His left hand dug into her thigh, holding her in place against his shoulder, but his other hand traced up on the back of her leg. The feel of it drove her wild, and she dragged her nails up his back, tearing at his shirt.
“No one touches you but me,” he said, fingers climbing higher on her thigh and giving her ass a squeeze where he’d spanked her. “Promise me that.”
“I promise.” How could she not when he was all she wanted?
He turned his face to kiss her hip, then slid his hand higher, his thumb finding her clit even as his index finger slipped inside her. Ahnna sobbed, nearly climaxing—but if she did, he might stop. If she did, he might not give her what she wanted, so she ground her teeth to keep from falling over the cliff of pleasure.
James worked her body as he walked down the path through the jungle, and it began to rain, cold droplets splashing against her bare skin in sharp contrast with the heat of his hand as he rubbed and stroked her, robbing her of control.
“Open the door.”
“What?” She opened her eyes, the world shifting in and out of focus as she fought the climax that was threatening to overwhelm her. Bracing her hand on James’s hip, she lifted her face to see the door to the house.
“My hands are occupied.” He slipped another finger inside her, angling it in such a way that her body shook. Then his fingers paused. “Open the door.”
Ahnna squirmed, trying to renew the friction, but his other hand held her still. “You’re cruel.”
“So I’ve been told. Open the door.”
She caught hold of the handle and lifted it, then heaved open the heavy door, rewarded as his thumb returned its attention to her clit. She moaned, gripping his sides as he walked inside. The house was lit with lamps, but the light seemed to pulse in time with his fingers as he strode through the corridors to her room.
Their room.
“Another door.”
Ahnna reached for the handle, desperate to get inside so that he would finally give her what she wanted, but James shifted so that her fingertips could just brush the handle. She stretched her body, trying to get her hand on the door, gasps tearing from her lips as he mercilessly pleasured her.
“Open the door, Princess.”
Ahnna stretched her body as far as she could, desperate with need as she clung to the edge of oblivion. Her hand closed on the latch right as he added a third finger, stroking her soaked core and shattering her will.
Ahnna felt her back bow as she wordlessly cried out, her wholebody consumed by the pulsing rhythm of her climax. It would not let her go, rolling over her with endless waves until she collapsed against his back, entirely spent.
“Good girl, Princess.”
The latch opened, and James carried her into the room, shutting the door behind them.
Though it should have been impossible, desire surged through her again with the promise of what was to come. James set her on her feet and Ahnna met his gaze, lifting her chin in challenge.
The corner of his mouth turned up as he said, “Don’t look at me like you’re not perfectly capable of getting me to do exactly what you want.”
His face softened, and he reached up and began unraveling her hair. “No more games, Ahnna. Not tonight.”
The curling tendrils of her hair brushed against the small of her back as she nodded, a sudden swell of emotion challenging desire for supremacy. She reached up a hand, tracing her fingers gently across his bruised cheek, his eye still swollen from where Aren had hit him. The cut on his throat with its stitches was a stark reminder of how close she’d come to losing him. “No games.”
She pushed his shirt off his shoulders, the fabric falling to the ground. His muscular torso was marked with yet more bruises and scrapes, the scar from where she’d struck him with her knife in the cabin red against his pale skin. All markers of what he’d endured to get to this moment, and Ahnna knew her body bore the same. She pressed her lips to his shoulder, then looked up at him. “I love you, James.”
His fingers tangled in her hair, the expression on his face making her breath catch. “For a time, I felt consumed with regret for the choices I have made. But standing here, I realize I cannot lament a single choice—for each one was a step along the path that brought me to you.”
Her eyes prickled with tears, and Ahnna blinked rapidly to dispelthem before lifting on her toes to kiss him. She lost herself in the taste of him as James pushed the remains of her bodice to the floor, then unfastened her belt, his fingers trailing over her ass as he let her skirt spill to the floor around her ankles. She untied the laces of the silver sandals, then kicked them away so she stood before him in only her bare skin.
“You are so beautiful,” he murmured, running a hand up her side and cupping her breast, his thumb pressing against the scar where Carlo had cut her. “Every time I look at you, it’s hard to breathe.”
For someone who could be so taciturn, when he chose to speak, James seemed to know exactly what to say, whereas Ahnna was at a loss using language to express how she felt for him. It spooled into frustration in her heart, because she needed him to know how she burned for him. How not a second passed when she didn’t think of him. How the sight of him before her was very nearly her undoing.
So she resolved to show him instead.
Taking hold of his hands, Ahnna placed them at her waist, then again rose on her toes to claim his lips. She parted them with her tongue, closing her eyes as she stroked it across his, then bit at his bottom lip. She kissed along his jaw, his stubble rough against her skin, and the feel of it causing tension to coil in her stomach.
