Page 50

Andor

For the second time I wake up naked next to Brynla Aihr, and again the world feels completely different.

Like it had been operating at a tilt my whole life and has only now righted itself.

There’s clarity, yes, but something deeper.

A lot fucking deeper, something I can’t even put into words but I believe it. Because I feel it.

Last night was intense. It was dark and wild and raw, and very much needed.

A chance for us to reconnect, a chance for Brynla to heal, however long that may take her.

Losing a family member, losing someone you love, produces a wound so deep that it will never scar over.

My mother’s death never resulted in scar tissue; it’s just been this cut that’s barely stitched together, the threads ready to pull loose at any moment.

Brynla had already lost her mother and her father, and now she’s lost the last person she had left.

The wound is carved so deep I can see straight through her to the other side.

Yet somehow, last night, I was able to mend her, if only for a moment.

“Good morning,” I whisper to her, my lips at her ear. I’m already hard and wondering if she’d like a repeat.

She lets out a soft moan as I run the tip of my nose through her hair, the lavender strands shining in threads of pink and silver from the early sun that’s peeking in through the window. Lemi, bless his hound heart, is still on the balcony, his silhouette visible through the curtains.

I slowly slide my hand over the smooth skin of her shoulder and down her arm, appreciating the firm muscle underneath, the slight flexing at my touch, such a testament to her power.

Then I let my fingers trail over her hips and she squirms slightly, letting out a breathy giggle that works like a bolt of lightning through my veins.

I grin against her skin, pressing more kisses behind her ear. I found a ticklish spot. I found a weakness, a tender spot surrounded by so much armor.

I temper the feel of my fingers even more, letting them trail over her skin like butterfly wings. She moves her hips back against my cock, grinding in hard, then pulling away, writhing against me like her body wants to escape but she doesn’t.

“This good?” I murmur as my hand slips down, down, sliding between her thighs to where she’s bare and warm and a little wet.

She nods, emitting another sweet sound that causes my cock to swell painfully against her. I work my fingers deeper into her slick space, her thighs parting slightly for me. My thumb finds her clit and I press the pad down, rubbing in slow circles in the way I’ve learned she likes.

“Oh,” she says, almost in surprise, and I reach back with my other hand, making a tight ring around my girth and pushing it in between her legs. She opens them wider for me and I press the head of my cock tentatively between her cheeks, enough to startle her and make her stiffen.

“Don’t worry,” I say, chuckling. “We can save that for another day.”

She relaxes slightly and I drag the tip down until it finds her wet and warm and I grit my teeth as I push myself inside her. From this angle, her back to me, lying on our sides, I can’t help but hiss. “Fuck,” I swear. “You’re so fucking tight. Let me know if I’m hurting you.”

But she only pushes her hips back against mine, driving me in deeper. We both gasp at the same time, as if our lungs are forcing the air out before we become each other’s oxygen. That raw connection from the throes of last night, unwavering, open and shared, is back, tethering us together.

My eyes fall shut and I lose myself to her, rocking into her body, my hand at her breast, rolling her nipple between my fingers, my other stroking her clit.

I bite her shoulder, I pinch at her until she gives that wanton cry of pleasure-pain.

I groan into her ear, asking if I feel good, if she feels good, telling her she’s an elixir, stronger and sweeter than any magic.

I give myself to her, in the hurried pumps of my hips, the sweat breaking between my chest and her back, the smell of sex in the room.

She comes, squeezing and pulsing around me, while her head arches back, a throaty, wild cry falling from her lips.

I reach up and make a fist at the top of her head, pulling her head back farther, and then while she’s bucking against me, the tension inside me comes to a crescendo.

My balls rise up until heat explodes from the center of me and I’m unleashing myself, coming hard inside her.

“Fuck, fuck, fuck,” I bite out through a low groan, the bed shaking beneath us as I slam myself deeper and deeper into her, as if I can be embedded inside her if I try hard enough.

By the time I’m finished—spent, my body limp against hers, our chests aching for breath—I feel like I’m in too deep with her in every which way.

I slowly pull out and she gives me a satisfied smile before she adjusts her head on the pillow again and lets out a deep, contented sigh.

“I’ll be right back,” I whisper to her, kissing the top of her head, taking a second to revel in her honey scent before I climb out of bed.

I drape the sheets over her, a show of modesty that seems to amuse her, and then pull on my pants.

I open the door slowly, quietly, looking up and down the hallway.

It feels completely still this hour of the morning, not a sound to be heard.

I walk across the hall to the bathroom. When I’ve done my business and freshened up, I step back in the hall.

And right into my uncle.

“Shit,” I swear, backing up. “You scared me.”

My uncle’s face twists venomously. That look of hatred mixed with self-satisfaction, like he’s ensnared me. I immediately feel uneasy.

“Spent the night with the prisoner, did we?” he says with a sneer.

“Jealous?” I counter. Probably the wrong thing to say.

He comes at me fast and I duck just in time, spinning around as he tries to grab me, bludgeoning the wall with his shoulder. A painting down the hall crashes to the floor.

“You’re jeopardizing your relationship with the princess!” he yells.

I eye the door to Brynla’s room and want to tell him to shut the fuck up, because she doesn’t need to hear any of this, but that will only provoke him.

If I say anything at all he’ll probably open the door and drag her out of bed, and if he dared to lay a hand on her there’s no telling what I would do.

“What’s going on?” My father’s voice comes from down the hall.

Fuck.

I look over at him as my father slowly approaches, still in his plush morning robe, a cup of coffee in hand.

“Nothing, Father,” I tell him, straightening up. “Just having a discussion with your brother.”

“I caught him sneaking out of the bitch’s room,” my uncle says, jerking his thumb toward Brynla’s door. He can barely put his thumb away before I’m at him, hand around his throat and pressing him back against the wall.

“Andor!” my father hisses, but I barely hear him. All I can think about is staring into my uncle’s beady eyes as I squeeze the life out of him.

“Call her that one more time and it will be the last garbage to come from your mealy little mouth,” I growl at him as he sputters under my grasp.

“Andor!” my father says, and he lunges for me. With a burst of strength he rarely displays, he grabs my arms and yanks me away from my uncle. “What in the goddesses has gotten into you?”

“She’s polluting his mind with her Eslander ways,” my uncle says, rubbing his throat and coughing with watering eyes.

“Is this true?” my father says, his expression surprised and ashamed. “After all we talked about?”

He expects me to look at the floor and apologize, as I have often done. But I refuse to cower this time.

“After all you talked about,” I say to him, raising my chin. “This has never been my idea. None of this has ever been my idea.”

I walk off down the hall, wanting to lead them away from Brynla. I’m sure she’s already awake, already heard our fighting, but I don’t want things to get worse.

My uncle and father hesitate and I’m terrified that they’ll go into Brynla’s room instead.

But then I hear their footsteps follow me, echoing down the hall.

I take the moment of relief to try to bolster myself against whatever they’re about to throw at me.

One would think that he would have interrogated me about what happened in the Midlands, but aside from small talk at the dinner table, inquiring about the suen I harvested, he hasn’t asked me much.

I expected him to call me into his office at some point and grill me about Brynla’s performance, but that never happened either.

However, there’s no time like the present.

I go straight to my father’s office and lean back near the window, arms folded across my bare chest as I wait for them to step into the room. My father barges in and gestures wildly for me to sit down as he makes his way around his desk, but I shake my head. My uncle takes the spot instead.

“I’m calling a meeting,” I say before they can get a word in first.

It angers my father like I knew it would, his nostrils flaring.

“Meeting?” my father practically spits. “There is no meeting! Tell me what you’re—”

“I have no intention of marrying the princess,” I say, raising my chin.

“I told you!” my uncle says to my father. “I told you that woman has gotten under his skin.”

“She has,” I say quickly. “She’s gotten very much under my skin. And sure, it certainly complicates your plans for Princess Frida. But that’s not all of it. That’s not the only reason why I won’t do it.”

My father gets out of his chair and storms over to me, stepping just a foot away, close enough to jab his finger at my chest. “You can’t betray me, Andor. You made a promise.”

“ You made a promise,” I counter. “One I can’t keep.” I take in a deep breath and yet I’m shaking inside for finally saying no. “One that I won’t keep.”