Within seconds, he’s removed my underwear, and he lifts me up.
Once on the bed, he flips me over and nudges me forward. I brace both of my hands on the wooden headboard. It’s a simple design, the beams giving me the leverage I need when Roman comes in behind me, his hard cock pressing into my aching center.
My body is ready, even though there’s always resistance with someone of his size. Still, I welcome the bite of pain and pleasure as he pushes through my tight muscles. It takes him a few seconds, and a quick reach around, his fingers pressing against my clit to help me loosen up before he’s fully seated inside me.
From this position, he’s so deep that I swear I feel the pleasure all the way in my gut. As he pulls out once, I brace myself, preparing for—
“Fuck,” I groan as he slams into me, every part of my body on fire as I try not to scream. He does this again. And again. Pulling all the way out and slamming his hard length into me from behind, one hand wrapped around my waist as he holds me in place and the other on my clit as he strokes me in time to his thrusts.
I’m screaming by the time he’s reached five seconds of this, convulsing against him as my body detonates and every part of me comes undone. He doesn’t stop there, although his strokes become smoother, less fierce, but just as heated.
As he starts to move faster within me, his fingers rub the moisture from my orgasm over my center and clit, until we’re both breathing heavily. My legs start to vibrate and I feel him swelling within me. Just as the spiraling energy in my center becomes too much for me to handle, he rumbles my name, and every part of me explodes as we both come at the same time.
Reality fades and by the time I catch my breath, returning from the impossible high, Roman pulls me down onto the bed so that I’m cradled against him. He’s still inside me, the final pulsing of our bodies a sign that the orgasm was as intense for him as it was for me.
His lips press across my shoulders and the back of my neck as he holds me as if I’m the most precious thing he has in the world.
It makes me feel both loved… and panicked.
The final trial is only hours away.
Tonight at dusk, we’ll know, one way or another, how this all ends.
All I’m certain about right now is that I’m not ready to let Roman go.
I’ll never be ready.
CHAPTERFORTY-SEVEN
Iwake up once when Roman carries me, clothed again, back to my sisters, returning me to the empty spot between them. Another sapphire rune settles around us, but this one pulls me toward sleep before I’m alert enough to object to being separated from him.
The ease with which he uses his power on me scares me a little. There are depths to his energy that I still don’t understand.
He backs away quietly into the shadows of the room, and then as sleep finally claims me, I remember that he once belonged in a pack, too. The fact that he brought me back to mine tells me he recognizes the need to bond… even if he doesn’t feel like he can be part of my connection with my sisters, a part of my pack. Yet.
What must be hours later, I wake to his voice and open my eyes to his shadowed gaze. “Nova. It’s time.”
I stretch out my limbs as my sisters stir and my demon wolves open their eyes. For a blissful moment, I forget what Roman’s talking about.
Then it hits me.
I jolt upright. “How long do I have?”
His palm presses to my shoulder, calming me. “I let you sleep as long as I could. You have two hours before you need to be at the arena. Tyrus confirmed that the final fight is still at dusk.”
“Okay.” I exhale, focusing on what I need to do, step by step, while Malia and Taniya rise to sit beside me.
“We’ll help you,” Malia says, her calming energy flowing through me from her touch on my shoulder.
“I need you both to stay here,” I remind them. “You can’t come to this fight.”
They exchange silent looks. “We want to be there, Noves,” Taniya says, the sharpness of her harpy’s nature pricking my shoulder when her talons appear.
Malia gives a firm nod of agreement. “We understand the danger. But we can’t cower here while you go out to fight.”
I’m shaking my head. “Crone could hurt you.”
Roman’s hand lands on my shoulder, resting across Taniya’s taloned hand, a surprisingly united gesture. “I won’t let that happen.”
