Page 40 of Gemini Kings
Ronin nudges him softly aside to lift me completely into his arms and cradles me against his chest and sort of herds Vasili before us into the adjoining cabin, with Vasili scooping up armfuls of thick plushy towels as we go and mumbling something fretful about conditioning rinse that we both pretty much ignore.
Not long after, I’m snuggled up between my warlocks in the dim cabin under thick covers in this soft bed, all of us naked and drowsy and more or less dry. Ronin props himself on one elbow to frown down at me, damp hair spilling over one shoulder.
“Didn’t mean for you to finish yourself off, love,” he groans. “Selfish bastards, the both of us, really. Tonight was supposed to be all about you.” He pauses. “Still not too late, of course.”
“Vasili needed us more tonight,” I mumble sleepily, snuggling up tighter against the Goblin King, who’s already sleeping so deeply he’s producing cute little snores with every exhale (which would completely horrify him if he knew). “I picked up bits and pieces about why, you know, through the bond and hearing the two of you talk. Tomorrow, I’m hoping I’ll hear the rest.”
“It’s his tale to tell, and it may take a bit of coaxing, but I’m thinking he’ll spill the beans for you. You told him just what he needs to feel safe doing it.” Ronin draws the thick duvet slowly down my body until he bares my tits. His amber gaze crawls over me.
And even though I literally just fucking came, my nipples pucker right up under that heated stare.
Especially when he flicks one of my rings, then gives it a cruel twist that makes me gasp. He knows I like it rough with the nipple play, and I’m already getting slick for him.
“Ronin,”I moan, half in protest, because I figure Vasili really needs his sleep.
And there’s no way he’ll sleep through anything that goes down with me in this bed without waking up and joining in and probably running the whole show.
“Zara.”Ronin mimics my tone perfectly, the beast. Even as he leans in, diabolical with intent, to lick a purposeful circle around my nipple.
A little whimper spills out of me and I arch into his touch.
Which is all the encouragement he needs to close his mouth around my tingling nipple with a hard sucking pull that wrings out a louder whimper.
Vasili stirs heavily against me. His breath unravels in mid-snore into a sigh. He slithers onto his side to face us, sleepy but interested.
“Hmmm, what have we here?” He leans in to nuzzle my other nipple, pricking me with his sexy fangs just hard enough to draw blood. Playing at the actual mating bite he sank into my tit a few weeks ago that left twin scars he and Lucius both love to tongue. They tend each other’s mating bites, Lucius and Vasili, which is just sweet as fuck.
I gasp out a breathless curse.
Vasili laps at the tiny new wound and gauges my reaction slyly under his lids.
“Tell me,” Ronin whispers, teeth scraping my nipple and tugging on my ring to make me writhe. Sweet Jesus, now they’re both nibbling on me! “How d’you fancy me putting that Kylo mask and costume back on for you, love? You’ll be my fiery Jedi captive, determined to resist my terrible power. And let’s see how Vasili does as that poncy General Hux.”
Chapter Nine
Lucius
That rampaging goat in my third period Common Magics class has all but destroyed my classroom.
It’s an all-too-damning testimony, of course, to my students’ general lack of aptitude at the Compulsion spell they’re supposed to have mastered by midterms, which are fast approaching. Before I allow them to tinker with their classmates’ fragile minds by unleashing the exercises in the textbook on each other, they’re supposed to practice on the goat.
The infernal creature’s done its damage and been dragged off in disgrace, but its indignant bleating still echoes above the chatter of lunch hour foot traffic down the corridor of this old Gothic church where classes have been held for centuries at the Icarus Academy.
In point of fact, that cloven-hooved devil might as well be blowing a victory trumpet. None of my underclassmen so much as fazed the wretch.
Good Lord, even my reliable juniors barely managed to slow its depredations.
In the end, if Racetrack hadn’t managed to teleport the troublesome beast into the corridor, it would still be overturning desks and trampling chairs to kindling and wreaking general havoc in here.
Truly, it’s one more indication I don’t need of the failing magic that weakens the witching world as the arcane races drift toward extinction. Centuries ago, the deconsecrated church hidden behind enchanted wards on this abandoned island in the Med would have echoed with prolific hundreds of young witches and warlocks wielding powerful magic.
Today, we have fewer than thirty students at the Icarus Academy, most of them rather weak, and barely enough faculty to run two tracks of coursework. This circumstance is entirely the reason the Dean continues to tolerate my own presence—the scandalous headmaster who fornicates with his barely legal charges.
Dutifully I straighten a toppled chair and rescue someone’s trampled spell book, left behind when the church bell sounded and my terrorized students went skulking gratefully off to the commons for lunch. In the gray light leaking through the row of arched windows, I breathe in the dusty scent of chalk and parchment and swallow a worried sigh.
I seem to do rather a lot of that these days.
Of the four warlocks in our queen’s new harem, I’m the one who worries.
