Um…
I lift my head slightly, disbelief coursing through me, but she presses me back down with a firm hand. Her palm is warm against my scalp, possessive.
“I said don’t stop.”
What the fuck?
The door opens. Footsteps. A pause that stretches too long.
My heart is hammering against my ribs, but not entirely from embarrassment. There’s something thrilling about this—about being claimed so completely that she doesn’t care who sees. About being hers in a way that’s undeniable.
“We need to talk.” Thane’s voice, clipped and professional.
I can’t see him from this angle, but I can feel the tension shift in the room. The weight of his presence. Bree doesn’t even flinch.
“Then talk,” she says simply.
My brain short-circuits. She wants me to keep going? With Thane standing right there?
But her hand is still in my hair, stroking through the strands like I’m exactly where I belong, makes the decision for me. If she’s not embarrassed, then neither am I.
I press my mouth back to her, feel her respond immediately. Her breathing picks up again, and I have to bite back a groan at how perfectly she fits against my tongue.
“They’ve requested to visit the sanctuary,” Thane says, his voice carefully neutral. “The Council. Two weeks from now. A formal dinner, followed by an inspection of the chamber.”
The words filter through the haze of heat and want, but it’s hard to concentrate when Bree’s fingers are stroking through my hair and her thighs are trembling on either side of my head.
Council visit. Inspection. Those should be alarming words, but right now all I can think about is the way she tastes and the soft sounds she’s making.
“Tell them they’re welcome,” she responds, calm and collected like she’s discussing the weather instead of hosting the people who’ve been trying to control her for months, while I work between her legs. “We’ll prepare a proper reception.”
“What kind of inspection?” I manage to ask, lifting my head slightly so I can see her face.
“The Ashen Oath chamber,” Thane answers. “They want to see it. Verify access.”
Bree’s hand tightens in my hair, not in pleasure but in something sharper. There’s a flicker of something in her eyes—calculation, maybe. Planning.
“Perfect,” she says, and I can see the way her lips curve into a smile that doesn’t quite reach her eyes. “It’s time they saw what real power looks like.”
I press a soft kiss to the inside of her thigh, keeping my mouth busy while watching her face. There’s a pause. Something unspoken passing between her and Thane, and even though I can see her expression, I can’t read the full dynamic between them. The air feels charged in a way that has nothing to do with what we were doing before he arrived.
“You can go now, Thane,” she says, and there’s an edge to her voice that wasn’t there before. Not cruel, exactly, but dismissive. Final. “Unless there’s something else?”
Another pause. Longer this time.
“Two weeks, then.” His footsteps retreat. The door closes with a soft click.
The moment he’s gone, the tension in Bree’s body shifts back to something purely physical. She exhales slowly, like nothing unusual just happened.
“Where were we?”
I look up at her, half-dazed by the whiplash between political maneuvering and this. “You want me to—”
“Finish.”
The command in her voice, the way the firelight catches in her eyes and turns them molten—it’s intoxicating. I dive back in with renewedfocus, the adrenaline from being watched somehow making everything more intense.
She’s close now, I can tell from the way her breathing changes, the way her fingers clench and release in my hair. I work her with single-minded determination, chasing every gasp and tremor until she breaks apart beneath my mouth.
