Page 56 of A Reign of Storm and Madness

My eyes crawl up from the massive length between his legs over the shadowed ridges of his stomach muscles and then his pecs to his face. He looks proud, almost smug that he’s stunned me, and I truly am so fucking shocked that I can’t hide it from him.

“Why would any man … do that to themselves?” I ask honestly.

He laughs, the sound more honest than I’ve ever heard it. Not calculated. Not deep and throaty and seductive. But real. That laugh is even more treacherous than his psychotic mind.

“Pain is fleeting,” Kalix says, taking a step back into the water, deeper until it rises above his knees. He only stops at his thighs. I suspect it’s because he doesn’t want to shield his cock from my view. After all, I’m struggling to tear my eyes away from it. My gaze keeps going there. I’ve never felt so damn innocent before in my life—not since the night my father died and I was taken to the Underworld. “Pleasure can be whenever you want, little thief.”

“I do not want it,” I say, ripping my attention back to his face. “Not with you.”

His smile doesn’t dim even the slightest bit. “I thought I told you not to lie,” he reminds me casually, hand slipping away from his cock as he takes another step into the water towards me.

I inhale sharply and move back. “I’m—” I see the water move before he does, but that can’t be possible. Regardless, he’s there in a beat, arms closing around me, lifting and turning me until it’s my back against the steps as the water sloshes around our bodies, sliding between us like a third lover.

“I’ll have to punish you for lying to me again after I warned you not to.” Kalix’s words drift over my ears just before my head closes under the surface. I release a scream, bubbles erupting at the muffled sound.

I fight against his hold, dragging my nails against the steps of the bath as I try to clamber backward and up. He drags me further, back into the center, deeper and deeper. I kick at him, but all Kalix does is catch one leg and wind it around his waist before grabbing ahold of the other and doing the same. Then I’m pounding on his chest with closed fists and struggling to get him to let me up.

He can fuck me if he wants, but if he doesn’t let me surface soon then he’ll be fucking a corpse. Kalix pushes his lips into mine, licking at the seam of my mouth with his tongue. A shudder works through my limbs.

How? I want to ask. How is he doing this? How is he not struggling to breathe?

Kalix shoves his mouth against mine harder, demanding. And just because I hope it makes him release me, I finally open mine. The second my lips part, he’s there, thrusting his tongue over mine like an invading army, taking and pillaging.

Kissing Kalix is raw and violent. I scratch his chest and when still he doesn’t let me up for air, I snap my teeth down, biting the shit out of his tongue until blood rushes into my mouth. He pulls his head back and grins down at me before kicking his feet, sending the both of us upward with strong strokes.

Black dots are dancing in front of my vision, blurring everything at the edges. When our heads break through the water, I cough, water spewing from my lips.

“You … fucking … asshole!” I bite out, gagging as more and more water comes up. How the fuck was he able to kiss me with so much damn water in my mouth?

“I warned you,” Kalix says, not sounding the least bit upset. My legs are still around his waist and I find that I’m so exhausted by fighting him that if he’s going to let me cling to him and use him as something to keep me afloat, then that’s his problem.

I suck in breath after breath, panting even as my hands lock on to either side of his arms and I press my face into the bare chest in front of me. I close my eyes and just luxuriate in the feeling of fresh air in my lungs. It’s almost peaceful. Almost.

It’s always almost a lot of fucking things with these Darkhavens.

Kalix’s cock bumps against my ass and I immediately release him and tread water a few feet away. He arches a brow at me as I glare back at him, not even trying to pretend to be his Terra in this moment. “If I wanted to fuck you, I would have you, little thief,” he tells me. “Running only makes me want to force you.”

I ignore his words and gesture to the bath around us and below with a big splash. “What the fuck was that?” I demand. “How are you able to hold your breath for that damn long?”

He tips his head to the side, lifting a hand to stroke back some of the wet black strands of his hair once more. “Some snakes can hold their breath underwater for ten minutes or even as long as an hour,” he says. “My familiars’ abilities can become my own. As a Mortal God, I would have thought you’d—”

I dive for him, slamming the heel of my palm up until it cracks against his nose, shoving the cartilage up as blood spurts with a satisfying spray. Glittering green eyes flare wider and the smile he sends me, coated in his own blood, is anything but angry. Fucking psycho.

Kalix rolls his eyes and lifts his hands, gripping my wrists and pulling mine away. “No one else is here,” he assures me.

“You don’t know that,” I snap. “Forgive me if I don’t necessarily trust the man who’s been chasing me around this fucking bathing room like a randy fucking Lord God with a mortal housemaid.”

“I do know that,” he insists, ignoring my other comment. “My familiars are keeping a watch.” His hands slip down my arms and back to my hips and I find him grabbing the backs of my thighs and lifting me against him until my legs are around him once more.

I blink. How did that happen?

He nuzzles against my neck, breathing warm air over the quickly cooling flesh. “You fight me so beautifully, little liar,” he murmurs against me. “You never give in even if you’re overpowered.”

His cock bumps against my ass again and I bite down hard on my lower lip as I lift up and away from it. I squirm in his arms, uncomfortable. And in true Kalix fashion, he grips my hips and brings me down with great force. All the air I just replaced rushes back out of me as the head of his cock sears into my entrance and then just slams inside.

I cry out before I realize what he’s done—what I’ve let him do—and then slap a hand over my mouth. The bars of his cock rub against my inner walls, scraping through my insides and setting off little fireworks throughout my body.

This was what he’d meant, I realize belatedly, when he said that pain was only temporary but pleasure could be whenever I wanted it.

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