“This is good,” he groans, his hand fisting at his side. “Fuck, it’s good. But it’s not you, Princess. It doesn’t have your pretty green eyes looking up at me. It doesn’t make those little needy sounds you make.”
He’s thrusting in time with the flower now, meeting its pulls, his abdominal muscles clenching with each movement.
“Nothing feels as good as your mouth, Irena,” he groans raggedly. “Fucking nothing. This flower can suck me all day, but it’ll never be the princess who hates that she wants to do it.”
The confession, wrapped in his dirty words, undoes me. My knees feel weak. I’m trembling, and it’s not from the cold.
He’s close. I can see it in the rigid line of his body…the corded strength of his neck…the way his jaw is locked tight. The flower is milking him frantically, its petals fluttering.
“That’s it,” he snarls, his gaze locked on mine, holding me captive. “Gonna come. Gonna fill this fucking flower up. Just like I filled your mouth, baby. Wish it was you. Gods, I wish it was your hot little mouth on me right now.”
With a roar that seems to shake the very roots of the stronghold around us, he comes. His back arches, every muscle standing out in stark relief. I see the intense, rhythmic pulsing at the base of his cock, visible through the frantic flower. It drinks him down, the crimson petals glowing faintly as it takes his release. The sounds are obscene—wet and greedy—and they go on and on until he is spent, collapsing back against the tub, chest heaving.
The flower detaches with a soft, satisfied pop, and slithers back into the greenery, obviously sated. Valen just lies there, breathing hard, covered in a sheen of sweat and bathwater. Slowly, he turns his head toward me. His eyes are heavy-lidded—satiated—but the heat in them hasn’t dimmed.
He doesn’t say a word. He doesn’t have to.
The message is clear, written in the steam and the heat in his eyes—This is what I want to do to you, Princess. This and so much more.
As I finally find the will to turn and stumble toward the archway and the wardrobe, my body is aching and empty, and I know that I want what he wants. That I want to give him everything.
It’s a desire I must not fulfill…not if I ever want to return to my life back at Court.
50
VALEN
She seems to like watching me come. And fuck, holding her gaze with my own while the flower sucked me off was intense. I’d still rather have her mouth or hand or pussy wrapped around my shaft though. I’m still half-hard as I step out of the tub and towel off.
Casually, I stroll over to where she’s standing in front of the carved wooden wardrobe that Horatio promised would contain clothes suitable for the banquet hall. She’s staring at it, but I have the feeling she’s not actually seeing it.
“So—let’s see what we have to wear, shall we?” I ask, coming up beside her.
Irena bites her lower lip and gives me a sidelong glance, as if asking if I’m going to try something. But of course I’m not—she’ll come to me when she’s ready.
“Come on,” I urge her. “Let’s see what’s inside.”
Without waiting to hear her reply, I reach around her and swing open the wooden doors, which are carved all over with magical looking animals and people dressed in Court finery.
Inside, the wardrobe is full to bursting.
Velvets and silks and satins in jewel tones spill out like a damn rainbow. Dresses with corseted bodices…trains long enough to trip a dragon…and sleeves big enough to hide weapons—or an entire person. Everything looks ridiculously formal—like something out of an opera about a cursed ballroom.
And not a single thing is subtle.
I whistle low under my breath.
“Well. Seems like someone likes living large.”
Irena reaches in cautiously and pulls out a gown the color of pomegranate seeds. The bodice is stiff with boning and overlaid in black lace. It looks promising… until she turns it around and realizes the bustier is cut low. Really low. Like, ‘would barely cover the bottom swell of her tits’ low.
Her brows shoot up as she sees the problem.
I can’t hold back a grin.
“Looks drafty.”
“Try obscene,” she mutters, but there’s color blooming in her cheeks.
