With her hands meeting around his nape, she murmured, “Thronos . . .” I’m yours. You’re mine. You confuse me. This confuses me. She hadn’t even orgasmed, and it was the best sex she’d ever had. Never had sex felt like coming home to someone.

Like she was being showered with fate’s gold coins.

He laid his big palm on the side of her face. “I don’t recognize . . . what your expression’s telling me,” he admitted in a gravelly voice. “But I think I like it.”

“I’m trying to tell you a thousand things at once. I’m telling you I’m ready—to be taken by you.” Not only was she accustomed to him; his c**k now felt so critical that she wondered how she’d survived without it. “I’ll give you anything you need.” Her hands moved to his ass, digging into the flexing muscles. “Do you need to thrust?”

“By all the gods, yes.” He drew his hips back, sinking himself more slowly.

Ecstasy surged inside her. Her lids fluttered as she moaned.

Another painstaking thrust. “Is it always like this, Lanthe?”

“Emphatically no.” She couldn’t stop writhing on his hardness, wanting ever more of it. “More, Thronos!”

“The way you move . . . maddening.” He clamped her restless hips, his body driving forward. Then again. Each time he hit the end of her sheath, her clitoris got a shot of delicious stimulation. Her orgasm mounted.

“You’re squeezing me so tight.” His pace quickened. “I can’t hold out!”

“No, don’t come,” she said, feeling her sorcery rising. “I won’t let you.” The air blurred near her lips.

Had she just used her power on him?

He thrust hard, groaning as if in pain. “Lanthe . . .” His skin sheened with sweat, his muscles corded. Just looking at him like this—her steady Vrekener in the throes, a massive warrior about to unleash centuries of need—brought her right to the edge.

She was going to come for this male, and she could almost fear the intensity of the escalating pleasure.

“Need to . . . thrust harder. Can’t go slow.”

“Don’t. Take me as you need to.”

With a groan, he shoved into her body. Again. And again, until he was railing between her legs, to her delight. His hands dipped beneath her, his remaining claws biting into the curves of her ass—a primal sign of possession that sent her spiraling.

So close, so close.

He gave a frustrated yell, confusion flashing in his eyes. “Lanthe, I can’t come.”

“I might have . . . commanded you.” Though she’d been tripping headlong toward her climax, she sucked in a breath and resisted it, wanting to torment them both.

“Undo it!” His tendons stood out with strain, his mighty body toiling to free its seed.

“Hmm. We’re going to have such fun tonight. . . .”

FORTY-SEVEN

This was anything but fun! Thronos could feel a knot of se**n trapped right beneath the crown, and he couldn’t release it.

His body knew exactly who he was claiming, knew it was to spill seed for her womb. The pressure of it made his erection throb like a hammered thumb—worse than it ever had before because he had se**n welling for her.

Her hot channel clutched him so tightly, seeming to demand it. He wanted to savor his first time, to savor her, but he could hardly think past that damned violent throbbing.

He gazed down to where their bodies joined. Mistake. Through the slit in the sheet, he could see her rosy flesh gloving his engorged length.

When he saw his mate was wetting the material with her arousal, his shaft jerked within her, as if panting for her. “About to lose my mind!” She’d told him that if he was ever inside her, there would be no doubt; he would be broken down at a molecular level, altered irretrievably.

She’d gravely understated.

Their crackling electricity now scorched him, as if lightning bolts detonated between them. The feeling of connection overpowered him, awed him. Physically, his body was wracked—he labored to ease the pressure and claim his pleasure—but he also needed to give his fated mate his seed, to leave something of himself inside her.

He gazed down at her face; her eyes were luminous, speaking to him in a language he didn’t yet understand. “Release me, Melanthe!” His voice was strangled, the pain unbearable.

Even as it felt so damned good.

In answer, she leaned up to kiss his neck. With her ethereal, blue sorcery coiling all around them, she licked his pulse point, the same way she’d taken gold dust from him. It drove him just as crazy. When she started sucking on his neck, he wondered if she sought to unhinge him.

“I’ll release you,” she murmured against his skin, “once you release me.”

Comprehension hit his lust-addled brain. He had to bring her to orgasm before she’d let him come.

He ran his arms behind her back, scooping her up, arching her br**sts to him. His mouth grazed one nipple, then the other. He took them with his tongue, then his lips, rocking between her legs as he sucked.

Against one plump breast, he yelled, “Release me!” Rocking, suckling, rocking her. Losing my mind.

“Thronos, I can’t hold back any longer . . .”

“Hold back?” This was all deliberate?

“I’m close!”

“Tell me what you need . . . to get you there.”

“Your kiss—take my lips!”

Their heads shot forward, teeth clicking before he slanted his mouth over hers. Their tongues tangled, flicking licks. They traded breaths, her moans and his groans. She was thrashing against him as wildly as he plunged into her.