“Will I be…uh…messy? Like you?” She flushed, feeling stupid for the question, but he smiled.

“Gods, I hope so. Wet, hot, and messy.”

Daenaira felt her whole body flash with intense heat just listening to his anticipation. She dropped her gaze along his body as he slowly showed her how to slip her touch in circles against herself. He was glistening with perspiration all along his skin, every contour and muscle standing out in stark relief. She saw his penis was heavy and stiff with renewed excitement, and it altered the entire landscape of her arousal, charging it up to a new level of expectancy. She realized what would be happening soon between them, and little vignettes of the sexual scenes she’d glimpsed in her life began to stutter through her mind as a strange sensation of spiraling pleasure etched through her—and then faded.

He let go of her fingers, watching her continue and feeling the picture of her autoeroticism burn him from head to toe. Magnus should have encouraged her to dip her fingers inside herself, but he couldn’t bring himself to do it. That, he thought fiercely, was his threshold. It was his to take. She could finish her lesson just like she was. Feeling her legs clutching restlessly around his thighs and watching her h*ps lift toward the stroke of her own touch assured him of it.

“Don’t stop. That’s it. Just let it take you, honey. Yes. Gods, you’re gorgeous. Show me how you come, Dae.” She was primed, her free hand restless on her skin and br**sts now and her eyes closed as she immersed herself in her own touch and the encouragement of his voice. “And as soon as you do, then I’m going to show you how you come. I’m going to show you a whole different way. I’m going to feel you a whole new way. Dozens of new ways.” Each promise brought her breath faster and harsher, and she shook her head in resistance again. He ignored the gesture because she didn’t draw away from herself. She was just very close and she didn’t know what to make of what she was feeling. She was so dripping wet he could see it and hear it as she touched. She had begun to moan softly, whispering his name and short words of denial.

“No,” she cried out softly.

“Yes, Daenaira. Just let it go.” Gods, she was killing him. Something had to break really soon or he wasn’t going to be able to keep still much longer. After so many decades of denial, he couldn’t believe how easy it was for him to fall back into this rush of need and craving. He couldn’t believe how hard it was to maintain even the slightest control. But he was beginning to think it had far more to do with the woman than it had to do with the deprivation. He had seen hundreds of women in hundreds of classes rise to crest and orgasm, and he had been mostly unaffected. Brushing her hair had been the most exciting classroom experience that he could remember. Watching her go liquid like this again, it felt so good it hurt.

He felt her body shaking in quick trembles against his, and he whispered soft commands to her to keep her on track. She was gasping, her body bowing, and she was incredible. The mixture of stark sensual pleasure and unadulterated anxiety was a stamp on his memory forever. She shuddered, contracted into herself, and burst like fireworks. Magnus could tell instantly that it was a raw ride over the edge for her, her whole body far too worked up for its own good. He reached to quickly replace her touch against her spasming little cl*t when she jerked her hand away. He put pressure against her, easing the sharpness of the twisting tide for her. Her thighs clutched against his forearm and she cried out.

Daenaira did not feel the relief she had been expecting. Not in the least. Her heart was pounding and her muscles trembled as the too-keen pleasure spit through her in ragged seizures. Just when she thought she would scream, he eased away from her clitoris and left the little spot twitching and throbbing, hard and alone.

As she tried to catch a breath, she felt confused by what she had felt, but at the same time it had felt rather like he had looked that day in the bath—in pleasure and in agony, both against his desires.

“Easy, K’yindara,” he said softly as he moved up over her trembling body to her mouth. “I know how that must have felt. It’s like that sometimes when there’s been such a drought of sensation that strong.”

“Like for you that day I saw you.”

“Yes. Exactly like that. It kind of turns you inside out.”

“Kind of?” She laughed at the understatement.

But then she saw his smile as it spread slow and wicked over his features. “Yes, baby. I’m about to show you something a bit more specific.”

“Oh, no, really, I think I’m done,” she breathed, pushing her hands against his shoulders.

He laughed at that. “Done? We haven’t even started.” Magnus feinted for her mouth but she turned her head and laughed uneasily.

“Magnus, I’m serious. I don’t want to feel like that again.”

“You won’t,” he promised.

However, her belief in that promise would require something she wasn’t sure about. It required she trust him. Oh, she didn’t doubt he knew what he was doing. After all, Hera had told her there was hardly an adult in the city he hadn’t taught sex to in one form or another. Considering what a sexual breed their people were, well, that said something.

So she didn’t know why she was hesitating all of a sudden. Even as she pressed her hands against him in resistance, she wanted to feel him under her palms. Before she realized the impulse, she was curving hungry fingers up around the thick muscles of his shoulders. Gods, he was packed with power, and she could feel it vibrating through every inch of his hot flesh.

“I’m not ready for this,” she confessed awkwardly.

“You’re just afraid, Dae. It’s perfectly natural, especially the way you’ve had to fight to keep control of your body over these years. What you are supposed to feel is a total abandonment of control. Resisting that is what makes it almost like pain for people like us who try to fight what should be coming naturally. You and I don’t like to give up control. But for you, I think I would give up that and a whole lot more. That’s something I’ve never felt before. Light, I’ve never felt half the emotions I feel because of you before.”

“You mean pissed off beyond coherent thought?” she asked with a giggle as he bent to kiss her in the hollow at the base of her throat.

“That’s one, yes,” he sighed, finding her pulse and licking against it. “Also, possessive. Violently possessive. I wanted to rip Brendan apart today when he was reaching to touch you. Light, even watching him get on that bed with you just about made me lose it completely.”

“Really?” Daenaira had no idea why something like that would make her smile, but she did, hiding it against the softness of his hair. The black curls were woven back into a plait at the base of his neck, small simple gold rings having been slipped onto the design at intervals. He didn’t wear ornamentation like that often, she realized, but she rather liked it. It was masculine in its way, and sexy.

“And stupid,” he sighed, drawing back to look down into her eyes, his hand coming up to touch knuckles over the arch of her brow. “I haven’t made so many mistakes with one individual in all of my life.” At least he didn’t think he had. He suspected Karri might have been a close second. The thought made him frown.

“Why do you think you have?” She stroked him around his ear. “Am I really that difficult? I mean, I just don’t seem to work right with anyone. Not even the best priest in all of Sanctuary.”

“You are perfect for working with me,” he countered quietly, “and don’t let my idiotic confusion make you think otherwise. I’m getting this straight now. Not flawlessly, not yet, but I’m beginning to understand that there’s a bigger plan to you and me than I was willing to commit to. Luckily, my goddess sent me a spitfire who could set me straight.”

She gave him her signature smile, unable to help the slide of her hand straight down his chest and belly until her hand wrapped around his thickened member.

“Quite straight at that,” she observed.

“Cheeky little bitch,” he growled at her before snagging her in a kiss.

Dae instantly recalled how beautiful his mouth felt against hers, her breath sighing into his lips as he dipped for her taste. But the light flicker of a tease was all it took to blow oxygen onto the banked ashes of the passion they shared. He made a rich sound of need low in his throat and speared his tongue in hot search of her flavor.

Daenaira felt renewed heat rushing beneath her skin, infusing her tissues more deeply and vibrantly with every hungry tangling of his tongue with hers. Whatever his intentions had been, even as inexperienced as she was, she could feel them rapidly deteriorating as the fire in his kisses grew wilder and fiercer. She was breathless and dizzy by the time he began to touch her face with his fingertips. Dae could feel him pulsing hard between her fingers, her limp, distracted touch around him turned incidental as he assaulted her inexperienced senses with kisses that couldn’t possibly be normal. She was learning how to catch up with him at first, and then how to keep up, but it wasn’t long before even his aggression and passion couldn’t suit them enough and she had to invest her own.

She let go of him, only to wrap herself tightly around his broad shoulders, lifting herself off the bed to press her chest against him because she was starving for more contact.

“Drenna!” he gasped when he could finally pry himself away for air. “You’re a siren. You’ve bewitched me from the start. Aiya! I’m desperate for you,” he cried into her mouth as he took her again, his fingers streaking roughly through her hair.

“Magnus,” she moaned restlessly, her legs climbing his body. “Touch. I need…”

“Yes, honey,” he agreed, his large, rough hands leaving her hair to streak down over her face and throat. He gripped her silken shoulders, sliding his arms behind her back and thrusting her br**sts upward as he pulled from her mouth and lowered his head to rub his lips down the skin of her breastbone. Her sugary cream scent pervaded his senses thickly because of how long she had been aroused already, the state intensifying the heady aroma especially between and beneath her br**sts as he kissed and licked the salty sweetness of her perspiring skin.

When he caught her nipple abruptly between the ginger bite of his teeth, she jerked herself concave to the sensation, but had nowhere to go with his powerful arms at her back. A moment later, she no longer had any desire to pull away. He nipped and drew at the pointed tip until she had both hands dug deep into his hair and she could hear her own cries echoing into the room.

“Hush,” he soothed her, licking a slow caress to ease the pleasurable sting of his teeth. “Save that sexy voice of yours, sweet Dae. You’re going to need it later.”

She laughed breathlessly, knowing by his tone that he was teasing her. She could feel the racing of his heart against her belly and the hot drip of his c*ck against her bottom. He was just as aroused as she was, if not more, and he thought to act superior as he wove his hot magic against her skin. Well, it wasn’t as though she hadn’t seen a few things for herself and hadn’t been paying very close attention. She clearly needed to pull her wits about her long enough to remind him of that.

Now that Daenaira had that in her focus, she was a little bit better able to concentrate in spite of his teeth returning to rub and nibble wickedly at her again. Though she’d never known the sensation, his taut tugging made her crave the full seal of his mouth. She wanted to feel him suck at her strongly, the way she knew he wanted to. He was just enjoying his torturous play and her wild reactions so much that his superiority was getting in the way of their mutual want. He shifted to the opposite breast and she bucked beneath him. Dae had to wait for her brain to clear of the explosive cloud of pleasure it sent hazing over her before she could concentrate on a little payback.

She wriggled a hand free of his hair, only then realizing just how deeply she had entwined her fingers into the plait, and waiting for a moment when he wasn’t watching her face she quickly ran her tongue up the inside of her palm. Dae had to pause a second when the combined flavor of both of their bodies danced over her taste buds, swallowing a groan and the delicious essence they made together. Then she watched him very carefully, a wicked smile already teasing her lips as she wriggled her hand between their bodies and reached to wrap him in her wet fingers.

This time it was Magnus’s turn to surge sharply upward into her, the oath that slipped out of him coarse and guttural.

“M’jan,” she taunted, tsking her tongue softly against his ear, “such language.”

Magnus’s golden gaze seared against hers, a world of decadent promises lurching from them in time to the thrust of his thick erection through her slick grasp. Together they worked him into a near frenzy, the swelling hardness of him seeming to grow in leaps and bounds. Then he swept himself out of her grasp with a wet pop of sound and seized her wrists in his hands, pinning them far above her head and catching her in a single locked grasp in order to free the hand he then burned sharply down her body. Her breast was targeted by his mouth and finally, oh gods, finally, she felt the savage draw of his lips sucking her nipple into contact with the flickering taunt of his tongue. His fingertip dipped briefly into her navel, then raked a winding path through tight little curls until he was swimming in slick and ready heat.

He touched that nexus of nerves he had shown her, and Daenaira gasped as the draw of his mouth sent out a stab of need that sang straight to that contact. Magnus released the rigid nipple he held prisoner, blowing softly on her in his own wake, smiling when she squirmed madly, trying to make him reclaim his kiss against her.