He thrust in and out, and it didn’t feel like he’d gone very far into me, but the friction still made me freeze up, caught there with my ass in the air at an unnatural angle, half-suffocated in the pillow, still crying. If Ennolu had answered my fevered prayer at that moment, I’d have died instantly, so humiliated and miserable that I didn’t know how I’d bear it if I survived and had to remember this.
Stefan stopped moving and started cursing, and a spurt of hot wetness tickled my insides.
Oh, that felt extremely fucking odd.
And then an irresistible flood of pure, spine-melting pleasure rushed out of my spasming cock, into my stomach and chest, washing the pain away, melting me into the bed, limp and wrung out and whimpering.
I couldn’t open my eyes. I couldn’t move a muscle. My flesh felt like it might simply flow off my bones, except that I didn’t seem to have any bones. My ears rang oddly, and everything under me seemed to be tilting sideways, tipping me with it.
“Fuck me,” Stefan said, and he sounded very unhappy. Had I done something wrong? I wasn’t unhappy. I might be, in a while, once the whole universe stopped buzzing at a frequencythat thrummed delight through my legs and my fingertips and even my hair.
When he pulled out, it made an audible squishy pop, and it hurt. Not much, but enough to be a mote of discordance in the golden fuzziness that surrounded my whole being.
I tried to mumble a protest, but it didn’t make any sense even to me, and then the buzz rose up and pulled me inexorably under the waves of a sea of warmth.
Chapter Eleven
“Remi? Remi, wake up.” Stefan’s voice. My eyes fluttered open, eyelashes catching on the edge of the pillowcase. I blinked. “Remi?”
When he laid his hand on my shoulder, I felt it through fabric. He’d covered me up, then. I’d slept right through it. How very disturbing that I’d been so lost to the world that I hadn’t even noticed.
Oh. Oh, gods.
I had to squeeze my eyes shut against a spinning slap of sudden dizziness. My stomach clenched. He’d covered me up after he stripped me, took me, and spent inside me. My curse. The potion that hadn’t done anything but nauseate me.
“He’s awake,” said an unknown male voice. “I can see it in the flow of his magic around him. But it doesn’t matter if he falls asleep again. I can examine him either way.”
Examineme? That had a far too scientific ring to it, and now my chest had seized up too. Examine me? Like a specimen? While I fell unconscious again? Ennolu preserve me, not that he’d done a good job of it so far. And this man could tell I’d woken by the sight of my magic, which meant…the mage Stefan had sent for. From the palace. Who’d been intended to help me, except that there hadn’t been time…all right. Perhaps he didn’t mean to dissect me after all.
“I’m awake,” I murmured, and pushed up on my arms. The coverlet slid down my bare back.
Stefan tugged it up again. “You can turn over, I’ll keep you covered,” he said, with a strange note to his voice. Well, of course he’d sound a bit off. He had to be furious. Or disgusted. Or—honestly, I had no idea how he’d feel about all of this. Gods, my head had started to ache.
I flipped over, and Stefan smoothed the edge of the covers down over my collarbones and stepped back.
And standing behind him was…surely I had to be delirious, but I didn’t think my imagination would’ve provided the aching stickiness between the cheeks of my ass.
In his attempts to educate me on the world I’d been dragged into, Aldrich had described Duke Lucian’s consort, the intimidating and powerful Lord General Benedict Rathenas, in some detail—right down to his penchant for all-black clothing and the huge ruby on a chain that hung from his left ear. Probably because Aldrich seemed to exclusively enjoy the company of women, he hadn’t sufficiently emphasized Lord Benedict’s absurdly handsome face or the breadth of his shoulders, but I had no trouble at all understanding what had led the duke to marry the man who stood before me, politics and their awkward familial relationship be damned.
He didn’t outshine my husband, though, be damned to both of them. Even with his unlaced shirt hanging askew and his hair a tangled mess, face pale and stubbled, brows drawn together in a brooding frown, Stefan held his own as a blond counterpoint to Lord Benedict’s tall, dark good looks.
And ridiculously handsome Stefan, standing there with his arms crossed and his stormy eyes fixed on me unwaveringly, had gotten that disheveled by spreading my legs and putting his cock inside me.
I tore my gaze away and forced it to settle on Lord Benedict, because my face might combust if I didn’t. I couldn’tthink about that right now. In fact, I ought never to think about it again.
“Lord Remi,” Lord Benedict said, with a courteous little nod. “My apologies for the intrusion.”
I had to lick my lips before I could even think about speaking, and everything still felt so dry. “You need water,” Stefan said, and turned away to my dressing table, which held a pitcher and a glass.
Lord Benedict shot a quick glance over at Stefan with a shake of his head, as if he also couldn’t believe my husband would be that attentive to my needs.
“I think the Lord Consort of Calatria can go where he pleases,” I managed to rasp, trying to smile. It didn’t feel all that successful.
Lord Benedict’s eyes narrowed. “I don’t think we’ve met,” he said, with a note of suspicion—and a faint thickening of the air around him that set my teeth on edge and stirred the edges of senses that had been dormant for so long I hardly knew how to interpret them.
“My valet described you and your earring, and I already knew you were a mage. Stefan sent to the palace for someone.” I started to cough, and Stefan slid a hand behind my shoulders and held out the water glass. A long drink cooled me all the way down my esophagus. Stefan took the glass and whisked his hand away as if I’d burned him. The impression of his skin on mine tingled as if I really had. “It’s not a hard conclusion to come to,” I said, dropping back on the pillow. It might’ve been more polite to sit up, but my spine felt like jelly.
The subtle tension bled out of Lord Benedict’s stance, and he sauntered forward, standing right by the bed. “Then it may be redundant, but I’m Benedict Rathenas, at your service,” he said. “Stefan, out. I’ll call you back when we’re done.”
