Page 110 of Brighter Than Gold

The ladies maid didn’t say another word, she simply opened the door and led me inside.

The quarters were stunning, and there was a hint of a delicate lilac smell that hung in the air. I suddenly realized how nervous I was, my hands felt like they were trembling.

“Just through there,” Briar said quietly indicating the large white doors.

“You can’t say a word, Briar.”

“You have an hour until the footman comes back.”

“There is supposed to be a guard by her door…”

“I’ll figure out something to distract him. Again.” She rolled her eyes and shooed me towards the door.

“Thank you.” I hoped she’d heard my earnestness.

She rushed back out as I held the door handle, taking a moment to still myself before I pushed it open.

The room was cool, orange embers glinted in the fireplace, and was the only colour in the starkly white room. I stepped quietly over to the bed and my heart leapt into my throat as I made out wild black curls stretched out across the pillows.

I came around the side of the bed where Reyah faced. She looked exquisite surrounded by all this white, just like she had that night in the snow. I didn’t wake her right away, instead just listening to her soft, sleeping breath, how peaceful she seemed. But I didn’t have the luxury of time, so I brushed my fingertips gently over her cheeks.

“Princess,” I whispered. “Princess, wake up.”

Reyah’s dark lashes fluttered as her eyes opened to see me.

“I’m not dreaming, right?” she whispered. “Are you really here?”

“Yes,” I smiled. “I’m really here.”

In the blink of an eye Reyah had flung herself down from the bed and into my arms. My back hit the cold marble floor, but Reyah was warm as her lips crashed into mine.

I couldn’t think straight, she kissed, and she groped, and she needed, desperate and near tears.

“I missed you so much,” she managed between breaths. It was such a welcome sensation, her heat, her weight over me.

In a single move I’d picked us up off the floor, Reyah wrapped her legs around my center as I carried her back to the bed. I lay her down carefully, and she immediately worked her nightdress up over her thighs and laced her thumbs into the edges of her undergarments and tore them off like they’d offended her.

A stronger man would have tried to wait, but Reyah moved next for my belt, and I could do nothing but help her unhook it.

“Please…please…” she kept whispering, as though I was holding something back from her. I worked myself free of the trousers as quickly as I could. I was so hard, so desperate to feel her around me. The whole bed smelled of her and I relished in it, in her cool winter scent.

“Please…” she whispered again, and the whimper made my cock surge painfully hard. I lined up with her, pressing the head slowly inside as her body parted to allow me in. Then I felt sharp nails on my ass digging in and forcing me to push into her faster.

“Gods Reyah, slow down,” I winced. But the way she looked up at me, feral and anguished, it did something to me. I gave a single sharp thrust into her, and her head tipped back as a deep moan clawed its way out of her throat with delirious pleasure.

“Please…” she whispered again.

I shoved into her again, even rougher this time, making her whole body rock beneath me. She was tight and so warm and being inside of her was like being home.

“Is this how you need me right now, Princess?” I growled into her ear, giving blow after punishing blow.

She nodded. “Please, Callan, more.” Gods, it was exactly how I needed it too, coarse and inelegant and possessive.

I pumped harder into her slick tightness, each rough thrust taking the edge off the last several painful weeks, each hard plunge reclaiming what I had lost.

Reyah bit down on her lips to keep from crying out, she raised her hands above her head, placing her palms on the headboard to steady herself and to push her body back down onto me, meeting my blows. It was such a crude and desperate joining, no words, just gasps, and skin and need.

I felt my release building in the base of my spine, curling around in my belly as every muscle seemed to tense, ready to fall from the edge of that cliff.

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