Page 17 of American King (New Camelot Trilogy 3)
I close my eyes and remind myself not to be selfish. What I want is comfort, her strength and vulnerability laid bare to me, but it would be cruel to demand it after she’s come straight from her dead grandfather’s house. Instead of biting her thigh through her dress like I want to, I hug her tighter, still gazing up at her face.
“How are you?” I ask. “How can I help?”
Her fingers twirl idly through my hair as she gives me a sad smile. It cracks my heart open to see, that mouth curling in such a melancholy way. When I saw her last October after all those years apart, what struck me most was how sad she seemed. How lonely. Her delicate face arranged in an expression of pained reserve, as if she’d kill herself before she sought comfort, and I got the sense then that she hadn’t smiled or laughed in years, that pretty mouth going long untouched by kisses or possessive fingertips. Nothing gave me greater delight than surprising her, than petting and pleasing her and spoiling her with every display of tender affection that I could dream up. Whenever she laughed, I felt at that moment that I could die satisfied, having made her safe and happy and loved enough to feel joy.
“I’m okay,” she answers after a moment of thought. “I’m sad and it hurts knowing he’s gone, but…there’s something clarifying about death. It’s like all the extra stuff gets swept away—anger and hurt and sharp words—and all that’s left behind is what matters. And what matters is you and Embry.” She shakes her head. “I’ve been so hard on him, when I know better than anyone how cruel Abilene can be.”
My chest tightens at the mention of Embry, but I don’t speak yet. I let her finish.
She gives me another smile, less sad this time, more rueful. “I’m sorry for keeping us apart these last few weeks. I’ve been selfish and angry and I don’t even know what point it served now. Punishing Embry only punished us, and God knows you least of all deserve to be punished. What was it you said to me on our wedding day? Living without the pain means living without each other? I choose the pain, Ash, and I always will. I choose the three of us, no matter what.”
“Greer,” I say, muffling my voice with her body as I hold her even tighter. I finally give into that dark urge and I bite her thigh, just a little nip, just enough to make her whimper and tighten her fingers in my hair. I love her so fucking much, and I want to give her everything—every single thing she wants and needs and wishes for, and all the things she doesn’t know to wish for yet—but she wants the one thing it’s no longer in my power to give. The three of us.
Once again, the weight of my missteps and my pride and what I know to be right and honorable hangs on me. It feels like a sword too heavy to wield, like a crown too heavy to wear. I can’t carry all of this. I can’t lose my heart to save my soul. But I must. I have to. Even though, for once, I take no pride in the pain it will cause me.
I stand up and kiss my wife. “Are you really okay?” I ask her, cradling her face in my hands. “Tell me if you aren’t.”
My tone is authoritative, and her body responds like a flower to the sun, tilting and opening to me. Despite everything, I don’t bother to suppress the tendril of satisfaction that curls through me at her response. She’s always been like this. Responsive. Open. Frost on a window that you can melt and mar with a single fingertip.
She peers up at me, sliding her hands up my chest. Out of habit I take her wrists in my hands and fold her arms so that they are behind her back, and she gives a small shiver of delight. Suddenly my barely dulled need from earlier comes roaring back, and I’m hard; when I’ve got her like this, trapped and panting and wary, I feel ten fucking feet tall.
“What’s your safe word?” I ask, wrapping one hand around her forearms so that I can use the other to take her chin between my fingers.
“Maxen,” she breathes with fear and with trust and with the whole fucking world in her eyes. She’s too good to be true. Too perfect to be real.
I’m hers. Forever.
But then I feel Embry’s absence like a living thing, a cold sucking of air and wind where his body should be right now; he should be shaking with need right next to us, his eyes as wild and skittish as an unbroken stallion’s, just waiting for the right hand to coax him into obedience.
I was that hand once.
And that thought brings me away from the edge of my need, just enough to remember who I am. A snarled tangle of kink and honor, and honorable kink means consent. Unconditional respect. I owe it to Greer to tell her everything now, because it affects her as much as it affects me, and she deserves to know. She deserves everything I can give, in fact, and this simple courtesy is the least of what I owe her.
“I want to play,” I say, loosening my grip on her arms and releasing her chin. “But perhaps we shouldn’t right now.”
She rises up on the balls of her feet and nuzzles her face against my neck, rubbing and making noises like a needy little cat. “Please, Mr. President,” she begs, and oh, she begs so beautifully like this.
“Greedy thing,” I scold her with a reluctant smile. I can’t resist her, and yet I love her too much not to. “We need to talk, angel.”
“Can’t we talk after? Sir?” She’s practically purring now, her fingers seeking out my chest and my belt and my shirt buttons without my express permission, and all I want on this earth right now is to yank her over my lap, flip up her skirt, and spank her for her sauciness.
But I can’t yet.
With a quick move, I scoop her up and over my shoulder, her ass up in the air and her legs kicking fruitlessly as I carry her over to the chair by the window and set her on the floor. I snap my fingers, and she drops to her knees so gracefully and gratefully, a relieved smile on her downturned face.
I sit in the chair in front of her kneeling form. “You may look at me,” I inform her, and she does immediately with spots of color beginning to bloom on her cheeks. She’s excited, and she wants this, and if the world were normal, I’d already be guiding her head onto my waiting cock.
The world’s not normal though, and she doesn’t even know it yet, which is why I can’t. But there’s more to this way of life than fucking and spanking, and if we both crave the comfort of the exchange, then there is another way.
“It pleases me to have you like this,” I tell her. “It comforts me.”
In response
, she leans forward and rests her head against my knee with a contented little noise, and I allow her the informality. I enjoy it, this contact, her contentment and trust, the way she acts like there’s no place she’d rather be than kneeling at my feet and resting against me. I run a hand through her magic hair, watching the sunlight glint through the strands. She could be anywhere right now—giving lectures at an academic conference or meeting with members of her grandfather’s party or doing the endless publicity and charity expected of a First Lady—but for right now, she’s chosen to lay all that power and acclaim aside and kneel. It’s heady, what that can do to a man.
“I would prefer to talk like this,” I say, still playing with her hair. “And I think you would too—” I feel her nod against my thigh, but I keep going “—But I want you to know that you can stand up at any time and talk to me as an equal. You are also permitted to speak freely and ask questions.”
This sends the first arrow of suspicion through her, and she lifts her head. “Sir?”
