over the cliff.
Everything but her faded. I had never lived before this moment. Never known need. Never wanted, except her.
Her breath stopped when I plunged into her, and I felt her muscles quiver. She was close. So close—but her desire fed mine. This would be a race to the end, and one I needed to lose.
Everything tunneled to this moment in time where her body rippled and embraced, her eyes glowed and her voice was hoarse with need. I gaped, stupidly turned on by the simple sight of her arched beneath me and her knee high at my hip, as if I were a fumbling adolescent who’d never seen a woman rise to her release.
I drank in the sight of her, mentally filing away the sound of her cries. Her breath caught with each drive, and my thrusts grew faster, until she was bucking to meet me, eyes screwed tightly closed and head thrown back, fingers in my hair, and my name fluttering the feathers of my wings on her exhale.
She was the most beautiful thing I’d ever seen—and so deeply, desperatelymine.
Knowing there wasn’t much time, and frantic for more of her, I arched my back so I could look down on her and slid a hand to her neck, fingers cupped behind her nape, my thumb brushing her jaw. She shivered, and a smile lit her face.
“Look at me, Diadre.Look at me,”I rasped
Her eyes flew open to find mine, detonating joy in my heart.
I pulled out of her, then drove in deep, lifting her hips with my thrust. Her eyes went wide and her mouth dropped and she whispered my name. I’d never heard a more beautiful song—and then I felt it.
The bond.
That throbbing heat, that electric snap, the piece of me that recognized her by name, it expanded until my bones creaked.
Fire in my chest. Flames burning in my veins, my soul came alive and curled in my blood, trying to push out from between my ribs—towards her.
Shuddering as I took her again, clawing into the furs to gather the sheds of my control, I huffed her name.
“Stay with me, Beautiful,” I growled.
She’d let her eyes roll back again, but when I spoke she came back to me and this time when our eyes locked, that heat in my chest flooded out from my heart, through my veins, to every extremity, and where I touched her, it seeped out of me and into her skin until it flowed through us both, a swirling tide of connection that set us both alight.
