Page 26 of Blackwarden

Rosalin

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He stared with insatiable hunger, black eyes devouring me.

Every nerve in my body tingled as the muscles in his neck tightened.

There was something so primal in the way his lips parted before his hands captured me.

One wrapped firmly around my backside, jerking me hard against him, the other twined into my hair holding me in place as our lips crashed together.

Like our first kiss, this was forceful and greedy and all consuming.

The urgency ripped my breath away and left me gasping and searing with need.

Keres was of sound mind this time. There was no question he knew exactly what he was doing.

..and he knew exactly who he was doing it with.

A moan slipped from him, burning through me and sinking between my legs.

Yes, he knew exactly what he was doing. Tracing his devilish tongue along my jaw and melting me into hot wax in his arms.

My mind was numb from his touch. I could do little more than trail my fingers up his arms before sinking them into his impossibly soft hair.

I followed the angle of his pointed ears to his horns, my curiosity taking over as I traced over the satin ridges, down to the tips.

They were warmer than I expected, and I lost myself in the surprisingly soft texture.

His hands roamed over my shoulders before he traced the bare skin at the neckline of my bodice.

With deliberate slowness, he unlaced my overdress, letting it fall to my feet.

He didn’t give me time to be shy before trailing his lips to my chest, pushing my chemise further down with his chin as he kissed lower.

“This is dangerous,” he said against my skin, goosebumps blooming over my flesh from the heat of his breath.

I couldn’t speak, couldn’t think. There was only his lips, his skin against mine. Even if I was able to speak, it would only have been to beg for more.

“We shouldn’t,” he panted between kisses.

“ I ...shouldn’t,” he corrected, hands roaming further up my thighs and pulling my hips against him before continuing to my ribs, his fingers like brands.

He climbed higher beneath my chemise, brushing agonizingly soft over my breasts and sending a hot shiver through me. “I’m not permitted to—”

I didn’t let him finish what he was going to say before I pulled my chemise the rest of the way over my head, throwing it to the side.

I stood half naked in front of him, worried I’d done something very wrong when he did nothing but stare, the muscles of his jaw flexing.

Maybe I’d wrongly assumed he wanted more, when he had in fact been trying to push me away.

I began to step away when he yanked me back into his arms, trapping me beneath his mouth.

I didn’t have the ability to feel his emotions like he could mine, but if his lips were any indication, he desired this intimacy as much as I did.

“What do you want, Keres?” I asked between gasps as I struggled to restrain a moan. Words were so hard to form. I don’t know what possessed me to ask, other than the memory of him asking me the very same question in my dream .

He eased back from me, eyes scouring over my bareness with a delirious thirst. His eyebrows furrowed in pain as he met my gaze with sorrow.

“Tomorrow...” He squeezed his eyes closed and hung his head, hands going limp at his sides. “I shouldn’t...”

I was frozen and exposed standing in front of him, and yet, he was the one that seemed vulnerable.

Completely and utterly broken by this curse that imprisoned him.

I didn’t know why he hesitated, but I could see what he wanted, and I needed to remove whatever barriers I could. Damn the consequences.

“Not tomorrow, Keres. Right now.” I reached to unfasten his pants. “Fuck tomorrow, we’ll deal with it in the morning. What do you want right now ?”

He shook his head slowly, resting his hands over mine as I fumbled.

It had been entirely too long since I’d unfastened a man’s trousers.

I braced myself for rejection. Whatever locked him away, whatever held him back, was too strong.

I felt as if he was pulling away, pulling back from me, that this was his way of telling me he couldn’t go any further.

That this curse was likely keeping him from saying the words.

Self-doubt slammed into me, and I closed my eyes, waiting for the sharp sting of his refusal. Instead, he brushed my hands away, my eyes flying open as he undid his trousers himself. Then he swept me into his arms and carried me through his sitting room.

I shouldn’t have been surprised, but his bedroom was... blue . A sumptuous dark blue, the same color as his hair. I grinned as I nuzzled against his neck, relishing the warmth of his skin against mine as I traced the line of his collarbones with my fingers.

“What are you smiling about?” he asked.

“Blue instead of black? This seems a bit more cheerful than the rest of the Gatehouse.”

He set me on the edge of his bed, bracing his arms on either side of me as he smirked .

“I needed a change.” He cradled my chin in his hand and tipped my lips up to his, kissing me so gently, I thought I might be dreaming again. “Do you like it?”

“It reminds me of your hair.”

The smile fell from his face. “My hair?”

I laughed loudly, immediately covering my mouth in embarrassment as he stood up straight, eyes wide with shock.

“Is your hair not supposed to be blue?”

“It’s...that’s...” He swayed on his feet as he struggled to answer.

I reached for his hands to steady him, pulling him from whatever he’d been trying to say.

His eyes raked over my nakedness instead, bringing him back into the moment before he stepped closer.

He took my face in his hands again and bent down to kiss me more forcefully.

He pushed me back further on the bed, tucking his thumbs into the waistband of my britches.

Slowly, so slowly, he slipped them down my legs, waiting for me to stop him.

As if he needed to give me one more opportunity to say no. But I would never say no, not to him.

I lay back on the bed, arms over my head, entirely at his mercy.

I should have been embarrassed, but there was something about the way he gazed at me—as if I was the only person who could satisfy him.

His eyes traced over every line of my body, memorizing the shape of me and taking their time wandering back to my face.

Which was fine because I couldn’t rip my eyes from him.

The dream hadn’t been accurate enough. He was all tight toned muscles flexing beneath unblemished skin.

The way his open trousers hung dangerously low, teasing me with the lines of his hips was maddening.

I wanted to trace those lines with my tongue.

With every breath the muscles of his abdomen flexed, drawing my gaze down the length of his body. He was a study in perfection.

How was he possible? How did he exist? And how was I going to satisfy the hunger in his eyes?

“I think you can answer me, Keres. What do you want? ”

He grabbed my legs at the knees and pulled me toward the edge of the bed, one side of his lips turning up in a fiendish grin.

“What if I’m not interested in what I want?”

My breath hitched as he kneeled, running those delicate fingers of his along my inner thighs.

He gently nudged my legs further apart as his lips traced the same route.

I was unable to look away from his piercing eyes, as he kissed a path between my legs.

Every inch of my body was paralyzed as his kisses turned into something deeper.

Held in place by my own selfish need, I gasped when he swirled his tongue over the sensitive nerves of my entrance.

My head fell back as the tension in my body pulled tighter with every stroke of his wicked tongue.

He stopped long enough to ask me a single question.

“What do you want , my Rosalin?”

Before I could form the words, he continued his delicious assault, fingers dancing over the tender skin of my thighs.

I’d been rendered speechless yet again as he coaxed two of his slender fingers deep, sending tiny explosions of pleasure through me.

His fingers, as I’d suspected, felt so fucking perfect.

“You.” I managed to say between gasps. “I want you.” I reached for his hair, letting it tangle between my fingers before I frantically grasped one of his horns and pulled. “All of you, please!”

He didn’t stop, instead he moaned, the decadent sound vibrating through my core and sending me tumbling over the edge.

“Please.” I clutched the bedcovers with my free hand as I cried out. My back arched in an attempt to escape his fiendish tongue as my climax rolled through me, crashing against the shores of my existence in waves.

“Please, Keres,” I panted. “I want all of you. Please. Please .”

Finally, with a satisfied smirk, he climbed onto the bed letting his pants slip off before fitting himself between my legs.

He bent low and kissed my navel before slowly creeping upward, trailing his lips along my ribs.

I was frozen in place, breaths little more than broken gasps, the heat of his body steeling my words .

“To answer your question, Rosalin,” he said between kisses.

“I want this ,” His lips grazed my nipple, and I shivered.

The waiting grew torturous. “And this .” His mouth moved to my other nipple with slow intention before he gazed up at me from between my breasts, his expression far more serious than he had any right to be. “I want you .”

He hovered above me, the muscles of his shoulders flexing beneath his skin as his eyes made the arduous journey over my body to my eyes. “Just you.”