Page 45 of A Haven of Brimstone and Darkness

Soft moans and footsteps linger in the air somewhere else in the garden. I know we shouldn’t do this here. In fact, I know that were I in my right mind, I’d be scrambling off Ruen and searching for my clothes that seem to have disappeared right off my body.Mors palliumor not.

Death comes for me?Death has been my companion for years. My father’s. My pride’s. Those brought at my own fingertips. I have been death’s apprentice for so long that I’ve forgotten what it actually feels like tolive.

I force Ruen’s hands to move against my body, contracting my fingers around his so that he is forced to dig into me. Rotating my hips again so that my entrance glides up the underside of his cock, I relish in the quick inhalation of breath he takes. Rising up and grinding myself down over him again, I leave a sticky trail in my wake, covering him in me. I like the feeling of marking him as mine. I haven’t had something that was purely mine in a long damn time.

“Please.” I gasp, my head careening back as my hair falls down my spine. With the wet glisten of sweat coating my skin, several strands stick to my shoulders and arms and neck. “I want it.” I drag in another gulp of air. “Ineedit, Ruen.”

He must be as desperate as I am because the words have barely left my lips when he’s releasing my breasts and gripping my hips to lift me up. I cry out, the sound choking me, as Ruen growls out a curse, holding me just over him for a beat right before he fits the head of his cock to my opening. Our gazes clash and his are completely swallowed by the dark circles of his pupils, barely discernible rings of midnight around them.

Then he slams my body down over his and the sharp intrusion has me screaming out. He cuts through me like a sword through flesh—easily, painfully, deliciously rough. My nails dig into his pecs and I grind down over top of him as the base of his cock comes right up against me. My thighs quiver at the sensation of being filled.

I’m filled to the base, the width and length of his cock stretching my inner walls. It makes my desire for more seem inconsequential now that I have it. More isn’t enough. I will always need something else.

Desperate tears prick at my eyes. Why isn’t it enough? What else can I want? What else can I need?

“Shhhh.” Ruen hushes me as he sits up, our chests pressing together. My lashes flutter shut as he kisses first one tear away and then another before fitting his mouth over mine. “Just feel me, Kiera.”

With his hands on my body and his tongue in my mouth, I do. I sigh and pant and whimper as he lifts me up and down over him. Our bodies come together only to separate as a slick stream of liquid drips down his shaft, soaking into the neat thatch of hair at the base of his cock. Throwing my head back as he skims his teeth over my throat, I stare up into the night sky.

Stars glitter all around us. Above and below until we’re surrounded by their presence. Lights flicker in the garden of statues. More candles lit now that the main fire has died down, the logical part of my mind suggests. In my more dazed dreamy state, all I can see is the sparkle of stars.

When a second pair of hands joins Ruen’s on my body, I cant my hips back in surprise, sheathing Ruen’s cock into my body in a rough movement. Ruen groans through gritted teeth as fingers grip my chin and tilt me towards a new mouth.

Resistance is futile and even if it weren’t, I have no desire to fight the pull of these Darkhaven men. Cruel. Monstrous. Damaged just like me, I want them to rip me apart and use me to seal their own scars. Maybe then I’ll have actually helped someone rather than hurt them.

The soft brush of gentle lips over mine makes guessing who’s kissing me no difficulty. Only Theos could ever be this sweet. I part my lips and drink him down, distantly realizing that it’s not him I’m drinking, but more of that delicious bubbly wine. I swallow as his tongue delves into my mouth and then I suck the remains from it.

Opening my eyes when he stops kissing me takes strenuous effort. The glint of his golden gaze softening when it meets mine is all-encompassing. His thumb strokes my bottom lip where it juts out.

“You’re so pretty like this, Dea,” he murmurs. “Surrounded by us.”

Panting, sweating, unable to stop myself, I respond with a moan of anguish. “I need more. Theos … please … make it stop.”

I’m begging, pleading with him, to make my mind stop spinning. My body to stop aching. My soul to stop splintering apart. If anything can keep me together, it’s them.

He kisses me again, swooping down to steal away the last of my air. “We will,” he breathes against me. “Just be patient.”

No. I don’t want to be patient. I can’t be patient. If they don’t do something soon, I’m going to die. I just know it. The fire in my blood is burning too hot. It’s going to expand and by morning, I’ll be nothing but a pile of ash and bone.

Wind is rushing through my ears, and whatever he says next is lost to the sound. Ruen lies back down, his chest leaving mine open to the cool night air. My nipples tighten and with gritted teeth, I reach for someone—any of them. I snag Theos’ hand and drag it up to my left breast.

Pressing my nipple into his palm, I gasp for breath. “Please…” That seems to be all I can say. Never before have I begged for something like this. I’ve never thought to, never wanted to. Until now.

“Soon.” The whisper of an answer comes not from Theos nor Ruen, but from the man that appears like a shadow at my other side.

Kalix.

Chapter 23

Kiera

There is a saying to the Nezeracians that wander the Hinterlands that refers to the moment a man and woman reach their pleasure. It’s something that I hadn’t learned until well after I’d been taken from the place that even Gods refused to go. They call finding the painful pleasure of release in climax ‘little death’ and it isn’t until this moment that I truly understand why.

Death is truly a sweet sacrifice for the living.

Three pairs of hands descend upon my flesh. Stroking, roving, moving. It’s not enough and the bastards know it. They’re driving me to the brink, edging me up towards a cliffside dive that is sure to kill me and I can’t help but react with the desperation of an animalistic being. Scratching, clawing, begging in whimpers and harsh jerks of my demanding hips.

Ruen is beneath me, the thickness of his length spearing up into me, rocking gently. I don’t fucking want gentle. I want hard and rough. I want to feel like I’m alive.

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