Page 64 of The Huntsman's Heart
“No.”
She laughs. “You are jealous!”
Heat flares in my neck and ears. “I know where I stand with you. Only a fool would be jealous of what he could never—”
She cuts me off by jumping into my arms, wrapping herself around me, demanding access to my mouth. I catch her up, not willing to question if she wants to give this moment to me. If she wants to use and tease me and leave me aching while she takes her pleasure from me, then so be it.
That is the only gift I have to give her. Submission. Obedience. Freely given instead of taken. Given to a queen who deserves it.
I stumble back against the mattress and we fall onto the bed with her on top of me. Her hungry, demanding kisses seek entry to my lips while she grinds against my cock. Her ribbon is still tied around me, and soon it’s straining as I thicken to my full size.
As if reading my mind, she reaches behind her to slip her hand into my trousers and smiles against my lips as she touches it. “Good boy.”
I don’t know if I love or hate the way she phrases that as if I am her dog. After all, do I not sniff at her heels and beg for her attention?
I groan as she squeezes me, thrusting my hips uselessly into her hand.
She laughs. The sound is as light as the sunshine streaming through the stained glass. My chest has never felt more empty.
Then she pulls at her clothing, at the perfect white nightgown the gargoyles must have dressed her in while she slept. She strips until she is naked on top of me and I stop thinking for a moment. I stare at her. The perfect curve of her waist and flare of her wide hips. The swell of small pert breasts and the dark tips of her peaked nipples.
The ugly scar that runs between her breasts makes a jagged stab through the warmth of the moment. Hesitantly, I lift my hand to trace the tough raised line.
She looks down, watching.
“Do you hate me?” I know the answer. Some awful instinct drives me to seek it out from her lips.
“I did.”
A phantom pulse skates around my body, a remnant remembered from when I was alive. She did? “And now?”
She grimaces. “I cannot hate you. I wanted to, but I cannot.”
“You are too generous.”
“Are you telling me how I should feel?”
I let out an exasperated huff of air. “You know I am not.”
She doesn’t argue. We don’t talk for a while. She traces her fingertips over my skin as if memorizing the lines of my chest, my neck, my face.
“I should not have killed you,” I say eventually.
She freezes, her fingers pressed to my lips. “I thought you had to.”
“She ordered me to make certain you did not return. Not to kill you. I realized too late that I could escape the deed but then…”
Her eyes widen. “Then I did it for you. I was the one who pushed myself onto your sword.”
I nod.
“She never ordered you to ruin me.”
I look away. “I do not know what came over me. I knew at the time that it was wrong. I could not seem to stop myself until your words stopped me.”
Placing her hands on either side of my face, she tilts my chin up so I must look at her again. “Is that you admitting you were wrong again? Twice in one day!”
“It is. I should never—” I can’t bring myself to say the words.
