Page 37 of Brimstone

I whimpered a little as I arched and my nipples grazed his tattooed chest.I’m so tired of being careful, I said into his mind. And then I drank. I laced my fingers with his, digging my fingernails into the backs of his hands, and I ground against him, angling my hips, fucking him as I swallowed him down.

It had been bewildering, tasting him up there on the dais at my coronation. I hadn’t been ready for it. Fisher’s blood was an eternal song. It cleaved my soul from my body. The taste of him was more exquisite than fresh, clean water. His blood was holy, and I drank like I needed to be saved.

His hands closed tight around mine. The veins in his arms stood proud, his muscles tensed. This was killing him, not being able to touch me properly. But the fact that he was allowing this was monumental.

There was something very empowering about a male like Kingfisher relinquishing control and offering free rein over his body. It was an act of trust. Submission, even. And a lethal creature baring his neck to you was a heady thing indeed.

I could feel the effect my venom was having on him, floating from his mind to mine. Strange. I could tell that this was his high now, but it still made me feel as though I were being buoyed upon a cloud into the ether. No words or direct thoughts passed between us for a while. I felt the deep well of love between us, though. The sensation was so immense that I thought I might die from the sheer magnitude of it. Was it my love for him? His love for me? The lines were so blurred I couldn’t tell where his feelings ended and mine started. It didn’t really matter in the end.

I stopped drinking, my body alive with foreign, unusual energy that didn’t belong to me. Fisher’s cock strained as he thrust up into me, and the walls of his bedroom began to sway.

Gods, he was so deep. So fucking perfect. I couldn’t stop staring at him as I sank down on his cock again, again, again . . .

“Look at you,” Fisher rumbled. “Fucking magnificent, aren’t you.”

I released his hands, leaning back to give him a better view. I was hardly shy in bed as a rule. But with Fisher, my confidence felt electric. How could I not feel that way, when I could still feel his emotions in his blood. He meant what he said. Hedidthink that I was magnificent.

“I’m done holding you back,” I said. “You can use your ha—” I didn’t even get to finish the sentence.

“Thank the fucking gods,” he snarled. Sitting upright, his hands went to my hips. I braced for the shift in gravity, to be thrown onto my back, but Fisher just held me there, fingers gouging into my ass cheeks and my thighs, and he slammed himself up inside me.

“My turn,” he rumbled. I didn’t even react when I felt the sharp sting of pain this time. I knew what was coming the second his canines sank into the swell of my breast, and I braced myself for that instead. He was more cautious this time. He didn’t dose me anywhere near as hard. A spike of dizzying pleasure crashed down on top of me, but I didn’t come, and I didn’t pass out. His hands slid up my back, hooking over my shoulders, pulling medown onto him, and the delicious friction between our sweat-slicked bodies began to push me closer toward an inevitable cliff.

“You feel so fucking good,” I moaned. “I want—I want to feel how hard you get. I want to feel you inside me when you come.”

Hell’s fucking teeth, he growled inside my head.I’ll give you what you want, Little Osha, don’t you worry.

I rocked against him harder, threading my fingers through his hair, pulling him down onto my breast. He drank deeper, following my cue, and the feeling of him growing hard as tempered steel inside me stole my godscursed breath.

Yes. Good. Come for me. Come.His encouragement was all I needed. I came apart with his arms wrapped around me and his tongue working over my nipple.

His bedroom went black as midnight, my vision failing. But . . . it hadn’t failed. Fisher’s shadows exploded out of him as he reached his climax, too. They fanned around him, broad and wide, forming the shape of gossamer wings, and then they swallowed me whole.

His magic cocooned us, cradling our bodies as we shook and trembled. There was no need to speak. We clung to each other for a long while, blood-high and love-drunk.

Eventually, our growling stomachs made us move, though; it turned out that sharing blood and spending an extended amount of time in a Fae warrior’s bed meant that you’d be ravenous after a while.

Fisher watched me get dressed, a small smile playing over the corners of his mouth.

I threw one of his socks at him, pulling a face. “Why do you look so pleased with yourself?” I teased.

And Kingfisher laughed. “Because Iampleased with myself. Because I’m the luckiest bastard alive. And becauseyoulook like you’ve just been thoroughly fucked.”

8

MAKE YOUR PEACE

KINGFISHER

ANOTHER DRESS LAYover the back of the chair, untouched. I’d chosen it yesterday, pulling it from the garment bags safely tucked away at the back of my mother’s dressing chamber. They hadn’t belonged to my mother; I found the dresses there shortly after bringing Saeris to Cahlish for the first time. They weren’t my mother’s style or her colors at all. She had simply foreseen a day when Saeris would come and had left an entire wardrobe for her—a gift for the beloved female that she would never call daughter.

Ivory white, the rich satin dress flashed like lucent faerie wings. The skirts were simple. Understated. No tulle or frills. There were no over-the-top adornments to it at all, really. The subtle pink-blue undertone that shone through when the fabric caught the light was enough.

Saeris’s scent hung thick in the air around the chair. She had stood there and studied the dress, I fancied. Run her hand over the corset. Once again, she’d chosen to pull on her fighting leathers and her boots before disappearing to take on the day.

I grinned, shaking my head as I turned and took in the dented pillow next to me.

She was already gone.