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“Yeah, last year. Wait, how did you get into this class? If you’re a freshman, you need to have met the prerequisites or get special permission.”

She couldn’t help but preen a little. “My advisor gave me permission based on my Advanced Placement courses from high school.”

The young man chuckled. “So you’re a hot nerd. I like it. I’m Justin.” He held out a hand. “Nice to meet you.”

“I’m Kate.” She shook his hand. “So, tell me more about Professor Abrams.”

The memory quivered, the surface rippling as though it were a lake into which someone had cast a stone.

As the ripples cleared, Kate blinked and Roan lifted his mouth from hers, their faces a mere breath apart.

Where had she just been? She couldn’t remember.

Whatever she’d been thinking about...

Had she been thinking about something? There was just a blank space within her mind. What had happened?

Roan’s blue eyes glowed, and Kate stared up at him, lost in his gaze.

“You will know no other man but me,” Roan said, his voice somewhere between a purr and a growl.

Caught in his trance, Kate traced his lips with her thumb, and he let her explore him as he leaned over her in the fairy bed.

He was so beautiful it hurt to look at him.

Was this really the same brooding king who had demanded she wait naked for him in his bed?

Well, here she was in a bed with him, mostly naked.

And all he’d done was kiss her in a way that had changed something within her on a chemical level.

Nothing would ever be the same again now that she had tasted him.

Did that mean she was doomed? At that moment, Kate couldn’t find it in her to care. Roan kissed her exploring fingers, nipping them gently with his teeth. She shivered as she imagined those teeth nipping other places upon her body.

One of his hands slid down her stomach, gliding beneath the waistband of her panties and she gasped in surprise as his large palm cupped her mound.

“Mine, little pet, all mine,” he whispered roughly against her neck before he nibbled on her earlobe. The combination of his touch between her legs and the feel of his teeth biting down on such an erotic place as her earlobe sent jolts of pleasurable fire through body.

“Yes…” she panted as she lifted her hips, encouraging him to touch her more, to do more .

One of his fingers feathered over her clit and she squirmed against him. He chuckled, the sound dark and dangerous as he penetrated her slowly with two fingers, stretching her, invading her.

“You’re so tight, my darling. Do you have any idea how mad you make me?” he demanded with a seductive growl.

“I do?” she wanted him to keep talking, to hear how she made him feel.

“Yes,” Roan said as he brushed his lips over hers again. “Just thinking about pounding into you, stretching you with my cock, making you scream my name…it’s enough to create the best sort of madness in a male.”

He braced his one arm above her head as he moved his mouth down from her lips to her collarbone, his tongue flicking out against her skin as he continued to thrust his fingers in and out of her.

A delicious building need started within her lower belly, like a fire being stoked on a dark night, sending embers and flames sparking to life.

“We shall live out every dark and wonderful fantasy, little one. You and me,” Roan said.

“Just like this…” he increased the penetrating rhythm of his fingers, his hand moving so fast that Kate could barely catch her breath until…

she simply shot straight over the edge into violently cascading ecstasy.

Roan’s mouth covered hers, silencing her scream, his tongue invading her lips, fucking her just as his fingers were.

He drew out every twitch, every spasm until her body simply couldn’t take another moment of pleasure and she begged him to stop.

He slowly withdrew his hand and she watched in hazy fascination as he licked the juices of her arousal of his fingers as though he was tasting the finest honey.

Then he lowered his head and kissed her, letting her taste herself upon his lips.

Kate melted beneath him, basking in the glow of her climax and the pure enjoyment of kissing Roan as though nothing else in the world could matter.

Above them, a breeze stirred the wisteria, and the scent of sweet night-blooming flowers filled the air. Dusk had given way to night.

“How long have we been kissing?” she asked in a whisper.

Roan gave a rich chuckle. “Not nearly long enough.” He kissed her forehead. “Sleep now, and you may face the labyrinth again tomorrow.”

His words swept her into a deep, dreamless sleep.

* * *

Roan held Kate in his arms until the night turned into a predawn sky.

He whispered a spell and forged a crystal on a silver necklace in his palm.

Kate’s stolen memory slipped from his mind into the crystal, which turned a pale blue.

He sat up and placed the necklace around his neck, holding it against his skin.

Then he tucked the bedcovers around her.

“Sleep on. Dawn is not here yet,” he whispered when she stirred as his departure from the bed.

He walked back to the morgens’ pool and knelt by the sleeping kobold who lay by the edge of the pond. He gave the creature a shake, and the kobold roused with a grunt and then swung a fist at his face. Roan only had to move an inch to avoid the blow.

“Manners, kobold,” Roan said.

The kobold gasped as he realized who he had just tried to clobber. “My lord!”

“Your name, kobold.”

“Um... Patch, my lord.”

“Listen carefully, Patch. You will continue to accompany Kate in my labyrinth. If you encounter any other dangers, you will summon me at once. Should anything happen to her, you will pay with your life. Is that clear?”

The kobold nodded and swallowed hard. “But I’ve never been deeper than this, my lord. I don’t want to go any farther.”

“She saved your life,” he reminded the kobold with a dark scowl. “You owe her a life debt. And since she belongs to me, that means you owe me , Patch.”

Roan hesitated, thinking. He needed to make sure that Kate would be safe and that she would go no deeper within the labyrinth.

Over the centuries, the labyrinth had filled with numerous creatures besides those he had set within it.

Even he did not know of them all now. To keep his little human safe, he had to keep her away from the heart of the labyrinth.

Only he had ever been to its center, and that was very long ago.

Kate must be kept away, for her own safety and so that she would fail in her mission.

Then, by their bargain, she would belong to him forever.

In order to protect her, he’d start by removing that pool infested with morgens. He’d leave no trace of it behind and he’d kill every bloody beast as he did it. He could not take the chance that Kate would find herself drowing in those dark waters again.

He gave the kobold another stern glare. “You know those outer paths well enough. Keep her on the outskirts. She must not solve the labyrinth.”

The kobold nodded. “Y-yes, my lord.”

“Good.” Roan released the kobold. “Now, go wait for her to wake.” He swung an arm to point at the bed behind him. “Remember. She must not find the heart of the labyrinth.”