Thalos hummed, trying to dress himself in a veil of disinterest, but… it was true.
Damn her.
Even now, he wasn't sure if he'd come to kill her quietly. Without witnesses. To restore order to his oceans. Or… to indulge.
Absently, his free hand moved. Cupping one delicate breast, his glacial eyes fixed to the way her skin grew taut. Peaked. Tiny scales glittering in the gloom as he circled her nipple with the point of his claw.
Her breath caught. High, at the back of her throat.
And he watched a net of bubbles trickle from her gills. Utterly taken by the way her pupils ballooned. Yawning wide. And her thighs—those grotesque, angular limbs so alien to everything he'd ever known—they pressed together. Rubbing, friction to ease the onset of estrus.
Vile.
Hideous, beguiling creature.
"One taste," he hummed, and tipped her chin back. His grip on her throat growing tighter. Greedy. "One chance. And what happens," he crooned, low and careful, "when I decide you're not worth what Nyxarion has sacrificed to claim you?"
Her eyes flashed in the gloom. Amused. "Are you asking permission, sovereign?" she hummed, a smile curling at the corner of her lips. "Already?"
Thalos' claws flexed, brushing her gills, a subtle threat. That if he chose, he could stop her breath with a single press of his fingers.
Bracing, her hands landed on his chest. Fingers spread across his collarbones, touching the dips and hollows. Exploring. Clinging.
It was… discovery.
Digits trembling as she followed the line of his ribs. The edge of his fins.
Jaw flexed, muscle bunching as he went utterly still and let her play. Because his brain was fogged with that damned scent.
Slick.
Citrus and ozone.
Bright and electric.
Etched with a musk that was all hers. Alien. A Siren.
The pheromone-addled, perfume of a body aching for a knot. A creature already marked by his venom.
Gills flaring, he took a breath.
Flooded his lungs with her scent.
Drinking it in. Shameless without an audience. Painting his gills with her scent as he filtered the heavy black waters, Thalos watched her.
Cock throbbing where it was trapped behind his slit, fingers wrapped around her throat, he pulled her closer.
And then, painting a whisper against her lips, he said, "You have no idea what you're doing."
"None," she agreed, giving him more of that maddening submission, before her hands drifted… lower.
Fins flaring, Thalos went still. Utterly. Lips parting when she traced his genital slit. Insistent. Her pretty grey eyes watching his face for any hint that she was succeeding. That her seduction was tempting him to taste his ruin.
Breath hissing through his gills, Thalos flashed his teeth. Deadly. Dangerous. Warning her not to push.
But she ignored him. Easily. "I know what men want of women," she murmured, and her touch grew bold. Pressing at his seam, letting her fingers slip inside—testing his restraint.
Bold. As if she'd done it before.
