Page 44 of God of War

"I'm so sorry, little one," he whispers, his deep voice rumbling through me. "I'm sorry it came to this."

The regret in his tone is unmistakable, as if he genuinely wishes he could have forged a different path for me.

A sob wrenches from my throat, the sound muffled against his chest. And then I'm shattering, breaking apart, falling to pieces in his arms as the reality of what I just did crashes into me.

I walked away from my family, from the only home I've ever known, from everything I've every know. For him. Because I love him. Because I couldn't bear to lose him.

He doesn't tell me it'll be okay. He doesn't whisper promises he can't keep. That isn't Naz. He doesn't lie, not to me. He simply gathers up the broken pieces of my heart, holding me together…shielding me with his strength because I have none left.

And then he lifts me into his arms, sliding into the back of the SUV with me, and takes me home. Toward the future we've sacrificed everything to build together.

"Make me forget," I plead as he strips me bare in the privacy of his bedroom—our bedroom—in his mansion in Calabasas an hour later, his hands gentle against my skin. I feel calmer but stretched thin.

I need his hands on my body. I need his claim pressed into my skin. I need to be his, broken open and shattered for him.

His hands tighten on my hips without hesitation as he lowers me to the bed, his touch a searing brand shutting out everything but this—everything but us. He follows me down, his weight grounding me in the moment. In him. In us.

"Mi alma." His lips find my neck, trailing scorching kisses everywhere he can reach. "Mi luz." He nips my pulse point, sending an addictive kind of pleasurable pain skittering through my veins. "Mi vita."

He paints a trail of devotion across my body with his lips, with his hands, with every word he breathes into my skin. His teeth close around one of my nipples, and my back bows off the bed, the shards of ice around my heart melting.

His fingertips dance across my abdomen, tracing every imperfection as if he intends to memorize—as if he already has. I gasp and quiver beneath him, delirious with pleasure, with the sight and feel of him.

He's soft with me, gentle in a way that's foreign and beautiful and so damn devastating. It's like he's determined to put me back together again with nothing more than the strength of his devotion, the fervor of his worship. And damn him, it's working.

I wanted to break. To crumble and burn. He won't let me. He builds me up instead, breathing iron and fire into my veins, into my soul.

"Naz," I whisper his name like a prayer as he settles between my thighs, spreading me wide.

His molten gaze locks with mine as he dips his head, inky black strands of his hair falling over his forehead. His tongue flicks out, the tip of it settling against my clit.

My back bows off the bed, a broken moan tumbling from my lips. This isn't fucking. It's rapture. Divinity.

"That's it,mi amor," he murmurs, his breath hot against my pussy. "Let me hear you."

I'm the one who was just tried and convicted, sentenced for loving him, but he eats me like a condemned man savoring his last meal, one seeking absolution between my legs.

His lips close around my clit, flicking, laving…reducing me to a sobbing, shuddering mess of ecstasy. The pleasure crests higher, higher, higher. Until it rips me open and shatters me apart.

I fall with his name on my lips, writhing in sweet torment as waves of his devotion crash through me, unmaking me all the way down to my bones.

He works me through it, bringing me back down with crooning praise and the gentle flick of his tongue against my clit.

Tears spill down my cheeks as he kisses his way back up my body, his lips settling against mine. I taste myself on him as his weight blankets me, as he claims my mouth in a kiss so full of possession, of devotion, I forget to breathe, forget my name. I forget everything that came before him and this moment.

The past doesn't hurt when the present is so good I can't even feel it.

"Are you ready for more, little one?" he rasps against my lips, notching his cock at my entrance. His body is tense and rigid above mine, trembling with need. But he doesn't move, doesn't take what he wants. He waits for me to give him permission.

I rock my hips in silent invitation, in a plea. "Please, Naz. More."

His gaze tangles with mine, never deviating as he presses forward, each thrust slow, deliberate…until his hips are flush against mine, and we're both drowning in ecstasy. We groan at the same time. Tremble in unison.

I'm so full of him, so consumed by him, there isn't a single place in me that doesn't bear his brand. That doesn't belong to him.

He presses his forehead to mine, rocking into me just as slowly, just as carefully as he entered me. He ruins me in a way he never has, breaks and unmakes me with each thrust, each touch. And then he puts me back together again with his forehead against mine, his voice rough with emotion. "Te amo, little one. I'll love you forever."

"I love you." Tears spill down my cheeks as I clutch him to me, trying to merge us into one being—not Naz and Brynna, predator and pawn, not the god of war and an Irishprincesa, but us, this, one soul permanently joined.

---