Page 28 of Untouched Queen by Royal Command

‘I think you’re conflicted.’

‘I think I’m a monster,’ he said.

‘Because you gave me what I asked for?’

‘You didn’t ask for that.’ She looked at him sharply and then glanced towards the big circular sofa. ‘I don’t want to sit at your cursed wheel,’ he muttered. ‘You were bathing. Do you need to continue with that?’ She might as well be clean. God knew no amount of water was going to wash him clean of this sin.

With the grace of a dancer and no inhibitions whatsoever, she walked towards the pool and shed her towel before stepping lightly into the water, deeper and deeper still, until she was shoulders deep and her hair billowed about her like tendrils of ink.

‘I’m sorry.’ She’d never know how much. ‘The way I treated you earlier was unacceptable.’

She watched him pace and then reached for the soap. ‘You fear passion,’ she said.

‘No.’

She raised an elegant eyebrow.

‘I lost control. I took without thinking. I hurt you.’ The way she’d taken him in her mouth, letting him push deeper than he’d ever pushed before—all animal instinct. ‘I can hear the damage in your voice.’

She looked at him, her thoughts her own, and then swam to a tap and turned it on and pushed her face beneath it and opened her mouth and drank. He wanted to look away from the innocent abandon in even that small act. The open mouth and the eyes that never stopped watching him, cataloguing every tiny twitch—or so he imagined. She swallowed and so did he, remembering, and the deep ache of desire that should have been sated sputtered to life again.

She swallowed more and then turned the tap off and cleared her throat. ‘How do I sound now?’

A little less rough. ‘Your lips are still swollen.’ The make-up was off but the lush redness remained.

‘I can’t tell.’ She was at the side of the pool again, closest to him, all graceful hands and arms, breasts with the nipples puckered up tight, but she wasn’t self-conscious—not one little bit—and he looked away and kept right on pacing, wondering why he’d turned around and come back because he was unravelling all over again. ‘Have you finished bathing?’ she asked solemnly.

He’d finished undressing in front of her, full-stop. At least one of them should be clothed at all times. It was his new motto when dealing with her. ‘I didn’t—’

She waited for him to continue.

‘You didn’t—’

She was still waiting for him to finish a damn sentence.

‘First times should involve satisfaction for all concerned,’ he muttered finally. ‘I should have made it so. I can still show you what it can be like.’

‘By taking control?’

‘Yes.’ By taking control and keeping it and pasting over the last twenty minutes with something infinitely more palatable.

‘You do realise that my satisfaction isn’t the goal here?’ she asked, and that, more than anything else in this crazy set-up, made his temper spike.

‘Because your teachers say so? Because you’re here to serve and my satisfaction comes before yours? Because you don’t deserve a first kiss that’s gentle and respectful? Because, believe me, Sera of the High Reaches, everyone deserves that.’

‘It wasn’t gentle, true.’ She was getting out of the bath now and walking towards him, water caressing her skin. ‘But my self-respect is intact, even if yours is not.’ She tilted her head back to look at him. ‘Your ego is bruised because you think I didn’t like your taste or touch? I can assure you I did.’

How could she have?

Her eyes seemed to soften as she stared at him. ‘Would you like to try again?’ she invited softly. ‘Bolster your ego, dilute your guilt—whatever it is that brought you back here to apologise? Because you can kiss me again if you like.’

It wasn’t about him. ‘What would you like? From me?’

‘Right now?’

‘Right now.’ Because he’d do it. ‘This isn’t about me.’

‘Do you really believe that?’ She picked up a towel and patted her face and wrapped it around her small frame and tucked it in. She pushed her hair to one side and combed through it with her fingers before wrapping slender fists around the dark mass and stripping the water from it in one smooth movement. ‘I’d like to kiss you again,’ she said at last. ‘I’d like for you to kiss me, gently and respectfully, whatever it is you think I need, and we’ll see how that goes. I might like it more than our earlier kisses. I might not. I’ll let you know.’

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