I knew he could be brutal. I knew I would learn more of his ugly childhood, hear of more horrid atrocities committed bythose he was with. But none of that would change what I thought ofhim.
So I reached down for the hard, molded muscles of his ass, boldly settling my palm over the ridges of the spiraled scar there. It was the same scar I’d seen on his father when the man had murdered my parents while I hid in a chest. The same white lines I’d seen as a betrayal just before I ran away to Koerlyn.
Harthon stilled, not even daring to breathe, looking as fragile as a man like him could. My heart fissured.
Without removing my hand, I kissed him.
Once.
Twice.
On the third, I’d finally made my point, because he kissed me back, his own moan emanating from his chest, hips nudging forward like he couldn’t stop them.
I gasped at the erotic sensation as they surged forward again, my hips jerking up of their own volition, needing more than those forbidden touches. The next one came deeper, stretching me in an unfamiliar way.
“Carella,” he said in a strained tone. He jerked himself back and held still, forehead resting on mine. “You haven’t done this before.”
When I didn’t deny that obvious truth, he warned, “I do not want to hurt you, but I will.”
I imagined so. I still wasn’t entirely sure how all of him would fit inside of me, but I didn’t particularly care.
“I think this ache might kill me if you don’t take it away,” I whispered, shamelessly desperate.
By some blessing, that was all he needed.
Slowly, body shaking with the effort of restraining himself, he eased forward. Discomfort edged on pain, and I bit my lip. Eyes riveted to my face, he paused. Kissed my cheeks. My forehead. Nuzzled my ear.
My body relaxed, and he moved again. This time I breathed past the discomfort, trusting him completely, losing myself in his tender gaze that watched me with wonder.
That gaze never left mine as he fully joined us, the pressure causing me to hiss. Nor as he started to move, and that foreign discomfort shifted into something heady and addictive. Nor as one hand cradled the back of my neck and the other gripped my hip, bracing me beneath him as his thrusts became more intentional.
And so I saw the moment his dark irises took on a violet hue, my eyes glowing so intensely they were reflected in his, brighter and brighter as his hips moved faster, and breaths became gasps, pleasure mounting into a sharp peak before exploding off the top.
* * *
Harthon’s whiskers grazed my skin as he planted a trail of kisses along the back of my neck, calloused fingertips drawing random shapes along my arm.
My limbs were lax beneath him where I lay sprawled on my stomach, utterly ruined and overwhelmingly content. From his sweet ministrations, Harthon didn’t seem to mind my current state, though I knew his body yearned to go again. A piece of his anatomy—my new favorite piece, maybe—made that abundantly clear the moment he slipped out of my body.
I, too, craved more of him, not caring how sore my body was. But he’d shut me down with a gentle, “As you said, I’ll have plenty more opportunities to savor you. And you, me.”
Now, sleep was trying to drag me under, Harthon’s soft touches aiding its quest.
It had struck me before, many times, how gentle and tender such deadly hands could be. The same was happening now, andI knew I was one of the fortunate few who bore witness to this side of him.
I shifted my shoulders in an attempt to stay awake.
“You should stop fighting sleep,carella,” Harthon admonished.
There was that nickname again, the one that twisted my insides whenever it rolled off his tongue.
“You’ve said before thatcarellameans ‘something rare,’” I said sleepily. “But what does it really mean?”
“It’s from an old clan language. One that arose years ago when the kingdom was fractured and warring clans gained control of the land for a short period of time.” His fingertip ran from my wrist to my shoulder. “It roughly translates to ‘sunshine’ or ‘sunlight.’”
Sunlight.
He’d been calling mesunlightall this time.
