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Just tell me…

‘You,’ I breathed. ‘I’m thinking of you.’

He slipped his fingers beneath my underwear in response.

Warm, firm flesh met mine, tracing the slick lines of my body with cruel gentleness. My hips bucked, trying to get him closer,deeper… and he laughed again, retreating.

‘No.’ It burst from my lungs by reflex. ‘No, please—’

‘I’m going to need a few more words,’ he muttered, his hand sliding between our bodies pressed together. The rustle of skin on fabric, the release of a button coming loose; a sob of relief almost escaped me. ‘What part of my ravishing person are you contemplating, exactly? I would hate to bore you with the bits you don’t care about, pretty as they may be.’

‘All of it,’ I moaned. ‘All of you.’

He flicked his finger over the vulnerable flesh between my thighs just once, then began bunching up my dress and coat with maddeningly patient movements – exposing me to the starry sky, messy and defiled, sprawled out over the old marble like a sacrificial offering. ‘Did I ever let you get away so easily, cactus?’

A whimper escaped me. The cold autumn breeze nipped my bare skin, the frigid marble was turning the front half of my body to ice … and yet it was the anticipation that had me shivering above all else, glorious and torturous at once. ‘Please.’

‘You stubborn little thing,’ he softly said, shifting his body over me, and it was not amusement lending that touch of emotion to his voice. Instead … fondness?Admiration? ‘Stop fighting, Em. Start wanting. You’ve earned everything and more.’

Everything.

His love. His pleasure. All of this court and this night and this madness, all of the future, all of the peace – and I gave in, finally, as his fingers gently scooted my underwear aside and the straining head of his erection settled against my entrance, thick and smooth and incomprehensibly hard.

‘That,’ I gasped. ‘Thatis what I’m thinking about.’

He pressed the tip into me, not even half an inch. A warning. A promise. Around him, my body stretched and strained, clenching as if to draw him deeper inside me – failing to get him even a fraction closer to where I so desperately needed him.

‘What is?’ His own breath was strained now. His hand around my wrists finally let go, settling on the marble floor instead. ‘Words, Em.’

‘Your cock, damn you!’ My voiced lashed into the quiet night like a whip – like breaking chains, and gods, it felt so, so good to lose. ‘I need your cock inside me like I need air, and please,please—’

He slammed into me.

One ruthless stroke, and I evaporated around him, reduced to nothing but need and desire as his hot, hard length filled me to the brim and then some. A scream ripped from my throat. My nails dug into the marble so hard it hurt. Too much sensation, too muchfullness, and yet he gave me no time to recover as he pulled back and drove himself deep again, claiming me like a victory. I gasped his name. He slipped his hand between my stomach and the floor in response, fingers finding the little bundle of nerves between my slick lips.

Colours exploded across my vision as he plunged into me at the same moment, too much of that gorgeous friction for my body to contain.

‘Is this what you want?’ His voice was a rough growl against my ear, each word punctuated by another savage thrust. ‘Is this what you need?’

I could no longer talk.

Animal sounds fell from my lips at every stroke into my body. There was no pain. Just that perfect completeness, obliterating any semblance of reason or restraint; his cock and fingers moved in perfect unison, a primal rhythm that sent a storm of devastating sensation roaring through my veins. I lifted my head off the marble, struggling to speak, and his teeth grazed my shoulder, addingmore.

‘Don’t hold back,’ he snarled, his voice scraping down my nape. ‘Don’t you dare hold back for me, Em.’

It turned out my body had yet more to give.

I melted like wax around him. Yielded to his relentless desire, tomyrelentless desire, the hunger and the triumph clawing through me and shattering all doubt and resistance in their wake …

The world faded.

The stars above me seemed to blur and burst. The darkness, the ruins, even the cold marble beneath me … they ceased to exist for a single blissful moment as I hung suspended in the void, nothing but my unravelling body and his conquering cock inside me.

Then I went over the edge.

Perhaps I screamed. Perhaps I cried. Perhaps I cursed the gods and every living thing in existence. But I’d won, I’d won, I’dwon, and Iknewit then – as pleasure rippled through me and every last drop of strength was obliterated from my body – thatI was safe. That I was home. That I would never,everbe small again.

Not for anything.