I remember his lips closing around my nipple and the scrape of his teeth. The way my back arched off the bed. The sounds I made when his tongue?—
I should be horrified.
I should be ashamed.
Instead, I trace the bruise on my hip with my fingertip and remember the way his hand tightened there, holding me while he pushed deeper. The sounds I made. The soundhemade, rough and low.
My face burns. I press my palms against my eyes and try to breathe through the rush of heat that follows the memories. I can still feel him inside me. The stretch of him. The fullness. The way he moved, slow at first, then harder when I asked for it.
When I begged for it.
Luchairn.
Say it when you come.
And I did. His name spilling from my lips while my body shattered around him. I said it over and over. And he kissed me each time, swallowing the sound.
My stomach clenches. Even now, sore and aching and alone, part of me wants him back in this bed, with his weight pressing me into the mattress, his mouth on mine.
What is wrong with me?
I roll back onto my side, and stare at the wall. The light coming through the curtains is golden and soft. Long past morning. I must have slept for hours.
The last thing I remember is his face above mine in thedarkness. I could barely keep my eyes open, and he was looking down at me.
I want one more thing from you before the sun rises, Moirthalen.
I’d tried to answer, to ask what, but my tongue wouldn’t cooperate and my eyelids kept sliding closed.
I want you to close your eyes and sleep.
That was the last thing I heard. His voice, low and soft, and then nothing.
I don’t know if it was magic or exhaustion or both. I don’t know if he stayed after I fell asleep or if he left. I don’t know anything except that I’ve woken up alone in a bed that smells like sweat and sex andhim. And my skin is still sticky with the evidence of everything we did.
I need to get up. Pushing myself up onto my elbow, I look across the room, and frown.
There’s steam rising from the bathtub that still sits in the corner. Did Cairn refill it while I was asleep? The same way he did the first time. Did he think about me waking up sore and sticky?
My face heats again, at the memory of him watching as I washed, then when he joined me in the water. I shove the memory away and force myself out of bed.
My legs don’t want to cooperate. The soreness between my thighs makes every step cautious, each one a reminder of how thoroughly he took me apart, but I make it to the tub, and slowly lower myself into the water.
The heat stings against the marks on my skin, and I sink deeper, letting the warmth sink into aching muscles, and close my eyes, tipping my head back against the rim.
One of them liked to grab my hair while she used my mouth.
When he’d told me that, I’d felt sick. He’s made comments before about being owned, but never been that clear about it.Never let me see that much.
Three hundred years. Passed from person to person, and made to service whoever selected him. How does someone live with that? And yet hestillasked for my consent. He still bargained with me. He made sure I said yes before he touched me.
Because I want you willing.
I sit up and find the soap and wash cloth. It rasps over the bruises on my thighs as I scrub, harder than necessary, and I welcome the small pain. It’s simpler than what I’m feeling. Simpler than trying to reconcile the fae who hurt me and collared me with the one who gave me his true name. The one who made me kneel at his feet with the one who made sure I was ready before he pushed inside me.
I force myself to finish washing, and climb out. There are clean clothes on the chair. A simple dress in deep green, fresh undergarments, soft stockings. I don’t know who left them. Maybe Cairn willed them into existence. Or maybe they were brought up by someone from the inn. But they fit perfectly when I dress, and I’m lacing up the bodice when there’s a knock at the door.
“My lady?” A woman’s voice. “May I come in?”
