Liora watched him, something old and ugly twisting in her chest. “Funny,” she said. “I remember a time when you would have done anything I asked. Steal, cheat, lie, murder, fuck. For me.”
He said nothing.
“Have I grown so little in your estimation?” she asked. “Or has the girl grown so much?”
“Neither,” he said, but he heard the lie in his own voice.
Liora’s mouth curved. “Very well,” she said. “If words won’t move you…”
She loosened the belt of her robe and let it slide from her shoulders. The garment fell in a soft rush to the floor, pooling around her bare feet.
Chapter ten
Prey
Hunter’sheartskipped.Yearshad not dulled her. If anything, time had honed her beauty into something sharper, more dangerous. Her skin glowed in the early daylight. The curves he remembered—had tried, and failed, to forget—were still there, perhaps a fraction softer, perhaps more human. “Majesty,” he said, looking away.
“Look at me,” she commanded.
His eyes were dragged back of their own accord. Liora, naked before him, slowly crossed the room. She used every inch of herself the way a swordsman uses his blade: deliberate, controlled, knowing exactly where to cut. The sway of her hips, the length of her stride, the tilt of her chin—each movement was a calculated strike against his resolve. She stopped when there was only the width of a breath between them. “You remember,” she sighed, pressing the length of her body against his fully clothed front. His nightshirt did little to dull the heat of her skin. “How you once worshiped me?”
God, he did. The memory was a physical ache in his chest. He remembered the nights he’d spent guarding her door,listening to her breathe, wishing he were the silk sheets against her skin. He remembered the way she’d looked at him earlier—like he was a tool to be discarded—and how much it had shattered him. But now? Now she was looking at him like he was the only man in the world.
Her hands slid up his chest, over the scars and the hard planes of muscle... He should push her away. He should remember the girl he’d promised to protect. But Liora smelled like sin and salvation, and his body was betraying him, hardening with a traitorous, desperate need. He trembled, caught between instinct and conscience. “Liora,” he said, voice barely a whisper. “I won’t...”
“Won’t what?” she asked, letting her lips brush his jaw without quite becoming a kiss. “Won’t kiss me? Won’t fuck me?” She rocked her hips against him, just enough pressure to make him suck in a breath, but not enough to give him relief. “You will. You will find her,” she said, her words a soft rasp against his ear. “You will kill her, and you will leave her bones in the woods. And when you return…” She let her hand slide lower, palm cupping him through the cloth, squeezing just enough to make his knees weaken. “…then,” she continued, “I will give myself to you fully. No more stolen moments. No more half-measures. You and I, together, on this throne. A king at my side, at last.”
“King,” he echoed, dazed. The word hit some deep, gnawing hunger in him that had nothing to do with sex and everything to do with the way he had always stood just outside the circle of true power. He had never really considered it before. He only wanted Liora. But this new thought woke something deep inside of him that he didn’t know was there.
“Say it,” she urged, drawing back a fraction so she could see his face. “Tell me I’m beautiful.”
He swallowed, Adam’s apple bobbing. “You’re… beautiful,” he said, the word coming out strangled.
“Again,” she said.
“You’re beautiful,” he repeated, breathless. His hands, which had been hovering uselessly at his sides, rose of their own accord to rest on her waist.
“Tell me,” she said, grinding her hips against him in a slow, tantalizing rhythm, “that there is no one more powerful than I am.”
“There is no one more powerful than you,” he said, the confession ripped from him like a prayer. “No one.”
She smiled, eyes half-lidded. Praise always did more for her than any caress. “Good,” she said, and rewarded him by rolling her body once more along his, enough to make him bite back a groan.
He was trembling now with the effort of not grabbing her, not taking, not begging. He wanted to sink into her, to lose himself, to forget that he’d saidnoa moment ago.
She could feel his restraint fraying. She pulled away.
The sudden absence of her warmth made him stagger a fraction, like a man leaning on a wall that was no longer there. “Majesty—” he began, reaching for her.
She stepped back, out of reach, lips curving in a small, cruel smile. “No,” she said. “Not yet.”
He stared, pupils blown wide. “You said—”
“I said when Snow White is dead,” she corrected. “Then you will have me. Then we will speak of marriage, of crowns, of you sitting beside me as king. Until then…” Her gaze flicked meaningfully downward. “…you may keep yourself hungry,” she finished. “Hunger makes men do such… impressive things.”
He stood there, chest rising and falling, straining against his own skin. The ache between his legs pulsed in time with the ache in his chest. “You are a cruel woman,” he said thickly.
“You like it,” she replied. “You always have.” She bent to pick up her robe, taking her time, knowing his eyes were on everyinch of bare flesh as she straightened and shrugged back into the silk. “Go, Hunter,” she said, her voice more cool and queenly now that the bait was set. “Follow the trail. She cannot have gotten far on that horse, not if the poison still drags at her limbs. Bring me proof when it’s done.”
