Page 71 of King of Fire and Flames

Finally.

A sense of blissful belonging washed over me. This was home. Wherever she was. As close to her as possible. My love. My Aldara.

She gasped, stroking my back before running her hands over my chest plate, then along my twitching stomach muscles.

“So good,” I said through gritted teeth. “This is all I’ve wanted since I left you in Mydorian… to be with you. To be as close to you as I can get.”

“And now you are. So for the love of dust, get moving before those guards come back.”

With great care, I drew back, then inched forward, the delicious friction testing my control. She writhed gloriously beneath me, urging me to go faster and harder, but I didn’t.

I couldn’t.

First, I had to make sure she understood.

When I found the perfect, slow rhythm that made us sweat, on the verge of losing control, I stroked her body, her cheek, cuffed her neck with all the tenderness my ruthless heart could muster.

“I will protect you always. Never doubt it. From the night I saw you lift that fork to the Sun envoy’s neck in my dining hall, an unbreakable spell was cast. Your spell, my Aldara. At that moment…”

Words failed me, the sight and feel of her warm, wet body, threatening to shatter my resolve.

Raising her hips, I changed the angle slightly. “I… I didn’t know it then, Leaf, but that night I had fallen from the highest mountain peak in the realms, fallen irrevocably in love with you. And since that moment, I swear on the souls of my dead family, all I’ve wanted is to keep you safe. Keep you close. See you smile… preferably at me.”

“Oh, gods,” she moaned as I raised her hips again and thrust higher, sliding against her favorite spot.

“There are no gods, only one goddess and her servant king. We are King Arrowyn and Queen Zali. Arrow and Leaf, bound in bliss for all eternity. Do you believe me, my Aldara? Do you believe that I never failed you? That I never…” I moaned, shuddering helplessly. “Never betrayed you?”

Dark hair fanned over the bedcovers as she shook her head.

“No?” I froze with my hips pressed against her, my cock pulsing deep inside her exquisite velvet warmth. “You don’t believe me? Then I had better stop.” My fingers digging into her flesh, I prayed to the gold that I had the strength to remain still for as long as it took her to surrender.

“Please,” she said, bucking and tugging my shoulders. “Don’t stop.”

“Then tell me your name.”

“Zali.”

“No. The name of your heart.”

“Zali,” my stubborn lioness repeated.

“Say the name I gave you… Leaf. Say it, and I’ll fuck you any way you want.”

She cradled my cheek and smiled into my eyes. “I’m called Leaf. And although I’ve spent a long time hating it, in truth, it’s the name I like best. Given to me by the only male who makes me cry, and burn, and long for him like no other. The only one who knows that I like it hard and very fast.”

I required no further encouragement.

Bracing my hand above her head, I leaned into the work and gave her exactly what she’d asked for—long, hard, punishing strokes that made sweat slick our skin as we groaned and raged and panted together.

“You’re never… leaving… my sight again,” I demanded, perhaps unreasonably.

“But Mydorian. My people.”

“Damn it… Leaf. I—”

“Arrow, please… Don’t think about what’s beyond our control. Not now. Believe that all will be well.”

Then she said my name again and again, an incantation, a spell, and as her muscles coiled tighter and clenched around me, I sank my fangs into her neck over the Aldara mark. She came apart at once, crying out, gripping me tighter. I shuddered hard, pressing my fingers over her mouth to silence her cries.

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