Page 18 of His Dark Delights

Lilly

The shadows in the room lengthened and stretched, converging on me as Soren stole another step forward. With one impudent shout, I’d snuffed out the sparkle in the king’s eye. Something dark and borderline cruel replaced it, making him almost unrecognizable.

“You will not deny me, Lilliana. No one can refuse the king,” he vented in a low snarl. That wasn’t the Ren I’d fallen in love with any longer. Maybe he’d never really been that man at all.

“A king? All I see before me is a butcher!”

Soren halted, a frozen wall of man and muscle towering over me. He waited, carefully reading my expression while absorbing the vitriol in my words. Slowly, something in that hardened gaze lightened a fraction.

“You know there are women in this city who would kill to be where you’re standing.”

“And I’m sure I’d be the first casualty.” As I’d be another fatality in the war if my heritage came to light.

The king huffed, shoving a hand through his hair and messing it up. The curls I’d enjoyed running my hands through weeks ago now fell over his temples. I’d be lying if I didn’t admit the fluffy dark hair wasn’t enticing me to reach forward now.

His Majesty bowed over the desk, slamming his fists into the sturdy wood.

My heart longed to reach for him when he hung his head, and his shoulders sagged.

Then he turned his face up to me. “I’ve thought of nothing else but you for the last two weeks, Lilly.

I thought, perhaps hoped, that you suffered this longing the same as me. ”

I curled my arms around my shoulders, holding myself together as his words threatened to tear me apart. “I don’t,” I replied.

“Your reaction on the farm. I thought I understood it. Now it seems I’ve misjudged you and your feelings.” He straightened up, smoothing a hand over the front of his fine clothing. The action meant to distract me from the war over his expression and the mask he failed to procure.

“So, what? You thought I’d had time to come to terms with your lies and deception? That you could summon me to your palace and the grandeur would lull me into a sense of comfort? Maybe that I’d be impressed and overcome with my desire for you, then I’d throw myself into bed with you again?”

His hand rose, and a groan scraped through his throat.

He curled a fist and twisted it, lips twitching with all the things he wanted to say.

“Yes, I know I lied,” he blurted. “Of course, I would lie about my identity at that moment, Lilly. It’d be unsafe otherwise.

Do you know how many of my subjects would have taken advantage of me at that moment?

Someone finds their king wounded in the woods and suddenly a new world of opportunity opens for them. ”

“I wouldn’t have done that!” I gasped. A small, wicked voice in my head whispered if I would have killed the Fairy Butcher. My heart knew the truth—that I couldn’t even if I had the chance.

Agony twisted his face. “Would I have known that in the beginning? No. I do now, and I—I was going to tell you the truth before we were interrupted.”

“What did you expect would happen if you’d had that chance, Your Majesty?

That I’d agree to come back to the palace and be your mistress when you weren’t off murdering the fae?

” A pricking sensation built behind my eyes, threatening to spill over.

I shoved down a sob before admitting, “No. No, I hated you the moment I realized who you really were.”

“No, I… Why—why do you despise me?”

My words were brittle. “Is your name not Butcher? How can I love a man with such a title?”

Voice thin and wrought with desperation, like he’d die without an answer, he said, “Could you ever love me?”

A heaving wave of emotions crashed into my heart. Weak to this man, I lost the battle against the admission, clawing its way up the back of my throat.

“But I did! I did love you. I loved you in a field of wildflowers when you were someone else.” My tears breached the surface, cresting over the edge and searing hot streams into my cheeks. “And I suffer for the space you’ve taken up in my heart. Oh, how I’ve suffered for it.”

Soren’s alluring eyes welled up with unspoken emotions upon hearing my wailed admission. A pulse kicked up at his temple, and his throat bobbed with his unsteady swallow. His body shuddered, and despite the frown on his lips, he crossed the distance.

The warmth of him swayed me. I rocked forward, unable to help myself. He pulled me nearer as if we were magnets and no force in the world could keep us apart. I internally raged against that fact, but complied with my dreadful need all the same.

“But I am still in there, aren’t I?” Soren placed his hand feather light over my heart.

The warmth of his palm sucked a shaky breath from my lungs.

He grabbed my hand and placed it on his chest, forcing me to feel the erratic pounding within.

“I am still that man, Lilly. You could love me again, you know? I want you to love me more than I need the sun.”

“But you will never love me enough to end your war, Butcher .” I spat the nickname, and he visibly cringed. “You will kill innocents, and you will kill fae while expecting to come to my bed at night, touching me with your bloodstained hands. The thought alone is enough to make me sick.”

His hands shot to my shoulders, curling his fingers around me and digging them into my flesh as if to shake me. “I said before that you wouldn’t understand the reasons for this war, and that remains true. How could you understand?”

I bit back a yelp as his grip tightened further. “Right. How could a stupid farm girl understand a king’s reason for war? I will never be yours and you will never have my heart as long as you crave bloodshed more than my happiness.”

Soren shook me then, not enough to hurt, but enough to frighten me. He growled. “I do love you, Lilly, but I cannot give up my purpose. What else can I do? What else will make you happy?”

I found clarity through my tears. The sobbing ache in my throat eased, and a blanket of chilling serenity flowed through me. I met his gaze, eyes full of cold, hard ice. “I could be happy again if I loved you less. Better yet, not at all. Then—then I might be happy again.”

“But you do still love me, and while you do, I still have a chance,” he claimed. His hands smoothed down my arms to my elbows.

“Chance of what?” My heart skipped a beat at the familiar intimacy of his touch.

It was deranged, but I longed to feel his kisses on my neck, his fingers on my bare shoulders, his teeth biting my thighs.

But mostly I ached for his weight on top of my body again, crushing me, controlling me, and focusing my mind as he entered me.

I wanted to bury my face in his neck, inhale his scent, and twist my fingers in his shirt, never to let him go.

I hated myself for that desire and the dampness growing between my thighs.

“A chance to keep you, to make you mine, and to make you happy.” The king’s grip was firm, not rough, but not gentle, either. I felt the inherent strength of his fingers, used to wielding a sword and winning victories.

I was nothing more than another fight to win. He’d said so himself once before. We were waging war—the battle for my heart. If Soren Carnifex won, my life would be forfeit.

“You most certainly have no chance of that. I’ve already told you I’ll never be yours as long as you are at war, and I see that’ll never end.”

“You will be mine.” His eyes darkened, and his tone dropped, becoming husky as he amended, “You are mine.”

My betraying heart skipped a beat.

“No!” I yanked myself from his grasp, bumping into the desk again. “From this moment on, I feel nothing for you, and I never will again!” My fingers brushed along something solid.

Soren lunged, grabbing me and pulling my face to his chest. His frantic heartbeat thumped against my cheek. The cage of his arms, the confinement, it was stifling. He was too warm, his scent too intoxicating. I couldn’t inhale… I couldn’t breathe—

“If you feel nothing for me, then why are you trembling, Lilly?” His voice was hoarse and rough. The sound struck me through the heart, and I reacted viciously, out of character.

My fingers curled around the item on the desk; something solid and heavy. I lifted my arm, swinging in through the air, and aimed for the king.

A king who was a soldier, a warrior, and a trained killer.

Soren caught my arm in the air. His grip as hard and unyielding as iron locked onto my wrist, twisting with precise calculation. A pathetic noise breached my lips. My fingers went limp, and a mug slammed on the floor, shattering into a dozen porcelain pieces.

His lips crashed into mine, stealing the gasp from my mouth. The addictive taste of his tongue cascaded over mine when it swept in. He deepened the kiss, pressing himself against me until I succumbed to the desire burdening my soul.

Ren’s kiss, his body flush with mine. It was warm, familiar, and mind-numbing.

He was the incarnate of my doom, solid and radiating safety when he enveloped me in his arms. Thoughts of my death at his hands invaded my mind, warring drastically against the wanton longing in my core, leaving me rattled, confused, but prone to his demanding mouth and greedy fingers.

The space between us became nonexistent. As Ren untied my gardening apron and unbound the laces of my corset, I couldn’t tell where I ended, and he began. Not until he grabbed my face in those massive palms, stealing every ounce of my attention.

His thumbs swiped over my cheeks, wiping away the fresh tears I hadn’t realized were spilling over. “Why do you have to be so pretty when you cry?”

“Ren,” I whispered, half-sobbing, unable to fathom anything other than the name I loved him by.