Page 10

10

F ilak was here. Now . In Dusbury . In Daisy and Lew’s apartment .

Daisy gulped, quivered all over, and leapt up to her staggering feet. An irrational, unthinking movement that only lurched her closer toward the pale, deadly wraith who’d somehow invaded her apartment, and clamped his sharp hand around her neck.

But instead of impact, or pain, or judgement, there was only — warmth. Warmth , and that familiar rich scent, gathering Daisy tight and close, enveloping her in sudden, astonishing safety.

“ Sólin mín ,” murmured Filak’s low voice in her ear, as one warm steady hand stroked up and down her back, and the other hand caressed its sharp claws so gently against her throat. “ Daisy mín. ”

It didn’t make sense, it was ridiculous, appalling, dangerous — but Daisy couldn’t seem to pull away. Could only stand there, trembling in an orc’s strong safe arms, and finding that she’d somehow clutched her arms tightly around him, too.

“Filak,” she whispered, choked, into the silken skin of his chest. “ What — why? I thought —”

He murmured something back, together with more firm, proprietary strokes of his hands. And whatever it meant, Daisy knew the feel of those hands, knew their steady certain reassurance, maybe even… their possessiveness. The way they too whispered, mine .

A hot shiver rippled up Daisy’s spine, and she drew back a little, needing to look at him, to search his face in the faint moonlight. To see if he really meant that, had he really come here for her…

But then she stilled, her breath hovering in her throat, her eyes staring, unblinking. Because somehow, here in the shadows and the moonlight, Filak looked… different. Still sharp, yes, still all hard-cut bone and striking black and white. But his pale skin beneath the black marks almost seemed to glow, like smooth burnished silver — and his hollow eyes looked far less skull-like, and more like deep shadowy pools, with light hidden and glinting inside. And even his mouth looked softer, more supple, its corner curling up in something hungry, something dangerous, something that flared heat straight to Daisy’s groin.

“ Daisy mín ,” he murmured again, as his hand still on her neck slipped up beneath her jaw, tilting up her face. “ Mín . Ach ?”

His . Daisy shivered again, caught in his touch, his voice, his eyes, his bizarrely compelling face. While a distant voice valiantly nattered and chanted, dredging up dark-edged visions of the tunnel, the cave, her ring crushed in his fingers, the mark over her heart…

“But,” she gulped at him, between breaths, searching his intent, shadowy eyes. “ Last night. Did you — did you trap me on purpose? Mark me like this on purpose?”

She flapped her hand at the sun on her heart, and Filak’s gaze instantly followed it, and held there. And then his own hand slipped up toward it, his long sharp fingers splaying wide and proprietary against her thundering heartbeat.

“Ach,” he murmured, steady, utterly unrepentant. “ Mín .”

Daisy’s breath shuddered out, her throat swallowing hard. Because even if Filak hadn’t understood the question, his implication was still far too clear, wasn’t it? He thought he owned Daisy . He thought he could do whatever the hell he wanted with her. Even if that meant drawing on her without her permission, or destroying her valuable ring, or trapping her in a dark cave, or…

Or this. Bodily steering her around and backwards, toward the table. Moving her just as he had in the cave last night, his deft hands and his lean body silently speaking, leading her, guiding her down onto her back. Spreading her out onto the table’s hard wood, all over her strewn messy drafts of the cascabela , oh gods —

“Filak!” Daisy hissed, but his mouth was quirking, as one of his hands returned to her neck, stroking with smooth, easy reassurance. While his other hand slipped down to her knee, sliding up her skirts to her thighs, her hips…

He was undressing her. Undressing her, here, in Lew’s apartment, on the kitchen table. After he’d all but admitted to trapping her like that last night, on purpose . And Daisy should have jumped up, wrenched away, shouted at him, demanded answers, apologies, something …

But instead, she just kept lying there, gasping and shuddering, as Filak’s steady hand slid her skirts up to her waist, and smoothly guided her knees apart. Exposing everything in between, oh gods, cool air tickling at hot swollen skin, her entire body trembling beneath his watching, glittering eyes.

The quirk on Filak’s mouth had slightly faded, in place of a slick, pointed black tongue, brushing swift and hungry against his lips. And with another sharp, decisive sweep of his hand, he shoved down his own trousers, and released his hard, bobbing cock.

Oh, hell. Daisy’s breath choked, her eyes snapping wide on the sight. On that long, silken cock, jutting out thick and brazen and demanding from the thatch of black hair at his groin. Its skin was just as pale as the rest of him, almost a perfect match with the pearly liquid seeping from inside that deep cleft, dangling down from him in a slowly thickening string…

But against that pale skin, again, were the marks. That same black script that was written all over the rest of his body — but here, the text was written so dense and fine that it almost looked like thick, fluid lines. Lines that weren’t drawn straight down his length, no, but instead curled around it, as if encircling it, protecting it. And they grew thicker and deeper as they went, until they coalesced upon that supple sliding skin at the head of him, painting it a full, dense black. Black that would usually sheath that seeping rounded head, but now, fully peeled back like this, it framed the clear, untouched white cleft beneath, and that string of matching, dangling white fluid still oozing out the middle of it.

Good gods. It was unthinkable, utterly bizarre, unlike anything Daisy had ever imagined existing on another living creature — and it had been inside her, just last night. And there was a sudden, irrational urge to grope for her pencil and draw it, to put it forever to paper, where she could pull it out and look at it whenever she pleased…

But instead, there was this. Filak’s lean body shifting closer between her spread legs, lining up that pale, shining head with her open, exposed heat. Until he just barely, briefly brushed against her, just there , oh gods — and Daisy jolted all over, her breath seizing, her swollen body helplessly quivering and clenching back against him, oh gods .

But Filak didn’t take more. Didn’t sink deeper. And instead he settled both his warm hands to Daisy’s bare, quaking thighs, and spread them wider apart. So he could better see this, oh gods, his marked cock just nudging into her, leaking his silvery nectar into her eager blossoming heat.

And Daisy shouldn’t have allowed it. Shouldn’t . Not with everything he’d done, everything he’d openly admitted to. He didn’t own her, he had no right to her, to trap her and mark her and destroy her property and break into her apartment like this. He was an intruder, a cheat, a wraith, a magic-wielding monster…

But gods, she wanted it. Needed it. And she nodded, saying, yes, more, please , as he finally, finally eased forward. That smooth, leaking head not just tasting, now, but prodding, pushing, pressing. Spreading Daisy’s slick spasming heat wide around him, stretching her open for him, demanding she take him, accommodate him, enclose him. Claiming her as his own, his to fuck and fill and keep as he pleased.

It was appalling, it was risky and reckless and utterly unconscionable , and if Daisy had possessed any remnants of sense whatsoever, she should have still argued it. Should have kicked, shouted, escaped. Made it clear that she wasn’t his property, he couldn’t just do whatever he wanted with her, she could leave anytime she wanted.

And Filak would allow it, if she tried. Wouldn’t he? He hadn’t forced her the night before, he’d let her leave this morning…

But Daisy still didn’t move. Didn’t make the slightest attempt. And when Filak’s glinting eyes found her own, his black brows raised as his invading cock pushed through the last of her resistance, and sank to the hilt inside her — she could only gasp, and nod, and hold his glittering eyes.

Saying, again, yes. Yes . Gods , yes.

Filak’s mouth quirked up again, into something almost like a smile, because of course he already knew it, just as well as she did. And even him doing it like this, so slow and deliberate and agonizing, on the messy table where she’d been drawing for Lew — maybe that was part of it, too. Him staking his claim, showing her how this stood, and what this meant.

It was a sweeping shuddering craving, or maybe even a relief, swarming Daisy with raw, dizzying power. Power that was echoed, amplified, by the orc plunged deep inside her quivering body, opening her, showing her. And now shuddering a little fuller against her, silently shouting his own ravenous hunger toward her, saying, yes, yes, mine.

And when he began drawing himself out, again moving with exquisite, unrelenting slowness, that was another lesson, another claim. His triumphant eyes feasting on her displeasure, on her ache and her need at the loss of him, her throat’s low, plaintive whine as he fell fully free of her. Leaving her empty, bereft, enough that her desperate tingling hands finally clutched for him, gripping at his lean hips, needing him back, please.

But he again took his time, leisurely lining them up again, letting them both watch his marked, dripping, black-and-white cock settling against its home, tasting it, teasing it. And then slowly, deliberately easing back inside, smooth and perfect and devastating. While Daisy’s body flared and arched, her teeth painfully biting her lip, fighting to hold back her moans, or her screams —

And then — a sound. A cough. From — the bedroom .

Daisy froze, her heartbeat skidding into a wild, piercing wail. Lew . Lew was here, Lew was awake — and she was sprawled on her back on the kitchen table, with an invading skeletal orc still feeding his huge tattooed cock deep between her spread legs, oh gods —

“Daisy?” called Lew’s voice, hoarse with sleep. “ Is that you?”

Daisy flinched and shuddered, cringing sideways, needing to escape, to run, to hurl herself out the window — but then, then, his hand. Filak’s hand. Curving close and safe and reassuring around her neck, speaking silently of steadiness, of ease. And when Daisy’s wild eyes met his, they were steady too, glinting with sharp, unwavering certainty.

Mine , they said, as that slowly sinking cock slowly sank home, anchored itself deep and full and pulsing inside. Sólin mín.

It was again utterly unthinkable, impossibly ludicrous. Lew could come out at any moment, and find this orc, with his clawed hand pinning Daisy by the neck to the table, and his marked, painted cock brazenly plunged all the way inside her, pumping out his seeping nectar into her —

But somehow, somehow, as ridiculous as it was, Daisy’s wild pummelling heartbeat… softened. Steadied . Her breath exhaling heavy and slow, and inhaling again. Sólin mín.

“Yes, it’s only me, Lew ,” she finally called back toward the bedroom, with only a faint tremor in her voice. “ I’m just — still not feeling well.”

A brief, unmistakable approval flared in Filak’s shadowed eyes, that quirk again curling at his lips. And then, oh gods, he began smoothly easing himself back again, sliding out of her, away, no . And even worse, Daisy could hear the sounds of it now, too, the slick slippery wetness of that torturous slow glide, followed by the soft squelch as he fell free of her, and then her own clenched breathless hiss —

“Well, keep it down, then,” snapped Lew’s irritable voice, as Filak’s free hand slipped down to his gleaming, dripping length, his claws grasping it easy and familiar — and then he raised it up, and gave Daisy a firm, demanding little slap. Thudding it down heavy and audacious against her coarse dark hair, spattering her with clinging drops of luminous white. Saying , again, mine .

Daisy’s whole body writhed, her eyes fluttering on the sight, and for an instant there was no Lew , no apartment, no fear, no future, no failure. Only that shocking, thrilling display, that marked gleaming length again raising up, thudding down with another firm, wet, demanding little smack. Saying , mine. You pay attention to me.

And yes, Daisy would do that, even as a grunt of displeasure filtered out from the bedroom. “ Or better yet,” came Lew’s sharp voice, “stop sulking, and come to bed.”

But Daisy scarcely heard it, because now Filak was slipping down again, and swiping himself slick and messy against Daisy’s open, dripping heat. Not pressing in and filling her, no — but instead just watching himself play with her, prodding her and painting her with his fluid, even popping slightly in and out of her. All of it brazenly coaxing out those slick, squelching sounds between them, far too loud and dangerous, all of it again shouting, mine .

“Daisy?” demanded Lew’s voice. “ Did you hear me?”

Gods damn it. And even as Daisy drew in a shaky breath to reply, Filak finally settled closer against her, and plunged himself deep inside, far faster and smoother than before. Making her shudder and arch upon him, again doing it on purpose, teaching her another lesson, mine, mine, mine…

But amidst the swirling craving in Daisy’s skull, the fear was finally chattering again, distant but insistent. If Lew walked out here and saw them, it could only mean devastation for both of them, maybe all of them. And there was a sudden, dizzying vision of Filak reaching a hand to the apartment’s wall, closing his eyes, and…

Daisy hauled in another ragged breath, and then clutched her jittering hands at Filak’s sharp hips, holding him tight. Holding him here, and clamping on him from inside, too, as her eyes held his, and her head jerked a sharp, shaky nod. Saying , yes, yes, Filak , I know. Yours . Please .

“Sorry, Lew ,” she called back toward the bedroom, still holding her gaze on Filak’s intently watching eyes. “ Maybe later. Sleep well.”

There was another low, irritated harrumph from the bedroom, but then only Filak . Only Filak’s blazing eyes, Filak’s hips drawing back from her grip — and then Filak’s slick slamming strength, ramming into her again and again and again. Being as loud as he damn well wanted, sliding and slapping and squelching, teaching her another furious, shouting lesson. He didn’t care what Lew saw or heard, he would gladly kill Lew before Daisy stepped foot back in that bedroom, he would punch a rock down Lew’s throat or jam his talons into his eyes. And Daisy wouldn’t do a damned thing about it, she would lie here and take it, welcome it, cling and nod and silently beg for it, as his hips ground and gouged deep, his invading cock straining and spasming, until…

He wrenched all over, his eyes flashing white — and Daisy juddered as he spewed out, flooding fierce molten heat sharp and deep inside her. Shuddering so hard that she shuddered too, wrenched up rigid and high and tight — and then it all crashed down again, ecstasy white and frenzied and blaring, her impaled invaded body milking him and caressing him and screaming back at him. Shouting , yes, yours, yes, you shameless feral domineering fiend, yes.

And Filak knew it, of course he did, and there was only triumph in the graceful arch of his lean body, in the hooded glittering intensity of his eyes. And for a brief, dazzling instant, as the sheer ferocious bliss kept reeling, there was an acute, crystalline comprehension, sparkling light and easy between them.

Daisy was his, yes, that was settled, now — but that also meant that Filak was hers. He was bound to her, entwined with her, and he’d had no choice but to come here and find her again. To … tend to her. To care for her, and rescue her. To sweep her away from Lew , from all this grim miserable darkness, off into the magic, into the bright shimmering dream.

And when Filak’s gasping, sweaty body finally sank over Daisy on the table, his face nuzzling at her neck, the truth of it only swirled closer, settling quiet and deep. He was hers. And it was right that his clawed hand should gently tip her face sideways, exposing her throat. Right , that his sharp teeth should settle against her skin, seeking and scraping, far harder and more purposeful than the night before. And right, painful, perfect , that those teeth should snap down decisive and deep, breaking the skin, piercing her with marks that would never, ever fade.

Daisy didn’t even gasp, didn’t whimper or shudder or flinch. Only exhaled, shaky and slow, as her trembling arms curled around Filak’s rigid, sweaty back, and held him close. Even caressing him, telling him yes, she understood, yes, she wanted it too. Wanted his sharp teeth, those rapid greedy gulps of his throat. And yes, he could swell and shudder like that again inside her, readying himself to again pour back inside, to return the gift she was giving him. Because he was hers, he was fierce and wild and feral but he was hers, her own marked magical devil, come to whisk her deep into his thrall, his lair, his dream.

And when he poured out again, softly groaning into her broken skin as he quivered all over, Daisy only clung tighter, and again allowed him to sweep her along with him, into the beauty and the wonder. She was his, he was hers, and he’d come to rescue her, to carry her away…

And even before he asked, Daisy knew the answer. Even when he slowly, gently extracted his teeth from her skin, and rose up to look at her. Even when his mouth was stained with red, his long black tongue sweeping hungry against his wet lips…

“ Tú kemur mee mér ,” he murmured, so soft. “ Ach , sólin mín ?”

You will come with me , it meant, even if the words themselves were still meaningless in Daisy’s ears. Yes , my sun?

And Daisy nodded, urgent and fervent, her smile quivering soft and true. “ Ach , my devil,” she whispered, toward his skeletal watching face. “ I’ll come.”