He doesn’t understand. I try not to let my voice crack. “Every time you sing, it's like the magic of it stays in me. I hear it in my sleep. I feel it calling me to you, even when you’re silent. There’s this constant pull. I can’t . . . I can’t get it out of my head, Rune. I’ve never wanted anything more than I want you.” He goes still. “But what if the feelings I have are influenced by your power? How am I supposed to know—”
“Little doe,” he says, shaking me slightly to halt the words. “Mine is not a magic that lingers. I’ve no real power outside of the water. When the song ends, it ends. I did sing for you. I had to. I poured every ounce of power I had intothat ruin. If I hadn’t, you would have been gone. And what would I have done then?” His blue eyes bore into mine. “What would I have done then?” he repeats, softer, before sliding his grip on my shoulder down past my elbow, lifting my arm to plant a soft kiss on the inside of my palm.
“But . . .” My mind reels, trying to make sense of how his lips press into the skin of my hands like he doesn’t see the blood that stains them. “I’m Nisse.”
He reaches down to pull my other hand to his lips, this time, kissing the knuckles. “Not anymore.”
Relief crashes over me at the tenderness, but his giant hands pull me in. “Come here,” he says, and though I move to kiss him, he scoops me up and carries me to the washroom, his towel falling on the way in a rustle alongside the soft footfall of each of his steps.
“What are you—?”
“Shhh.” He pulls me up so the words brush my ear. “I want to wash you.”
There’s an oil lantern flickering in the corner, joining with the brush of light from a full moon that ghosts through the window.
“I hope you plan to make it quick,” I say lightly, even as something in me weeps for the idea.
He sets me down beside the tub, his lips brushing the sensitive skin below my ear. I shiver as he speaks. “I don’t.” Sensation zaps from where his breath skims my neck all the way down to where I’m already slick for him. “Take off your clothes, Odi.” I tug at the hem of my shirt and he helps it over my head in one motion, revealing the scars on my bodyand the viper-shaped ink on my arm. Slowly, he slips gentle fingers under my wraps, loosening them until they fall away. As I go for the tie on my pants, he steps around me to get into the tub, and I realise it’s filled with clean water and the aroma of salt and oranges. Like he’d already planned to coat me in his scent.
Once the cool air kisses my bare legs, he reaches out to beckon me in, but there’s no way we’ll fit. He takes up the lion’s share of the room, but I take his hand, and somehow we do, with my back flush to his chest, half in his lap so the hard length of his cock rests between my legs. He reaches forwards to thread my fingers, then holds both my hands to my chest with one of his own. I suck in a breath as the first brush of contact drips water down my stomach. It’s warm, but the touch is too gentle. Intentional. Like it’s meant to prove to us both we’re still here.
All is quiet as he dips the sponge in the water again, and it splashes in drips over my thighs. “Rune,” I say as he runs it over my shoulders and across my back, tightening his grip on my hands, like he thinks I might try to bolt away. He’s right. I don’t know if I can take this. The water tracks down my skin, slips down my spine. “Rune.” My voice cracks, sounding strange in the empty air. I’m not sure what I intend to say.
Just as well he doesn’t answer.
Instead, he lifts my hands up over my head, pulling me up on my knees, and runs the sponge down the bottom of my arm, then scrubs slow circles beneath my breasts. Everything in me feels painfully exposed, like he’s washing away what’s been there too long. Like he already knowswhat he’ll find underneath. I can’t help the part of me that wants to shy away. Not the animal this time, but me. The woman whose body has only ever been a weapon to tend to rather than . . . this.
He trails his lips up my shoulder as he lowers us down, planting slow kisses down my neck. I dive into the sensation, using it as an anchor. My hips move on their own, seeking friction, slipping against the length of his swollen cock. “So impatient,” he says. But I’m already trembling. The water below splashes again, and he sits back before squeezing it over my hair and using his fingers to scrub at the roots.
“Prince.”
“Hmm?”
“Let me touch you.”
“I’m not done yet.” Then he’s wrapped each of his hands around my wrists and pushes me forwards so my hands grip the side of the tub, his chest grazing my back. A thrill of adrenaline beats through me with every pump of my heart. “Don’t move,” he says. His voice rumbles, and my stomach swoops as I watch talons grow from his fingers on either side of mine.
Besides my chest, which moves with every quick breath, I’m still as he sits up on his knees behind me. The water sloshes, and I gasp as one warm hand grips my thigh, then he pulls my legs out wider.
“Fuck,” he whispers as he trails the sponge over my ass and down each of my legs. The murmur goes straight between my thighs. As if he knows, he glides the sponge between them, favoring one side and then the other, barely grazing whereI need him most. “You’re so perfect.”
My fingers clench the tub’s wooden sides. The water splashes again, then goes quiet as sharp, languid talons graze down my back and around my hips. Every inch of my skin erupts in goosebumps. There’s a wet smack as he slaps my ass, and a spark of pain flares through me before I jolt at the feeling of smooth, untaloned fingers slipping in teasing circles around my clit. Heat immediately starts to burn low and build, and I arch into the friction, reaching for more. He grips my hips, keeping me still, and when he finally sinks a finger into me, he speaks. “I want to watch you break on top of me.” Another finger joins the first, working in and out, growing slicker with every pass. “But that will require us to move to the bed.”
“Please.” I can’t take it anymore, but he doesn’t stop, just keeps his fingers moving in slow strokes. I continue to beg, my voice is needy and breathless, dangling on the very edge of my sanity.
Finally, he stands and steps out of the tub, splashing water over the floor as he goes. The sight of him sends a fresh wave of arousal dripping down my legs. The light catches every dip and cut of sharp muscle. On the glittering scales that shine up his arms and in patches on his face. He could be a statue. A god of the sea. His cock twitches, and my eyes lock on the movement. It strains into the air, already dripping from the tip. Rune glides his fingers over the head, then fists his hand along the length and pulls in one slow stroke, his attention glued to the way my eyes widen.
“Don’t stop,” I say, crawling over the lip of the tub. The floor is cool on my hands and knees, but his eyes are heavywith heat, the high points of his cheeks are flushed with red, and the groan he gives as I rise to catch the beading precum with my tongue, makes power sing through my veins.
“Odi.” His talons thread through my hair, and I respond by swallowing him down in one motion, as deep as he’ll go. His hips jerk and his hiss sends another thrill of victory through me. I bob up and down in time with his hand, swirling my tongue over his head and flicking the sensitive triangle of skin at the bottom. He begins to move with me, rolling his hips, meeting me for every stroke, fucking his hand and my face. “Fuck, Odi.”
I groan, urging him on. I’m growing wetter. My nipples ache from how taut they are against the cool of the air. I need to take more of him, but the grip in my hair tightens, then pulls me off with a wet pop. I suck in a sharp breath and then whimper as he brings my body up, lifting me off the floor. My nipples brush against his chest as he pins us together with a single, massive arm. I wrap my legs around his waist and lock my lips with his, still needing to taste him. He responds in kind, sweeping his tongue against mine as he moves us to the bed.
He lays back on the blankets, never breaking the kiss. The wood of the bedframe protests at the added weight, but the mattress is soft beneath us and he uses one hand to line himself up and the other to hold my hips as he eases in the tip of his cock. I press back into him, greedy for the way I know he’ll fill me, and he takes my cue, easing out and back up, working deeper, stretching me to the point of sweet sting.
“Too much?” he asks when my breaths grow shorter. I shake my head no, unable to pull in enough air to speak. The world has narrowed to this moment—the strength of his chest pressed to mine, the way his arms engulf me, how he peppers my shoulder with light kisses, so soft I hardly feel them as he rolls his hips, reaching deeper and deeper.
When he’s finally seated all the way, he stills, waiting for me. It doesn’t take long before I sit up, letting my nails dig into his chest, feeling another rush of wetness at the predatory way his eyes travel over my parted lips and peaked breasts. He nearly takes up the whole bed. I’d never noticed it before, but with him beneath me now, in his half-shift, it’s undeniable. My hands look small compared to his shoulders, and when he wraps his hands around my hips, his fingers nearly touch.
