Page 138 of The Oracle of Dusk

“But this is the biggest one!” she accused him, shaking the thing at him.

“So it is.”

“Oh goddess…”

He advanced on her. She backed away, holding the dildo out as if it were a sword. It might as well be. She could probably kill someone with it. Given the size, it might do her in.

“Will it fit?” he asked, backing her into a corner, looming over her until she was holding the dildo less like a sword and more like it was a lifeline. She averted her eyes as her mind spun. He tipped her chin up so she was forced to drown in his golden gaze.

Just the heat in his look made her ache. Her grip on the glass tightened.

“I don’t…uh…maybe? Its…the…well, um… it’s really big,” she spluttered out, her words ending in a whimper.

He wrested the dildo from her grip and set it aside.

“Then we’ll complete our prayers another way. Once we’re fully bound, I’ll go slowly, ruining you one toy at a time until you can take me. Would you like that, Aurora?” he purred.

Heat crept up her neck again as she envisioned just what he might do to her. Things she’d only dreamt of.

She nodded.

“Then say it.”

“Yes,” she whispered.

“Yes, what?”

Her breath came fast. Was this how it was to be between them? Him speaking her fantasies into being, making her say words that had spent a lifetime trapped in the back of her throat? She swallowed.

“Yes, I would like that.”

“And if at any time you don’t like something, what will you say?”

Merciful Triad, she was required to think during this ordeal? They were both quite doomed.

“Stop?”

He smiled.

“Good enough. Clothes on or off?”

“Off. On! Wait…oh, I don’t know,” she groaned.

Theron chuckled and scooped her up, his eyes glittering gold. He sat down on the edge of the bed and arranged her in his lap, the skirt of her gown hiked up around her thighs as she straddled him, her knees on either side of his hips. He divested her of her veil and began pulling the pins from her hair, massaging her scalp. She leaned into his expert touch, the tension leaving her shoulders as he freed the last of her hair from its confines. Aurora helped him out of his headband, necklace and earrings. He ran his finger along the edge of her ear, sending a shiver down her spine when he freed her from the weight of her earrings. Her eyes were on his lips. She remembered how soft they were, how sweet his kisses could be, and how demanding, how consuming. He leaned in for a kiss and she placed a finger on his lips.

“You’re really alright with this? There’s no going back. No undoing it.”

The question took him aback. A flash of something, maybe vulnerability, crossed his face. He looked away, threading his fingers through hers.

“In a perfect world, I would have preferred more time to know you. I know you’re courageous, infuriatingly soft-hearted, that you’re intelligent, devious when it suits you, but I might have preferred to wait until I knew if you could smile for me the way you do for Hyllus, if you could laugh with me as you do him. In a perfect world, I would have liked to give you the choice of temple, the choice to leave if you so chose. But this world is flawed, as are we all. I’m a jealous man, a bad man who has chosen to be a good king, honourable when it suits me and wicked when it doesn’t. In this world, you’re the only one I would choose to bind myself to. But maybe the more salient question is this—areyoualright with this, knowing there’s no going back?”

Aurora swallowed. He wasn’t looking at her, giving her time to sort through her thoughts without the pressure of his desires. But the answer was yes. She’d wanted him from the start, much as she’d tried to resist. She knew he was flawed, calculating, possessive, but he’d also, time and again, seen her through the worst both she and the ancient past had to offer and still chose to remain by her side. That didn’t mean she wasn’t afraid of what the bond would mean, how it would alter her life, her future. But courage was not borne out of fearlessness.

With her fingertips on his jaw, she turned his head to hers, their lips meeting in a tender kiss. She chose to be brave—to take a leap of faith and trust that this man who was meant for her would stand by her side for all that was to come. That what they had together now would blossom and grow.

He deepened their kiss, one hand on the back of her head, the other slipping under her skirt. Nerves assailed her as she placed her hands on his chest. His heart hammered against her touch, and a part of her anxiety quieted. Theron was as nervous as she—of course he was. Warmth bloomed in her chest. They could be brave together.

He rubbed her through the fabric of her underclothes, swallowing her cries. She fought his belt off in increasingly jerky movements as he played with her. When Aurora finally freed him, she took his silken length in her hands and explored him as much as she could while he teased her to distraction. She wasn’t certain how something that large would ever fit inside her, but as he brought her to the edge of the precipice, she found herself more and more eager to discover the means.

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