“Thank you,” she said slowly, her cheeks burning. “And I’m sorry. I fear my resistance to cold has left me.”
“You will get it back,” he said. “As soon as your owl returns to your side, your resistance to the cold will return. He is part of your soul. You need each other to survive.”
“You speak with longing.”
His eyes darkened. “I have never had a bond like that.”
For a moment, Reyna could do nothing but stare into his eyes. The wind still roared around the rocks as rain pummelled the ground just outside their enclosure. She did not know how long they had been in their shelter, nor did she care. Right now, it felt as if the world was very far away. All the courtly politics she hated so much, all the battles and the wars. She wanted to forget it all for just a little longer as her heartbeat drummed in her ears.
“I have never been naked with a male before,” she whispered.
Lorcan reached up and traced his finger down the length of her face. She shivered. “I feel very fortunate to be the only one.”
His mouth was suddenly on hers. With a gasp, she curled toward him and opened her lips to invite his tongue inside. He kissed her hard and fiercely, as if a sudden hunger had taken over his mind. A hunger that she felt herself. The weariness of the past two days no longer plagued her. Body lit up by his touch, she dug her fingernails into his back and pulled herself so close that her peaked nipples pressed into his chest.
In truth, she did not know what she was doing, nor did she care to think much about it, lest logic took over and put a stop to it. She had felt a connection to this warrior from the moment she had seen him, and he saw her in a way that no one else ever had. She saw him, too, even if he still kept his secrets hidden away from her.
Back at the castle, she would never again have the chance to give in to her desires, and one day, Lorcan would likely be torn from her side. He was Thane’s warrior. Thane’s confidante. If he ever discovered what she had planned…
His hot mouth on her throat pushed all those thoughts out of her mind. Sparks lit up on her still-damp skin. She moaned as his strong hand slid down the side of her body and then ran along her back to cup her arse. Need curled through her core like fire. The cold of the rain-soaked night was nothing more than a distant memory.
Scratching her fingernails down the length of his muscular back, she shifted her thigh sideways and slid her leg around his waist. He moaned, his hard length now pressing against the very core of her. She was slick with need, and her desire pulsed out a drumbeat between her thighs.
Everything about this male called to her. The way he stood tall and strong when the rest of the world was falling apart. The way he moved with vicious grace as he swung his sword. His dark eyes. The way they saw so much, how they stared right into the very depths of her soul. His sharp cheekbones, his cutting jaw, the mound of delicious dark curls on his head. And the way his body felt against hers.
As his mouth dipped even lower, his lips melting against her aching nipples, she wanted to scream. But she couldn’t. The enemy was close by. Even with the pounding drums of the rain, she couldn’t risk her explosive screams reaching the ears of the wood fae.
All she could do was writhe in the dirt.
He flipped her onto her back and peered down at her. His eyes were hot with need; her desire was reflected in his burning gaze. With a guttural growl, he pinned her wrists against the dirt, and then penetrated her with his massive length. Stars lit up in her vision.
A soft moan slipped from her parted lips as his cock throbbed against her slick walls. A million tiny tremors shook her body. Her breath was stuck in her throat. He pushed in deeper, and her back arched. This was unlike anything she had ever felt in her life.
“You are amazing, Reyna Darragh,” he groaned as he pulled back and then pounded deep inside of her with one intense stroke. She cried out, unable to keep her pleasure hidden any longer.
Again, he slowly pulled back and then slammed hard into her core. She was a mess beneath him. Every single part of her felt alive, but her body could do nothing but shake from the intensity of the sensations pouring through her.She stared up at his dark eyes, and he smiled. Her heart flipped.
Leaning down, he dragged his tongue across her nipple. Heat flooded her veins even as she trembled uncontrollably. An impossible ache had formed between her thighs, a need so great that she could barely think around it. She needed more. More or she would burst into flames.
Lorcan sucked on her nipple as he stroked her aching insides with his hardness. She panted beneath him, and hooked her leg behind the back of him, yanking him toward her, desperate for more. His pace quickened. The whirlwind of sensations threatened to pull her under, drowning her in the thick of it.
And then, suddenly, it was if everything popped. Pleasure throbbed through her core, and her back arched. She shuddered around him, her entire body transforming into a trembling mass of pure delight. Clinging onto Lorcan’s muscular arms as if they were a lifeline, she let go of everything, giving in to her deepest, darkest need for him. It nearly pulled her under.
His moans mingled with hers as his length throbbed hard between her thighs, emptying his seed inside of her.
A moment later, they lay together in the dirt, arms and legs wrapped around each other, sweat glistening on their once-cold bodies. Reyna could barely comprehend what had just happened. She had imagined what sex would be like, of course, but this had far surpassed her imagination. It had felt as if they had shared something far greater than just their bodies. Even if they had not spoken a word through it all.
As the rain continued to thunder down outside, Lorcan shifted to face her and pushed her damp air out of her face, smiling. “I hope you are pleasantly warm now.”
Her face flushed, even after what they had just shared. “I’m certainly not cold.”
The wind caressed her thigh. She frowned. No, that couldn’t be the wind. It still raged through the grasslands, bitter and harsh and terrible. This had felt more like a slight breeze, a whisper of something else.
She glanced down, gasping at the black shape curling around their bodies. It looked like black smoke, drifting through the cave. It looked like...shadows.
Reyna pulled back, heart hammering hard. Lorcan’s face had darkened, and his expression was as unreadable as it ever was. Suddenly, she understood everything. She knew what he had been hiding. He had always seemed different, and now she knew why.
Lorcan was not from these lands. She had guessed it before, but she hadn’t thought it possible. But now she stared the truth in the face.
