“Oh, I’m in the mood,” I said. “But my idea of reveling does not involve dancing.”
She reached out, taking my tankard from my hand and setting it on a barrel for someone else to finish. Then she rose up on her toes and leaned in close, her lips brushing my ear as she spoke.
“I am hungry, Vidar,” she whispered, her tone sending chills straight down my spine and to the tip of my cock. “But I fear your body is too broken for the things I’d like it to do for me.”
“Doc says there are no breaks. Just bruises, love.”
The excitement that lit up behind her eyes was all I needed to see.
I turned my head into her neck, taking in her scent before I backed up and nudged my cabin door open with my foot. I slipped inside and waited for Dahlia to follow, aching to quench both our needs.
As soon as the door closed, my body was searing. I watched her lower the latch to lock us inside and when she turned, those stormy eyes were a tempest that fed the wildfire in my core. Each breath she took lifted her breasts against the top of her bodice and all I wanted to do was rip the damn thing off her and let them spill out.
“I did not frighten you too horribly, did I?” she said. “When I pretended as if their torture bothered me?”
“Frighten me? No.”
“I knew his face. From our dream.” The corner of her mouth quirked again. “He tasted as foul as I expected.” Her eyes flitted toward mine, darkened by her desire. “I want you to cleanse him from me. Make me forget what he tasted like.”
Dahlia was my monstrous addiction, and I was her tonic for the madness the sea wrought on her vulnerable mind. Night after night she dreamed ofhim.The father, she and Meridan called him. Akareth. The terrible god below that neither of them could truly say existed, but signs of him were everywhere. In the beastly creatures that stalked the waves. In the changing tides. In the wayDahlia was haunted by something pulling her to the depths every time she let her guard down.
I was accustomed to keeping her focused on me to draw her gaze from Akareth. It was my pleasure to rid her of Whitton’s stain as well.
I growled low, advancing on her. I gripped a thick handful of hair at the back of her neck and crushed my mouth to hers, pinning her body against the door with the weight of my own. My lip screamed at the pressure, but I didn’t care. Even as the wound reopened, I couldn’t tear myself away. The image of her seemingly lifeless body sprawled on that table flashed behind my eyes and I kissed her harder. More possessively. Our tongues danced around each other, both fighting for dominance. I moaned as she licked the inside of my mouth, savoring the taste of my blood. She loved it. It drove her wild and the thought that it drove her wild sent heat right to my core every time until I was practically bursting from my pants. Her hands came up, clutching my neck and digging her nails into my flesh. I hissed and reached for her skirts, forcing them upward in search of bare skin. Once I found her thighs, I hoisted her off the ground. Her long legs coiled around me, gripping me tight as she rocked her hips against my groin. A wave of pain roared up my side where I’d been continually beaten in the ribs and I groaned, but it only seemed to excite her.
“I hope they did not damage you too badly,” she breathed against my lips, one hand snaking down between us to tug at the laces of my britches. “I need your strength.”
I turned my head, my teeth grazing her neck.
“Even if they did break me, I’d let you use me to your heart’s content.”
I let one of my hands join hers between us, sliding it up the inside of her thigh to find her wet and craving attention.
“No bloomers,” I smirked against her. “How unladylike.”
She finally breached the laces on my pants and slid her hand inside, gripping the girth of my cock in her fist.
“We both know I’m not a lady. Nor do I want to be fucked like one.”
I slid my fingers through her wet folds, circling her entrance as she rocked toward my touch.
“How would you like to be fucked?”
She turned her hand from my cock and pressed it to mine, forcing two of my fingers into her hot sheath with a gasp.
“Like I just killed that pig of a man for you.”
I hummed against her ear and then dropped her to her feet, but before she could get her balance, I tugged on her arm, making her stumble past me. She placed a hand on the table in the middle of the room to catch her balance, right where I wanted her. Pressing my palm between her shoulders, I bent her over the surface and began ripping at the laces of her bodice. I just needed to see her skin. I needed to feel it. Taste it.
Once I saw her pale shade down the plane of her back, I bent over her, kissing a trail up the length of her spine. She let out a long, shaking breath as I tossed her hair to one side, nipping at the skin on her shoulder. As she squirmed, I threw her skirts up over her hips and slid two fingers deep inside her again.
The way she whimpered made me weak in the knees.
“Ihatedseeing you like that,” I said against the crest of her ear. “Act or not, it was hard to bear.”
“Are you angry?” she whined, pushing back against my bulging hardness. “Because I was. I knew that if he took you from me, I would not be able to control myself. And the water would never stop pulling me back. Akareth’s voice would drown me. I would be lost in his control and deprived of the thing that denies it to him. Does it frighten you to know that? That you hold so much power?”
“Fuck, Dahlia. The day you finally decide to destroy me I will fall to my knees and beg for it.”
