Page 72 of Golden Queen (Idrigard #1)

"Sera, I can't," he said again. The words sounded like they were wrenched from deep inside him. The flames in his eyes flared brighter, stoking the fires still burning in me back to life.

"You can, Io," I said. My shoulders rose and fell with the force of my labored breathing. I felt like something had broken in me, and I might actually die if he didn't touch me. "Please," I begged in a near-whisper.

And then he did. He crossed the space in two long strides. I reached out for him, feeling something inside me seem to cave-in as he slid one hand around the back of my neck, fisting it in my hair.

The other hand went to my thigh, pulling my leg up as he pressed his hips into me. Even through the material of his pants, I could feel him, hard and hot against my flesh.

"I can't," he growled again, even as he covered my mouth with his, thrusting his tongue inside. He tasted sweet and familiar. I drank in the feel of him, strong and warm against me. I felt like I had been dying of thirst, and he was my salvation.

He pulled my hair roughly, tipping my head back and baring my throat so that he could run his teeth and tongue down my neck.

I grasped his tunic, reaching up for the buckles that held it at the shoulder. He released me long enough to undo the straps, but he never took his lips from me until he lifted the leather over his head.

I tore at the buttons of his shirt, not caring if they broke. I just needed his skin under my palms. I needed to feel him pressed against my body.

The need left me shaking and trembling—my knees weak, my breathing ragged.

When the buttons of his shirt were loose, I pulled the material over his shoulders and down his long arms.

When the shirt slid over his hands, I jumped as the material caught fire. He threw it into the bathwater, where the flames hissed and went out.

When he was in front of me in only his breeches, I reached down to the buttons. He stopped me, grasping my backside and lifting me against him.

He turned, and in two strides, I was on the bed beneath him. His teeth were on my skin again. The sharp bite as he took my flesh between them only made me ache more.

Dark, heavy magic crackled in the air, shadows dancing at the corners of my vision, unfurling around us. The room pulsed with energy in time with the beating of my frantic heart.

He pressed me down into the mattress as his hands and mouth roamed over me. There was nothing gentle about his touch as he made his way down my body. Each nip, each dig of his big fingers into my flesh sent wild heat coursing through me.

Some primal urge for him to claim me took control. I spurred him on, moaning his name in response to his rough touch and his sharp teeth. When he bit my nipple hard, I cried out in a strangled groan, so deep I didn't recognize my own voice.

He slid his big hand up my body, wrapping his fingers around my throat lightly. He looked down at me with eyes gone darker somehow.

Any words I might have said died on my lips as his fingers pressed into my throat. And then his mouth was on mine again as he shifted his hand to angle my face to him—to claim my mouth by force.

"Is this what you needed so badly, Sera?" he asked, mockingly. The words were laced with malice and an edge of that anger he'd shown me.

"Yes," I said defiantly, holding his gaze.

He held my throat as his lips claimed mine again. Each kiss, each bite, was like a brand, angrily searing me.

All I knew was the scent of him and the feeling of his skin on mine. His fingers at my throat, the pressure of them against the pulse in my neck. And the ache—deep and unquenchable, to somehow be consumed by him.

His mouth trailed down my body, and then he knelt between my legs and bit me there, making me writhe and reach for him.

He laughed cruelly and ran his hands down my backside, along the cleft and over my asshole, lingering there in a way that made me both fear and desperately want him to slide that finger in. The thought shamed me—I couldn't believe I could want something like that.

I would have taken anything from him though—given him anything in that moment as long as it meant he would stay with me and quench the hunger running rampant through my body.

He slid his long finger back around and centered it, beginning a slow slide into me.

Fear seized me. "Wait," I said.

He stilled, raising his eyes to mine. The mercilessness I saw sent a jolt of unease through me.

When he spoke, his voice was cold, unfamiliar. "What? Are you now going to decide to have some fucking honor, Sera? To not be a heartless, faithless bitch?" he asked, cruelly. "Because it's a little late for that."

"No," I spat, my own anger flaring to life in response to his words. "I just...I need to explain something."

"What?" he said harshly, doubt coloring the word.

"I..."

"What, Sera?" he said, impatiently. His tone almost softened—almost. The anger, and those wicked, wild flames were still in his eyes.

"When they...took me," I said, pulling my eyes away and looking up at the ceiling, "they did something to...make me into a maiden again...so that I would not be ruined for...for...him."

He flinched as though I’d burned him, and I felt his hands leave me.

"What do you mean?"

"I mean...they used magic to make me...intact again."

The air that whispered across my skin was like a knife to my chest as he backed up, looking at me horrified.

I was wrong. I was so fucking wrong. He was disgusted with me. I could see it on his face.

I turned over and reached for the blankets, trying to cover myself as shame washed over me.

I got the quilt over me and dared to look at him. His expression had not changed. He was standing there, wide-eyed, horrified. His chest rose and fell in great bursts of air.

A sob tried to escape, but I refused to let it, shoving my hand over my mouth and biting down hard. I heard a whimper from my throat, one I knew would turn into a scream if I didn't do something to stop it.

I turned my face into the pillow, curling myself into a ball, wishing I was anywhere, anywhere in the world. Being in the bed of the fucking Prince of Penjan would have been better than being the cause of that look on his face.

"I'm sorry," I whispered raggedly. The words were weak and pathetic to my own ears. All the reasons why I had wanted to be with him sounded inane and utterly selfish in my own head.

"Why didn't you tell me?"

His tone surprised me. I had expected derision and scorn, disgust, and maybe even pity. All I heard was sorrow.

"I just...I thought they had shattered the part of me that...felt this way. And when I realized they hadn’t...I just needed you." It was all the explanation there was. It was all the excuse I had. "I'm truly sorry, Io—for everything."

"No," he said, slightly incredulous. “Gods no, Sera. I’m sorry.”

I stared across at the wall, unable to look at him. I felt so empty and hollow all of a sudden that even the tears had gone.

I felt the bed shift with his weight as he moved behind me, laying his body next to mine. "I didn’t know, Sera...I’m sorry…fuck," he exclaimed in a voice gone harsh with emotion. "I'm sorry for the way I was so rough with you."

I felt a tentative hand at my side as though he was unsure whether he should touch me.

"I was angry,” he admitted. “Angry at you and angry at myself for wanting you—for needing you.

Fuck, Sera. You say you need me, but I feel like I'm being burned alive every moment by how badly I need you.

" His hand slid around me, pressing against my stomach through the blanket as he leaned his head against mine, breathing out a long, ragged breath.

The sound of his voice, nearly broken with emotion, almost destroyed me. "I'm sorry, Sera."

"You did nothing I did not want you to do, Io," I said, swallowing the painful knot in my throat. "I should have told you..before, so that it wasn't so...jarring to find out that I’m vitiated," I finished.

"Vitiated?" he said, puzzled.

"It means..."

"I know what it means, Sera. I'm just confused why you would call yourself vitiated."

"I don't know. It feels like I'm corrupted inside, broken. Truly ruined as they claimed I was…by all the things they did to me. Not just what they did between my legs, but all of it. I was so helpless, so weak, and I never thought that about myself before. It made me...less than I was somehow. Like it took away what little strength I had. And...I saw the disgust on your face. It’s not something you can—"

He cut me off. "Fuck, Sera! How can you even think that?

I was not disgusted with you. I was disgusted with myself for the way I treated you—the things I said.

I was...I wanted to hurt you," He admitted.

When I glanced over my shoulder, he was massaging his temples with his thumb and middle finger as though the memory pained him.

He dropped his hand from his head and laid it against my cheek. "You are in no way less. You're the strongest person I know. I'm the one who's weak. I'm the one who's been silently praying that you'd give me even the slightest excuse to touch you. And when you did, I punished you for it."

I turned and raised myself up so that I was beside him, sitting back on my bent legs, still holding the blanket around myself. "You didn't hurt me, Io. I told you, you didn't do anything I didn't want you to do."

"Just fucking stop it, Sera," he said, surprising me by reacting with anger to words that were meant to assuage his guilt.

"Stop what?" I asked, unsure what I’d done wrong.

"Stop trying to make me feel better. I hurt you, and your response is to reassure me—to make me feel better. I don't deserve it, Sera. I have never deserved that kind of—"

"Love?" I supplied.

His eyes were like bottomless pits of misery.

I leaned up and laid my hand on his cheek. "I do love you, Io. I could no more deny that than I can stop breathing. Both would kill me just the same."