Page 51 of Damned and Broken Gods (Labyrinth of Gods #2)

Her breath hitches, her eyes welling, and although her mouth parts, she doesn’t speak. She blinks back the moisture and opens to me, her eyes shining with an answering longing, reverence, and so much fucking love that it leaves me breathless.

The coiled heat inside me expands as I carefully brush her hair back.

“Can I have you, Leela?” My voice cracks with emotions that threaten to undo me. “Can I have you this night? This once? Will you let me nestle deep in you, as one? Flame to flame?”

Tears spill down the side of her cheek. She nods and whispers, “Yes…”

That one word, her consent, breaks the last of my control.

LEELA

My yes broke him, softened him, and he fell onto me, into me, his body a delicious pressure that mine had been aching for. I accepted it with open arms, lips, and hands. Exploring his silken skin beneath my fingertips, taut and shifting as the muscles beneath contracted and pulsed.

He undressed me, his breath shivering across my skin, his battle-scarred palms branding me with a promise of heat.

He bared me, his hot gaze lingering on every part of me as he pulled away, reaching up to peel off his tunic, his gaze leaving me only for as long as it needed to.

His skin gleamed in the moonlight, familiar to my eyes but not to my hands, and oh gods, did my hands want to explore him.

I reached for him, trailing my fingers across the hard expanse of his pectorals, then down his cobbled abdomen. His muscles jumped beneath my touch, and he sucked in a sharp breath. My core contracted in response, a deep clenching blooming lower down in a resonant ache to hold him.

I went lower, to the waistband of his pants, my pulse thrumming in my throat at my boldness, and he watched me, his chest rising and falling in anticipation as I lowered the material, my knuckles grazing his heat and then…Oh…Oh gods.

The corner of his mouth lifted in that cocky smile that I didn’t see often enough, but damn did I love it.

I arched a brow, and he arched one back, as if to say, What now, Leela ?

I licked my lips, and he tracked the movement, his eyes darkening. But when I lifted my head, intent on claiming that part of him that made me ache to hold it, he gently gripped my throat and held me back.

“Not like that. Not this night.”

I wanted to ask, Then when? But he covered me with his body, his lips coasting over mine, his breath a promise, and when the kiss landed, it was a homecoming that scattered my thoughts and melted all resolve.

He pinned me like a butterfly, one hand on my throat, the other at my hip, moving low, sliding between, finding my center. And…oh gods.

My soft cry was swallowed, claimed, my gasps worshipped.

I moved against his hand, my hips no longer in my control but in his—the puppet master of my desire. But I didn’t want to shatter like this. I needed him inside me. With me.

I tore my mouth free of his. “Araz…Please…”

He claimed my mouth again. Bruising. Demanding. Then dropped his lips to my throat, to my chest, to my aching breasts.

I arched as he branded me there, drawing a line of flame between my core and my nipples until I was squirming and writhing, moving toward release only for him to pull me back.

I hated him.

I loved him.

I fucking needed him now.

“Araz, fucking hell.”

He brought his lips to my ear. “Tell me how much you want me.”

A sob of frustration tangled in my throat. “I want you. I want you so bad that I’ll die if you don’t fuck me right now.”

“Say it again,” he growled. “Say fuck .”

“Fuck, fuck…Oh…”

The head of his cock pressed to my entrance, and fresh heat bloomed. He stilled, his body rippling with tension, then lifted his head to lock gazes with me.

“I love you, Leela.”

Everything inside me stilled, like the eye of the storm, like the pause of a great revelation, because although I’d felt his love and seen it in his eyes, this was the first time he’d said it out loud, and it was as if he’d put a key in a lock and twisted.

A low sob broke from my throat as a balloon of joy bloomed in my chest, one that even the shadows of what’s to come couldn’t pierce.

He cupped my jaw. Gentle. Firm. “Look at me when we join. Don’t close your eyes. I want to see myself in you when we become one.”

He entered me slowly, inch by inch, stretching me until I was gasping and clutching at his shoulder because he was too much.

Too fucking much. And yet my body adjusted, as if he belonged.

As if it knew how to claim him. My hips wanted to move, but he held me firm, his mouth parted above mine, our breath mingling as we acclimatized.

A low whimper fell from my lips, and he met it with a groan, and when he was finally seated, he relaxed his grip on me, permission for me to move. For us to join fully, thrust for thrust, him meeting every rise with a snap of his hips that tore guttural cries from my throat.

He held me as I unraveled. As I bloomed, hot and slick, just for him.

My eyelids fluttered, the sensation too much, and he squeezed, a warning to stay.

To be present. And I obeyed. I looked into his eyes.

Into the flames as he unmade me and reforged me.

Until the flame inside me roared. Consuming, cleansing, and changing me forever.

Our cries united, and our mouths met, hot and fevered, our bodies still moving through the climax. Into it. Past it. Into something sacred that I didn’t understand but needed. Vital. Essential.

Over and over again.

We slept in a tangle of limbs, breath in sync, but I woke alone, tucked beneath the covers, with two inquiring beady eyes looking right at me.

“Blue…” I made to sit up, remembered I was naked, and quickly pulled the sheets up to cover me.

“If I had eyebrows, they’d be in the fecking air right now,” Blue said. “You finally did it. The deed. The horizontal tango. The bug on its back, desperate to be flipped. Ya fecking did it. Good on ya, chickadee.”

But I didn’t feel good. I mean, I felt great physically. Energized in a way that I’d never felt before. But emotionally? Tears filled my eyes, and Blue scampered across my pillow to press his cheek to mine.

“Oh, Leela, chick, don’t cry…” He drew back, his expression fierce. “Did that fecker hurt you?” His eyes widened. “His dong…It was his huge dong, weren’t it?”

I snort-laughed through my tears. “Fucking hell, Blue.”

He reached out and caught a tear, holding it up to his face. “These are much too precious to waste.”

I wiped at my face. “I’m fine, and…he didn’t hurt me. It was…It was beautiful, but now…Now he’s gone. And he’s going to pretend it didn’t happen and?—”

The door opened, and Araz entered, carrying a tray laden with breakfast foods. He frowned when he caught sight of my tearstained face.

“You left and made her cry, you muscle-bound oaf!” Blue shook his fist at Araz, and then he noticed the breakfast tray. He lowered his fist and turned to me to whisper, “I fink ee left ta fetch breakfast. We might ’ave jumped the gun a little.”

Araz set the tray on the floor by the bed, then sat by my hip. “Blue,” he said, never taking his eyes off me. “Go be somewhere else for a little while. Please.”

Blue looked to me, and I nodded.

“Fine, but I’m tekin a slice of this fried bread with me.” He leapt off the bed, grabbed a slice, and scampered off.

Araz hooked a finger under my chin and nudged me to look at him. “You honored me last night. What we shared was sacred. The way I feel for you is flame eternal. I do not take it lightly. I will not turn from it and pretend that it did not happen, but…It cannot happen again.”

My throat pinched, fresh tears welling, but I blinked them back and nodded. “I know.”

A slight furrow formed between his eyebrows. “Do you wish we hadn’t taken this step?”

“No!” I clutched his wrist. “Never. I…I got to be with you. To love you in the most intimate way. To know what it feels like to be one, and I…I’ll carry that with me forever.”

He pressed his free palm to my cheek, and I leaned into his touch, my eyes closing. “Does there have to be war? Araz…can’t we…just be?”

“Maybe. Maybe you’ll succeed,” he said. “If anyone can bring a god to heel, it’s you. And if that moment comes, if you convince the Asura to stand down and let my people go, then I will lay down my arms willingly.”

My gaze flew wide. “You will? You’ll give me time?”

“Yes. I’ll give you a year. And if you fail, then I will come, and I will take what is mine.” His hand slipped to my nape and up into my hair, fisting possessively. “ Everything that is mine.” His hot gaze fell to my lips, his nostrils flaring. “I pray you don’t fight me then.”

There was a hardness in his eyes, one that told me that if that moment came there would be no compromise. A cold spot formed in the pit of my belly.

“If it comes to that…If we were on opposite sides of a war, standing face-to-face on a battlefield…would you…would you kill me?”

His eyes flared, and his expression twisted. “I will do whatever it takes to free my people and everyone who the Asura have enslaved. And Leela, if you stand with the Asura…If you stand against me, then I will do what needs to be done.”

He’d kill me? And how could I blame him?

He wanted to save his people. To free the souls that were being forced to work for the Asura and fight for them under conscription.

There was honor in that. But there was no honor in war.

Not in my book. I would try it my way. With love and understanding.

I’d make changes from within to slacken the shackles until they slipped off completely.

But if I failed…If the Asura refused to bend, to change, then what?

Could I stand beside Araz and wage war? Could I kill my people—the Asura and demigods?

And all the beings still forced to fight with us, because that would be the price.

My pulse pounded hard in my throat.

“Leela…” Araz stroked my cheek. “Let’s not squander our last days together.” He picked up the tray and placed it on the bed between us.

I held the sheets with one hand, sitting up fully.

“Let me get you a shirt.” He crossed to the dresser, and as I watched him rummage, a thought rose in my mind, vivid and sharp.

I could make him stay.

I could break my vow to free him.

It was the solution to it all. I could keep him here for as long as I needed to fix things. But if I did that…then I’d be no different from the Asura who ruled right now.

Nausea rolled in my belly as my system revolted at the idea.

I couldn’t do that to him. To myself. To us.

Change would begin with Araz’s freedom, and whatever came next…we’d have to deal with.