Page 13 of Risen (Love and Revenge #6)

A shiver ran through her body as she felt the effects of my emotions—and my aura.

But she didn’t put distance between us, the way a rational person would.

Her voice softened even more. “I know that’s how you feel.

I know that for a long time, no one ever showed you anything different.

The others in the court care for you, Dusek.

Several of them would probably even welcome your attention.

They’re just waiting for you to love yourself enough to try. ”

Her hand smoothed over my chest and she shivered, probably feeling the fear-inducing aura that radiated from me no matter how hard I tried to tamp it down.

But still she didn’t draw back. “Surely you can see now that I’m not the only one who wants to love you, to be close to you.

So… will you finally stop trying to push me away or keep me at a distance and admit you deserve this? ”

I looked at her. Really looked. Saw the strength and determination in her. And for the first time, I let my aura uncoil around her on purpose. Not fully. Not the whole of it, by any means. But enough for her to really see what I held in check every time she was near. Every time anyone came near.

The air shifted, thickened. The light dimmed as shadows bled outward from my skin, curling like smoke, pooling at our feet.

My voice deepened, took on a bit of an otherworldly echo.

“This is who I am, trinket. Are you sure you want this? The naga seems to be immune. But I know you are not. You feel it. Every skitter of fear. I can taste it on you.”

Ruya reached out, her hand threading gently through the tendrils of darkness that she couldn’t see but could undoubtedly sense around her.

She didn’t flinch when they brushed her fingers.

She didn’t pull back when they kissed her palm.

She just… accepted it with another of those little shivers that seemed equal parts fear and… lust?

That final realization rang through me, a death-knell to the last scrap of my hesitation. She accepted me. All of me. And far from recoiling, she seemed to like the heightened, adrenaline-fueled energy that grew between us as she rode out the fear.

Suddenly I stopped seeing her as fragile. As delicate or innocent. Ruya knew what she wanted, and she was brave enough to make sure I knew it too.

My voice dropped to a broken whisper. “Touch me, trinket?”

She obeyed without hesitation, touching my face, her soft fingertips grazing over my cheek, along my jaw, her sweet omega aura twining with my darkness as she traced my features.

“I’m not afraid,” she said again. “I want this. I want you, Dusek. Are you listening this time?”

I hadn’t planned to cry. But it came anyway. Hot, and fast, and humiliating. Sadavir was right, I tried to live up to my name, but in reality, I was nothing but a mushy mess inside. Some boogey man I was. I didn’t even recognize myself anymore.

Ruya stepped in without hesitation and wrapped her warms around my waist, pressing her cheek against my chest. And still, still , the shadows and my aura of terror didn’t deter her, didn’t send her scurrying away or screaming into insanity.

If anything… she seemed to be growing more accustomed to my aura the longer we touched.

Throwing out all the fear, and hesitation, and hurt—all the expectations of rejection and scorn—I placed my finger beneath her chin and tilted her head back, making her lift her face so I could bend down and press my lips to hers.

Ruya had kissed me before. Several times. But this was the first time I initiated it. The first time in so long that I willingly, purposefully reached for another person. And the only time I had ever done so while knowing with such unshakable certainty that they wouldn’t reject me.

It was gentle at first. A question. A bare whisper of a touch. Then she kissed me back like her life depended on it. My hands curled around the curve of her waist, and hers tangled in my hair, as the passion between us deepened, growing hungry and fierce.

I’d never kissed someone like this, without holding at least some part of myself back, for fear it would all go wrong.

We moved without words, deeper into the shadows, and I led her to a cave I’d discovered in my lurking.

To a bed of soft moss that wasn’t good enough for her, but called to me with the gently murmuring earth magic of this place.

She knelt and drew me down. Unfastened my shirt.

Slid her fingers over scars and old damage.

And when I hesitated, when I froze, she waited.

She kissed the marks I had gained in my time as a slave.

Before Robin and the others had freed me.

They were too old for her to heal now, an ingrained part of my body.

But she sent her warm healing magic through my body anyway, restoring, invigorating, silently letting me know that she would heal all my hurts, if she could.

I undressed her in pieces, each layer a reverent reveal, my dark vision letting me see her, even in the near-total blackness of the cave.

The curve of her collarbone. The perfect heavy mounds of her breasts.

The strong, graceful lines of her thighs.

The soft swell of her belly. I had always struggled to maintain any real belief in the Goddess.

But here she was before me, in every perfect line, every soft dip and swell of Ruya’s body.

I moved slowly at first. Every touch tentative, every movement asking permission for more. And she answered me in sighs and whispered yeses and the anchoring weight of her hands on my ribs, smoothing over my chest and back, gripping my cock as if it was made to fit her hand.

There were no words between us. Just acceptance, and understanding, and the kind of love I had never allowed myself to dream of before I met her. A connection I never thought I could have. She welcomed every part of me. My magic. My hesitation. My hunger.

When she drew me down, I went willingly, lying on my back on the springy moss.

Ruya straddled me without an ounce of hesitation, gripped my cock and sank down on me as if she’d imagined doing this a million times over.

She rode me slowly, eyes fluttering closed, breath shivering from her lips as we moved together.

I let my instincts take over and push my caution aside, gripping her hips, thrusting upward, mesmerized by the vision of her taking her pleasure from me here in the dark.

When she came, it was with her head thrown back, her aura pulsing in gold waves that lit my soul from the inside out, and my name falling from her lips.

I had never had sex with a witch before. Had rarely had any encounter of the sort, if we were being honest. But I had heard enough stories that the clutching wasn’t a surprise. Her body squeezed me tight, almost painfully so, and I groaned with tortured pleasure.

My hands smoothed over her skin, gentling her, exploring every inch of her beautiful body that I could reach until she relaxed enough for me to move again.

I gripped her hips as she rocked, slowly building up to a crescendo once more.

My hand slid down to rest on her soft belly, my thumb pressing against her clit as she rocked into me.

I was awed. Overwhelmed by the joy of being able to touch her so freely. To drink in her every sigh of pleasure.

I was so wrapped up in her pleasure that I nearly forgot to be afraid of my own.

I sat up suddenly, wrapping my arms around her to hold her close, as I felt my own climax roll through me.

I tried to brace myself for the screaming and terror that would come with my release, even as I crested that peak against my will.

Murmuring her name like a prayer, I spilled deep inside her, shuddering as my control slipped and my magic flared, my dark aura lashing out, wild and uncontrolled.

Ruya gasped, her body tensing up, her fingernails digging into my back.

But unlike the last time I had come undone in her presence, she kept her wits about her under the onslaught.

After one long, frozen moment, she rocked her hips against me again, hard.

A little growl escaped her as she took me deeper, her omega magic swelling around us as she somehow seemed to morph her terror into dark euphoria.

The next time she gasped, it wasn’t caused by fear. Her silvery hair spilled around us as her inner walls clutched me tight once more, her orgasm locking us together in a way that made the wild, dark thing inside me mad with delight over the way she claimed us.

Afterward, we lay tangled together, her head on my chest and our legs threaded together as we waited for her to stop clutching. My fingers traced the curve of her spine like it was a priceless sculpture, a work of art. I had never felt so sappy in my entire life.

“You’re not a monster, Dusek,” she murmured sleepily.

“Then what am I, trinket?”

She lifted her head and stretched to press a kiss to my chin, and I could see her smug smile in the dark. “Mine.”

My breath caught. The word was both terrifying and thrilling.

I had never belonged to anyone as anything other than a captive magic slave or a useful court member.

But she was right. I was completely and utterly hers .

All of me—even the darkest corners of my horrible bubak nature—belonged to this brave, beautiful, patient omega.

I pulled her close and pressed my mouth to her hair, not fearing the little shudder that ran through her body in response to my heightened emotions.

It was okay. Her response to me wasn’t the life-ending thing it had once felt like it was.

It was just… a part of who and what I was.

And she didn’t hate me for it. She accepted all of me.

For the first time in my life, I didn’t feel cursed . I felt…blessed . I wondered if it really was the Goddess I saw in her. Wrapping my arms around her, I pressed a kiss to the top of her head and thanked any deity who happened to be listening.