Zara woke to faint light coming around the edges of the curtains in a room she didn’t recognize. At first she tensed, dragged back to so many mornings when she’d woken in places that she didn’t know, that sometimes weren’t safe. But then she recalled in rapid succession, the pleasures of the previous night. And she smiled.
Her body ached, but it was a good ache. A well-used, well-pleased ache that came from two men entirely focused on her pleasure. She rolled over to find Hux beside her in the big bed. But Richard was gone.
Hux was asleep, and she examined him in the dimness. She had seen his surrender last night and it was remarkable. Watching him pleasured by another person, another man, was always moving. But it had felt…different…with Richard. Like he was drawing out some part of Hux that he normally hid, even from her.
Hux opened one eye. “I can almost hear you overthinking.”
She laughed and leaned up to kiss him before she settled into his open arms. “I can hear you overthinking, too.”
“Well, it’s a…unique situation,” Hux said slowly. His fingers began to thread through her hair, stroking through the locks and against her scalp gently. “We’ve indulged in heady pleasures like this before, but never with a man who…”
“Who knows what we are? Who is the kind of man with the power to destroy us?” Zara said, glancing at the door.
Hux nodded. “Yes.”
She pondered that statement for a moment. It was true, of course. Richard was a gentleman, with obvious power and wealth. The two of them were thieves and liars, making their way by often illegal or at least what would be considered unsavory means. A man like Richard could break them with a flick of his wrist.
“I know you don’t trust him and maybe I’m a fool. But Hux, I don’t think hewantsto destroy us,” she said softly, and then looked up at Hux.
His expression was troubled as he stared straight across the room at the embers of the fire that glowed in the distance. She sensed the pleasure that remained in him after last night just as it remained in her. But she also sensed his worry. His concern. She sensed a great deal in him in that moment, so much that he normally hid from her in some attempt to protect her.
But things had changed last night. She knew it. She’d felt it when the two men touched her, when she’d watched them touch each other. The world had shifted, and now she wondered if it was possible for them to hide anymore. If this was the moment they could come into the light together in some new way and maybe, just maybe…change?
She cleared her throat and traced a pattern on his bare pectoral muscle. “Hux?”
“Mmmm?”
She wanted to look at him but couldn’t quite dare to do it. “Were you…were you ever embarrassed about my history as the Countess. As a lightskirt?”
He jolted beneath her, and when she forced herself to look up, she found his dark eyes wide. “Where is that coming from, Zara?”
She shrugged. “I…it was just something about the way you reacted at the beginning, when Richard made his initial offer.”
Hux’s expression softened and he reached down to trace her lips with his fingertip. “Zara Cooper, I have never been nor could I ever be embarrassed by you. I’m…I’m proud of all you are and all you have ever been. I’m proud of all you overcame.”
Relief rushed through her at that statement. She’d always thought he felt that way, aside from that brief moment the previous day. But this was the first time they’d ever discussed it. And now it was like a floodgate opened. She wanted to say everything. Even the things that she feared.
“Because of you,” she whispered.
He stiffened further and shook his head but didn’t respond. His twisted expression almost made it seem like he couldn’t respond. Like he feared what would happen if he did.
She sat up and turned to look at him. She needed to look at him now. “Hux,” she began slowly. “You must know that I—”
She didn’t get to finish. He caught her arms and drew her forward, catching her mouth in a kiss. She didn’t fight him, she never had, she never would or could. He swept her away and she wanted to be caught in his tide.
But she knew his tricks. This pleasure was a wall so she wouldn’t declare her heart. He didn’t want it, even if he wanted her.
And that stung more than it should have. Still, she relaxed into him, letting the kiss grow deeper and with more purpose. She wanted him and if he only wanted her and nothing more, that had been enough for years. She couldn’t risk that just so she could say emotions that he considered foolish or unrequited.
She moved over him, straddling his waist, and he moaned against her throat as he traced the line of her pulse with his tongue. She clenched her legs around him at the sensation of his hot mouth on her skin. There would never be a time that this remarkable man didn’t move her. She had to remember that and not get caught up in whatever foolish notions she had about what they should share beyond passion and friendship and protection.
He reached between them, his breath short as he positioned himself at her entrance. She adjusted and he slid in without difficulty. They sighed together and she began to grind into his lap, sinking into pleasure that erased all other thought immediately.
There was no sound but the wet slap of their bodies coming together and the occasional pop and hiss of the dying fire behind them. Zara leaned back and Hux put a hand on each breast, massaging them as she increased her pace over him, balancing herself just on the edge of yet another orgasm. But before her body could find that release, there was a sound of a clearing through behind them.
“My, my, what a sight to see,” Richard said as he closed the chamber door behind them. He was wearing a dressing gown but clearly nothing else beneath it if the outline of his cock against the fabric was any indication.
Zara lifted her breasts a little farther and didn’t slow the pace of her grinding. She just let him watch, his blue eyes dilating, his hands clenching at his sides like he wanted to reach out for them. And she hoped he would give into the impulse. She wanted to feel his skin on hers as she came around Hux’s cock. In a very short time, that had become a need, not just a wish.
