Her lips curve in a smile that's both challenge and invitation. "Prove it."
I take my time, peeling away what remains of her clothing with deliberate slowness, savoring each new expanse of skin revealed. She's impatient, tugging at my shirt, trying to hurry me along.
"No," I murmur, capturing her wrists and pinning them gently above her head. "Let me worship you properly, wife."
The word—wife—carries a weight it hasn't before. Not just a title, not just a political necessity, but a designation of belonging, of connection.
When she's finally naked beneath me, I sit back on my heels to simply look at her. The flush that spreads across her skin under my gaze, the rapid rise and fall of her chest, the slight parting of her lips—all of it calls to something primal in me, something possessive and protective in equal measure.
"You're so beautiful it hurts to look at you," I tell her, honesty forcing its way past my usual restraint.
Her eyes widen slightly, as if surprised by the raw emotion in my voice. "Lachlan..."
I silence her with a kiss, not ready for whatever she might say, afraid it might break the spell of this moment. My mouth trails down her throat, lingering on the rapid pulse at its base. My hands map the contours of her body—the delicate curve of her collarbone, the swell of her breasts, the dip of her waist, the flare of her hips.
When my lips close around one nipple, her back arches off the bed, a broken sound escaping her. I take my time, lavishing attention on each breast until she's squirming beneath me, her legs parting in silent invitation.
"Please," she gasps, her hands tangled in my hair.
"Please what?" I tease, my mouth continuing its journey down her body. "Tell me what you want, Princess."
"You know what I want." Even now, a hint of her familiar defiance colors her voice.
"I want to hear you say it." I settle between her thighs, my breath warm against her most intimate place. "I want to hear exactly what you want me to do to you."
Her cheeks flush darker, but her eyes hold mine with surprising boldness. "I want your mouth on me," she says, the words coming out in a rush. "I want you inside me. I want everything you promised."
The blunt desire in her voice sends a jolt of pure need through me. I lower my head, giving her exactly what she askedfor, my tongue tracing patterns that draw increasingly desperate sounds from her throat. Her hands clutch at my hair, her thighs tensing around my head as I drive her toward the edge with relentless precision.
When she shatters, my name on her lips is the sweetest sound I've ever heard. I continue my ministrations through her climax, drawing out her pleasure until she tugs at my hair, silently begging for mercy.
I rise up her body, shedding the last of my clothing as I go. When I finally settle between her thighs, the head of my cock pressing against her entrance, I pause to look at her face. I need to see her eyes when I take her, need to witness the desire I've fought so hard to coax from her.
"Mine," I growl as I push into her, one slow, deliberate thrust that seats me fully inside her heat.
This time, she doesn't fight the designation. "Yours," she agrees, her legs wrapping around my waist, her hands sliding up my arms to my shoulders. "And you're mine."
The reciprocal claim hits me like a physical blow. I've never belonged to anyone but myself, never allowed anyone to stake a claim on me the way I so casually claim others. But as I begin to move within her, as her body takes me deeper with each thrust, I realize the truth of her words.
I am hers. Perhaps I have been since the moment I saw her standing defiant in her conquered castle, golden hair wild around her face, green eyes burning with hatred and fear and something else—something that called to a part of me I hadn't known existed.
Our bodies move together in perfect rhythm, her hips rising to meet each of my thrusts, her inner muscles clenching around me in a grip that threatens to undo my control. I want to make this last, to draw out her pleasure until she can no longer remember a time before us, before this.
I hook an arm under one of her knees, changing the angle of penetration, driving deeper. Her cry echoes off the stone walls, her nails scoring lines down my back that I'll wear proudly tomorrow. I want her to mark me, to claim me as thoroughly as I've claimed her.
"Look at me," I command as I feel her beginning to tighten around me again, her body climbing toward another release.
Her eyes open, the green nearly swallowed by the black of her dilated pupils. The emotion I see there—raw, unguarded, powerful—pushes me toward the edge of my own control.
"Don't close your eyes," I tell her, needing her to see me, to know exactly who is taking her to these heights. "I want to watch you come undone."
My hand slides between our bodies, finding the sensitive bundle of nerves at the apex of her thighs. A few skilled circles of my thumb, and she's crying out, her body convulsing around mine, her eyes never leaving my face. The sight of her completion, the rhythmic pulsing of her inner muscles, draws my own orgasm from me with an intensity that borders on pain.
I collapse beside her, drawing her tightly against me, unwilling to break our connection even as our breathing gradually slows. Her skin is damp with sweat, her hair tangled around both of us like golden ropes binding us together.
For a long while, we don't speak. Words seem inadequate after what just passed between us—something deeper than physical pleasure, more significant than the mere joining of bodies.
Finally, Fiona stirs against me, her hand coming up to trace the line of my jaw with tentative fingers. "I didn't know it could be like that," she whispers, her voice holding a note of wonder.
