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When I lifted my head, my feet sank, and I might have gone under had he not planted a hand in the middle of my back and pushed me back into a floating position.

“What do you mean?” I blustered.

In the dim starlight reflecting on the pool, I saw his tusks gleam as he grinned wickedly…moments before he bent his head over me.

When he caught my nipple in his mouth, I sucked in a breath and jolted, instinctively curling around him.

Vartok raised his head and spoke sternly. “Trust, Myra. After everything I’ve given ye, I’m owed a reward.”

Oh. He was right. I remembered how hard his cock was, how aroused he must be. I had been only focused on my pleasure, not his, and shame shot through me at the realization.

“You want—” I began, wondering how to offer him release.

“To taste yer nipples, aye. I’ve been dreaming of it for months,” he announced sternly. “Now lie back like a good lass and let me have my taste.”

Confused, and more than a little aroused, I did as he commanded.

Months ?

When the ridges of his tongue dragged over my nipple, I couldn’t help the way I grabbed for him, arching into his hold, trying to stay afloat. He chuckled against my breast and slid his other hand beneath my shoulders, keeping me above water as he laved and sucked and?—

“Oh God!” I groaned when he tugged with his teeth. How had he known what I liked, what I needed?

Beneath the water, his hand fondled my arse, and I remembered the way he’d touched me there . How naughty it had felt. How much I’d liked it.

Aye, I was a good student.

Vartok’s tongue skimmed over my skin, and the noises he made? As if he liked my taste? I knew he had likely done this hundreds of times before, but they— he made me feel special.

How in the world could I possibly be this aroused again already? The throbbing heat in my core hadn’t had the chance to subside, and I was already flexing in the water, trying to capture the pressure I needed. Impossible when I was floating like this …

Vartok, however, understood.

“Come along, my pretty little human,” he said, straightening and pulling me toward the ledge where we’d left our clothing. “I have other plans for ye tonight.”

“But—” I began, and he cut me off by lifting my mouth to his and silencing me with a kiss.

By the time he released me, I was sitting on the stone ledge, my lower legs dangling in the water, and my arse surprisingly warm from the steam swirling around me.

Still, as he lowered himself back into the water, I glanced around, my arms wrapping around myself to cover my breasts as I glanced in all directions, wondering if I could reach my cloak from here.

“Vartok,” I hissed worriedly. “I am—anyone could see…”

“Aye,” he chuckled. “’Tis the point.”

With that, he wrapped his fingers around my wrists and pulled them away from me to plant my palms on the rock beside me. I couldn’t help the way I continued to peer at the shadows, wondering if there could be anyone watching.

I had lived in Bloodfire Village long enough to know that orcs did not consider sex to be shameful.

They celebrated their arousal with their Mates, and the unMated ones rutted whenever and wherever the opportunity presented, because pregnancy wasn’t a worry.

Only Mated pairs could produce offspring, and that freedom allowed orcs to view sex as a lark instead of a commitment.

So, nay, no one would judge me if they saw what I was doing tonight .

But still, it felt strange to be on display this way. Uncovered. Revealed.

My whole life, I’d been reserved and careful and controlled. This? Tonight? Being with Vartok? I felt anything but.

I pressed my palms onto the rock, grounding myself, as his hands skimmed down my legs. His fingers curled around my ankles and he pulled my thighs apart, settling between them, his shoulders stretching me wide.

“What are you—” I began, but his mouth closed around my nipple and I gasped. The sensation—the combination of warm flesh and cold air—had me shuddering as my core flooded with need . I would have pressed my thighs together, had I been able to.

His dark chuckle told me he knew .

Aye, his hands were caressing me, and the feeling was even better out of the water, as my skin prickled in the warm steam and the droplets of water made their way down my skin. I found myself moaning, wriggling against the stone, trying to rock forward, even as his touch kept me grounded.

Then his mouth moved down me, kissing the center of my chest between my breasts, then my stomach, then…

“Nay!” I gasped, my hands flying to his hair, my fingers wrapping through his braids and beads as I realized what he was about to do.

Vartok paused, his mouth pressed against my curls, and I felt him tip his head back to look up at me .

“I’ll stop if ye are uncomfortable, Myra. Are ye?”

Was I? My fingers loosened.

“I just…I have not…Why would you…?” I knew I was stammering, but when he grinned, I felt it against my mound.

A gleam of teeth in the darkness.

“Because, dkaar , I’ve been dreaming of how sweet ye’ll taste for months now. Sucking yer dew from yer fingers wasnae good enough. I want to stroke ye with my tongue. I want to fook ye with my mouth. I want to lick yer climax from yer sweet cunny.”

Oh my God.

Months ?

“Will ye allow it, Myra? Will ye fook my face?”

His description left me dazed. My hold loosened. In fact, I think I pushed him down a little bit.

“Aye,” I croaked out. “That sounds…”

Vartok’s chuckle was barely audible over the sound of the pool, but I felt his breath against my sensitive core. My skin still prickled from my earlier release, after all, and now…

When his tongue found me, I slapped my hand over my mouth to keep from crying out. No matter what he said, I didn’t want anyone to hear me.

Except...

Within minutes, I couldn’t have told you my own name, much less what I was nervous about. Vartok’ s tongue was that good . Wide and ridged, it slid into my channel deep enough to make me wonder if he could hit that spot which had driven me over the edge before.

His tusks scraped at the skin of my inner thighs, making me shudder in anticipation, as his fingers teased and stroked, alternating between my clitoris and my folds.

He even used his mouth on my bud, and when he did that, I realized I’d fallen backward, and now lay sprawled against the stone, writhing with need as his fingers curled within me.

I could have climaxed like that, but Vartok had other plans.

He coaxed me to the edge of my release, and then—just as I was reaching blindly for him, the sensations overwhelming, he slid his tongue inside me once more as his palm cupped my clitoris, giving me the pressure I needed.

With a wordless scream, I came on his face, bucking desperately against his tongue as he grunted and hummed in encouragement.

Holy God, what was that ?

I lay panting, spreadeagle on the stone, the water lapping against my feet, staring up at the stars.

How had that even been possible ?

To orgasm twice in one evening? One after the other? I would have thought such a thing impossible.

I lifted my head to stare down my body at Vartok, although he was difficult to see through the steam that wafted around us. I could guess he was grinning .

“Good lass,” he murmured, kissing my inner thigh, then my clitoris, which still throbbed. “Such a good student.”

The reminder that I was only his student, and he was only doing these things because I’d asked him…even that couldn’t dim the haze of my satiation.

“Why…” I began, but I trailed off, because I wasn’t certain what I was trying to say.

Chuckling, he slid his hands beneath my arse and gently lifted me into the water with him. I flopped against him, feeling as weak as a—a—a very weak thing.

“Vartok?” I murmured.

He hummed and pulled my face closer.

“Ye taste better than I possibly could’ve imagined, Myra. Even better than sucking yer spend from yer fingers. I’ll be certain to obtain it directly from the source from now on. ‘Tis my new favorite flavor.”

I could see his tongue—God, that had just been inside me, had it not?—swipe across his chin, licking up more of me. I should be humiliated by such a display.

I wasn’t.

Instead, I pressed against him.

“What about ye?” I murmured, remembering his hardness, wondering if I should offer to stroke him to completion, the way he had done to me. “’Tis important to pay my debts.”

But he chuckled and pressed my head into his shoulder. “Ye have nae debts , pet. This isnae the human world, and I am no’ one of those unfeeling brutes. ”

Did he sound a little offended? I tried to lift my head.

“But you are?—”

He pushed me back down, even as he turned us both in the water, obviously looking for something along the ledge.

“I came already.”

“What?”

“Myra, love, do ye honestly think I could feel ye coming on my face, feel ye squeezing my tongue, hear ye screaming to the stars, and no’ come?

” He sounded exasperated as he felt around on the ledge.

“I spilled into the water without even having to touch myself, which is something I havenae done in a decade. Ah, here’s the soap. ”

I found myself fighting giggles. Not at the realization he’d climaxed because of me , but by how irritated he sounded.

“Stop laughing,” he commanded.

“Only if you let me wash your hair,” I shot right back.

With a good-natured grumble, he moved me to the edge so I could stand then handed me the soap as he began to untie his braids.

“I have more to teach ye, pet.”

I was beginning not to hate that name at all. My limbs were languid as I sighed happily.

“Good.”

“Will ye come to me tomorrow?”

Feeling emboldened, I teased him. “Is that a command, oh wise teacher? ”

He froze. When he spoke again, his words were more hesitant. “Come to me tomorrow night, my little human.”

I smiled in the darkness, pleased to hear his order.

“Aye, Vartok. I will.”