Page 58 of Veiled Flames (Destiny of Dragons #1)

Forty-Two

Rosomon

M y body is shaking, but Tynan continues to relentlessly hammer his rod inside me, hitting so deep that each strike causes a delicious pain that heightens my pleasure in ways I don’t understand.

This is what I asked him for. What I wanted. I asked him to drive his hatred into me. I asked him for cruelty.

Some of his hardest drives steal my breath, but I love it.

With no time to react to individual thrusts, my body is continuously firing, endlessly stimulated to the point that pleasure and pain are impossible to differentiate and difficult to bear.

But as punishing as his drives have become, they don’t carry the cruelty of what Saxon did to me. While the actual act and its effects may be similar, the motivation behind it is different. Very different. And that changes everything. Transforms it from night to day.

Not only did I ask for this, Tynan isn’t really trying to punish me. He’s not trying to teach me a lesson. He’s drilling me thus, because it’s what I asked him for, and it’s transported us both to the utmost pinnacles of pleasure.

His hands shift from their tight grip on my hips, but I still can’t move.

His forearm presses my bound bosom against the mattress, and his bent knees hold my legs wide apart as the unrelenting stabs of his cock pin my lower body to the pillows and mattress.

Then his finger digs under my belly to swipe my nub.

I convulse with blinding pleasure. It’s like Tynan understands exactly what my body needs and precisely when. Like he knows exactly how to deliver everything that I need.

My sexual pinnacle strikes with ferocity.

I have no control over any part of my body, nor the sounds I’m making.

I try to draw my legs together, but my toes long ago lifted off the floor, and his legs are positioned so widely and firmly I have no power against them.

My body squirms and thrashes, and he keeps me pinned with his arm and his ever-stabbing cock.

I call out his name, and he echoes it with my own as his seed joins my juices to ease his path inside me. His thrusts continue, somewhat slower and less rhythmic, but in every second that passes, he continues to deliver exactly what my body most wants and needs.

As my contractions subside, he slumps forward, his solid body landing over mine. Atop me, he pants hard, as if he’s struggling to draw breaths, and if he stays like this much longer, neither of us will be able to breathe.

Mercifully, he rolls to his side, lying next to my limp and shaking body. My head is turned the opposite direction. As much as I want to see him, I’m not sure I have the energy to change my head’s position. He performed all the work, why am I so exhausted?

“Are you well?” His fingers trail up my spine. “Did I hurt you too badly?”

I open my mouth to speak, but discover it’s turned to a desert.

The mattress shifts, and he pulls me into his arms, cradling me across his lap as he sits.

Stroking my face, he looks down into my eyes with so much concern it breaks my heart.

Saxon was careful with me when he took my maidenhood, but I don’t think I’ve ever seen anyone so worried about my welfare.

Not ever. Not even Nurse on nights when I was overtaken by fevers.

My hand shakes as I lift it to his cheek, and as I touch him, his chest shudders, and his eyes close.

“I am well,” I croak. “But very thirsty.”

“Yes, of course.” His eyes brighten with joy, like he’s discovered his life’s true purpose.

He sets me down near the headboard, and then quickly fetches the tankard of ale that the servants brought with my uneaten sup. Kneeling next to me on the bed, he presents the ale like an offering to Othrix, and I gulp down at least half of it.

Wiping my lips, I hand it back to him.

“Are you certain your thirst is quenched?” he asks.

I nod, shocked again at how caring he is. How he’s putting my needs above his own.

Tynan tips the ale to his lips, and I watch as his apple of Othrix rises and falls with his swallows.

He offers the ale back to me. “You should finish it.”

Smiling, I take the tankard and drink the last few swallows. Then he quickly sets the vessel down on the bedside table and returns to me, sliding his arm around me as we rest against the headboard.

“May I hold you like this?” he asks. “Is this welcome?”

“It’s very welcome.” I lean against his firm chest, and he adjusts our positions so that I’m curled against him, his long arms around me and my legs tucked up to the side.

I’m still in shock, less from the sex and more about how something so near brutal has turned my feelings toward him more tender.

And how undeniably caring he’s being toward me—since he entered the room, if I’m honest. It was me who brought anger into the room.

Using his bent finger, he tips up my chin. “ Never make me do that again.”

“But—” I blink with alarm. Did I misread what just happened? And everything that went before it? “Not ever?”

“Not like that.” He shakes his head. “Not as if I were drilling you against your will.”

Relief floods through every part of my body at once. I didn’t realize how much I wanted to have sex with Tynan again, until I thought we might never do it.

I slide my hand over his chemise, loving the form of his body beneath it, and wishing I were touching his skin. I twirl the ties of his chemise around my finger, too lazy to loosen them.

“Even doing it as an act,” he says, “I don’t want to risk hurting you. And I don’t want to pretend that I hate you.”

“You needn’t worry,” I say. “What we just did, it felt… Every moment of it felt very good.”

He rakes back his curls and looks down into my eyes. “As much as I hate to admit it, it felt very good for me too.” He shakes his head. “The results were good, even if what drove me to do it was not.”

“I shouldn’t have asked you to do that.”

His expression shifts, and suddenly, even though I’m in his arms, I feel as if he’s traveled far away.

“What is it?” I ask softly.

He presses a soft kiss against the top of my head, and the hand of the arm wrapped around me slides down to my bottom. “It’s nothing, dearest Rose.”

A smile rises inside me. It’s strange, but I’m growing to like Tynan’s pet name for me. But, no matter what he claims, something just changed.

“I want to know what you’re thinking,” I say softly. “But I understand if you don’t want to tell me.”

His fingers trail up and down my back, gliding over my corset. “I suppose I see no reason to guard my thoughts.” He sighs. “Not from someone who knows my family’s reputation. Understands the depths of my shame.”

I lift my head from his chest. “Tynan, no matter what you believe, you are not like them. You are not cruel. Your family’s legacy may be, it might be what you were taught, but what you did to me tonight doesn’t make you cruel.”

His eyebrows rise. He doesn’t believe me.

“It wasn’t cruel, because your intent wasn’t cruel.

” Saxon drilled me roughly because he was truly angry .

Because he wanted to show me that he could overpower and control me.

Because he wanted to scare me out of training camp.

I know how horrible that felt. The emotional pain and betrayal far worse than any he inflicted on my body.

I suspect the men in Tynan’s family oft do similar things—and much worse—to women. But I can’t imagine it from him.

“You used your strength to give me pleasure.” I stroke his face. “Not to demonstrate your power or to hurt me.”

He kisses my forehead. “That’s a very generous interpretation.”

“It’s not true?” I lean back from him slightly.

He shrugs. “Perhaps it’s partially true.” He closes his eyes for a moment. “But at times I admit I was driven by fury, by intense hatred.”

My breath stutters. My feelings for Tynan have warmed, and I’d hoped his had too. If I’m permitted to stay here at camp, I hope we can remain friendly and perhaps do this again. “Do you still hate me?”

“ Hate you?” He pulls me more tightly against him. “No. Never.” Grinning, he winks. “Well, not for at least a day now.”

He shifts his hold on me, so he can look more deeply into my eyes. “The fury I felt tonight wasn’t driven by hatred of you . My fury was directed toward my grandfather, toward my father, my older brothers. My entire male line.”

“Oh, I see.” But even as my words are out, I realize I’m not certain what he means. “You were angry about what I did to your family.”

“No. I applaud what you did to my grandfather. I greatly admire how you were clever and brave enough to make your escape.”

“Then what was it?” I look up into his eyes seeking answers.

“The anger I plowed into you—” his eyes flutter closed “—wasn’t about what you did to them, but about all the things they’ve done to me.” He turns away. “When you called me weak, my fury exploded like a lighting stick to dry tinder.”

“Oh.” Is his skin so thin he can’t tolerate such a small insult? “I apologize.”

He cups my face in his hand. “I’m the one who must offer apologies. That word—” he shakes his head “—it set off an explosion inside me.”

“Why?”

He stares into my eyes for what feels like a very long time, and slowly, the gulf that opened between us fills. Tynan is here in the room again. Here and fully with me.

“In my family—” he blinks “—any tender emotions, any act of kindness.” His body trembles against mine—not with fear, but with fury. Fury that’s not directed at me. I hope.

“Kindness, generosity—any attention to the needs of others…” Shame overtakes the anger in his eyes. “Such things were not only discouraged in my family, they were viewed as signs of weakness. They brought on punishments. Severe punishments.”

Pain flickers in his eyes. “To compensate, I learned to lash out in anger. To quash my own pain and channel my anger, I utter threats and sometimes even inflict the pain I feel upon others.” He turns away from me.

“I’m so sorry.”