“Healed weeks ago,” I panted, meeting his glazed eyes and grinning, twisting my hand as I stroked him again. “I missed seeing you like this.”
“Owned completely by you? Aching for more? On the verge of begging?”
I squeezed him from base to tip and found a spot on his throat to drag my teeth. “We can do better than on the verge, husband.”
His groan filled the entire room, his hands squeezing my ass deep enough to leave impressions. “Please,” he breathed.“Please,Ameirah. I missed you too much to wait this long, you’re killing me.”
I kissed his throat, smiling against his damp skin. When one hand left my backside, my toes curled in anticipation of the firsttouch, and Varidian didn’t disappoint. My husband never did. I crashed my lips into his as the pads of his fingertips circled, sending sparks through every nerve ending.
My body thrummed with heat and the memory of burning up on the rooftop, my deathfyre destroying the medallion, killing the king, was too close for comfort. So I kissed Varidian until the taste of him drove out the remembered smoke, touched him until his groans replaced the sound of wyvern roars, and rode his fingers until pleasure overrode fear.
“Dearling,” Varidian groaned, then gasped,“Menace,”when I lightly ran my fingernails over the length of him.
“I want you now.”
“No.” His fingers sped, his body holding mine captive against the wall. “Not until you’re gasping my name.”
“If I gasp it now, will you give me what I want?”
His laugh vibrated over my throat as he kissed me there, then lower, his hot tongue tracing the rise and fall of my collarbones. “No. But I’ll never turn down a pretty gasp from my beautiful wife. Or a plea.”
Everything clenched inside me when his open-mouthed kisses found the juncture of my neck and shoulder, so sensitive as his fingers stroked hot, aching flesh.
“Varidian, please.Please.”
He groaned, teeth scraping down my chest, his head bowed so he could capture my nipple in his mouth. The sensation made me arch off the wall, my body sliding against hot, slick muscle until I could hardly stand it. How quickly I’d lost my control. How quickly he commanded me.
Two fingers glided inside me, slow as he made sure to brush every sensitive spot until my legs trembled. I dug my fingernails into the back of his neck and forgot about every injury we bore.
“Give me my favourite sound,” he said against my breast, his tongue lapping, sending sparks directly to where I clenchedaround his fingers. “Let me hear the cries of my wife coming for me.”
The words were enough to push me right to the edge, and I panted there, shuddering,so close.I might have whimpered the words because Varidian sank his teeth into me, sharp canines and all. And as his thumb swept urgent circles over my clit, my eyes rolled back and pleasure struck, as fierce and all-encompassing as a wildfire.
It burned away the weeks of distance, the fear and panic, the dungeon and Riverren and the rooftop where I killed a king. Nothing existed except this, except pleasure so intense it rewrote history.
“Ameirah,” Varidian grunted, one hand finding the back of my neck as he pressed me flat to the wall, the other trapped between us. His hands shook, and my toes curled at the stimulation, but I only realised it was involuntary when I sighed and melted against him and his handskepttrembling. “I can feel you. I canfeel you.”
I dropped my head onto his shoulder, my breathing slowing. “Well, your fingers are still inside me.”
He shook his head, flicking droplets onto my shoulders. “Ameirah. I can feelyou.I felt your release as if it was my pleasure. I can feel you now, sated but with simmering need, as if you want more.”
“You know I do,” I murmured, trying to get my mind to function again. “Are you sure you’re not imagining it?”
“I’m sure,” he said with enough snarl to his words that I believed him, stroking his shoulders with soothing gestures and slowly aware of the sting at my breast. “It’s like my awareness of you with the marriage mark, but so much clearer. Intense.”
He relaxed against me with I ran my fingers through his wet hair, though his breathing remained fast.
“There are old stories, no more than legends now,” I murmured, trying to reach through my chest to feel his emotions. All I found was my own lazy satisfaction and a bright spark of curiosity. “Fae who could sense each other, not just their locations, but their feelings, their pain, their needs. Fae who shared bonds that went far deeper than anything we know now. Bondmate warriors who could share power and strength. Soulmates whose love was eternal and unbreakable. Platonic heartmates whose friendship never wavered, who always knew when the other was in trouble.”
“You and your stories,” Varidian said so fondly and with so much love that my chest grew full to bursting. “You think our marriage has grown into one of these legendary bonds?”
I shrugged, splayed my hands over his chest, tracing the ink and scars there but avoiding the new scar. “Dark legends have been reborn. The lightning soul has returned. Why not mates too?”
“I’d say that was wishful thinking if I couldn’t feel your awe, your hope.” He kissed me once, twice, then returned to my mouth for more.
“What do I need right now?” I asked, heat and affection blooming as our gazes locked.
“Are you testing me, dearling?”
