Page 94 of What Is Dark Within Me

Whatever she planned to say was lost as Nicolas’s lips crashed against hers with painful ferocity. Teeth scraped against teeth before she fully realized what was happening and tilted her head into the kiss. One of his hands curled into the hair at the base of her neck as he lifted her and she wrapped her legs around his hips.

She couldn’t stop kissing him—vanilla and woodsmoke filling her senses—as he carried her toward the throne on the right. Nor could she stop the rest of her body from responding. She moved her fingers through his hair, and over his jaw, his collarbones, his chest.

He pulled his head back. “Not there,” he muttered, depositing her on the throne. It was more comfortable than she’d imagined, though she had the sense this room hadn’t been used much, even before the war.

“Why?” she asked, the question muffled as he kissed her again.

“I’ll explain after, I promise. Just… touch me anywhere but there.”

Aleja wanted to follow up, but her body decided it wasn’t worth the delay when Nic told her, “Spread your legs. I want to get on my knees for you this time.”

She let him drag her trousers off, the cold air of the throne room sending goosebumps down her inner thighs. He tugged at her top. “This too, dove.”

It felt strange to be naked while he was fully clothed, but there was such an unguarded expression of hunger on his face when he looked at her that Aleja felt… powerful. She saw her reflection cast in the silver of his eyes; her pink scars and the tangled branches of the throne rising over her head like a crown.

“My general. My consort. My wife,” Nicolas said, like the words themselves were a prayer, before he buried his face between her legs.

If Nicolas had intended to tease her first, it seemed like he had lost all self-control. His tongue swirled around her clit as she sagged with the pleasure of it, her back hitting cold metal. One of his hands gripped her ass, the other pushing against her right thigh. A moment ago, she had looked like a queen, but now she’d become an offering, a sacrifice.

But it was her choice, and there was power in that too.

“I thought you said you were going tofuckme on this throne,” she gasped, trying to tug Nicolas up by the hair. She wanted to come around his cock, scratch lines into his back, and damn—he knew her body too well. Just a few moments of him lapping at her, and her toes had curled into painful knots.

“I got distracted. You taste incredible,” he said. He dipped his head lower before she could protest and his tongue slipped inside of her, as if he wanted to drink from the source.

She tried to stop herself, but the climax came quickly, unexpectedly, and a ragged moan escaped her as she dug her nails into Nicolas’s scalp. Aleja had come hard before, but it had never felt like she was in danger of leaving her body if she gave in to the sensation. It was so disorientating she hardly noticed when Nicolas pulled himself up using the throne’s arms—lips glistening, eyes wild, wings spread.

“I want to be inside you,” he said, sounding off-kilter himself.

“Yes,” she said, though the orgasm hadn’t fully ceased. She felt another spasm. “I need you, Nic… please.”

She wasn’t sure when he’d slid out of his trousers, but his cock lay flush against his stomach, slightly darker than the rest of his skin. Aleja reached for him on instinct, loving the weight of him in her hand. He gasped her name, letting her reposition him toward her entrance.

She felt a slight ache as he filled her. Damn Otherlanders, she thought before she felt present enough to meet his eyes. At that moment, she realized Nicolas was not simply in love with her. Heworshippedher.

“Alejandra,” he said, voice raw. His hands were on her hips, but he remained motionless.

“It’s okay. You can call me Aleja,” she said. She tried to grind into him, but he held her still, his cheek pressed against her hair.

“You’rethe one I want to be fucking right now,” he said.

“We’re the same person,” she told him.

“You know what I mean, dove.”

She was still Our Lady of Wrath, High General of the Knowing One’s armies, but she was… more now. Every life she had lived stuck to her like another piece of armor. Even if some were rusty—a bit forgotten—they hadn’t ceased to make her whole.

She curled her nails into his lower back, using her thighs to draw him closer. This time, he didn’t resist. “Nic, if I’m remembering correctly, you always fulfill a promise. So, move. Destroy me. Make me come so hard I fall apart, then fuck me again to put me back together.”

He obliged, pulling out to the tip of his cock before thrusting back in. She fell back, using the throne as leverage to tilt her hips and find an angle that made her gasp as he drove into her.

Aleja realized another orgasm was rapidly approaching. This time she didn’t fight it. When she closed her eyes, Nicolas curled his fingers under her chin, forcing her into eye contact. “Watch me as you come. Say my name. Tell me you belong to me and no one else.”

And she did. A prayer of her own, this time. “Knowing One. Nicolas. I’m yours. I’m yours, in this life and every other, I—”

Stars filled her vision, but she forced herself to keep her eyes locked on his face. For a moment, she wondered if she was on the verge of death. Shudder after shudder ran down her spine. He must have felt the way she vibrated against him, and the sensation dragged a moan from his mouth.

She’d watched him come before, but it was different with their foreheads pressed together, their lips brushing in unintentional kisses. She could no longer tell whose sighs of pleasure were whose. His cock swelled, and she felt the force of his climax spilling into her.

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