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“Where are you going?” I ask, following him.
“That’s entirely up to you,” he says, bending over to snatch his dagger from where it landed a dozen feet away on a floral-patterned rug. “Who hurt you, Gwyn?”
I know without a shadow of doubt that if I tell him, he’ll portal to their last known location. He’ll hunt them to the end of the earth for what they did to me. And there’s a part of me, however small and feral, that would love for him to do just that.
It’s what they deserve—a brutal death like the one they granted me.
Yet, that’s not what I want.
Hurt doesn’t have to beget hurt.
All the pain and suffering and loneliness they forced upon me had led to this, to him.
I kiss him, soft and slow, savoring the taste of the celebratory wine on his lips, the warmth of his chiseled body pressed up against mine.
“There’s one place I’d like to go,” I whisper against his lips, “but the only person you’ll be able to turn inside out is me.”
He holds up the dagger, the air around us shimmering with anticipation. “Where?”
“My hidden cottage.”
It’s exactly as I left it.
Clean dishes beside the sink, mortar and pestle on the small two-person table, clothes strewn about the floor. Dust coats the dried flowers on the windowsills, and cobwebs dangle from the ceiling rafters.
My cheeks heat.
The last time we were here, disdain sharpened Riven’s features. Now curiosity softens them as I lead him into my bedroom and over to the rickety bed that’s embarrassingly small for one creature, let alone two.
“Is this where you let your imagination run wild?” he murmurs. His lips find the spot where my neck meets my shoulder, and his hands slide down my sides. One drifts lower—between my thighs—and cups me, his fingers pressing just right. “Where you played with this pretty cunt of yours for years and years, aching for cock?”
“Yes.” My thighs squeeze around his hand to add pressure. “Would you like to see?”
His approving grunt is pure sin.
I step away from him, instantly cold, and climb onto the mattress. It creaks beneath me as I spread my legs wide, never breaking eye contact. His gaze darkens as I drag my fingertips over my breasts, pinching my nipples. He watches like I’m a vision pulled straight from his filthiest dreams as I trail lower and lower—
“Stop,” he orders, voice low and lethal.
My hand hovers just above the ache.
“I appreciate the visual,” he rasps, “but if anyone is going to make you come, it’s going to be me.”
“The bed’s too small for both of us,” I tell him, breath catching. “It probably won’t be able to hold our combined weight—”
“I don’t care.”
He pounces on me, springs whining in protest.
Unwinding the ribbon from his wrist—our ribbon now—he loops it around both of mine, tying me loosely to the warped wooden headboard. The gesture is meant to be sexy, and it is, but it also feels sacred, ceremonial.
The second I’m secured, his hand replaces mine and—
Dagny, save me.
His finger strokes through my slick center, slow and reverent, circling but never quite giving me what I so desperately need. I’m thrashing, arching into his touch, body begging for more. When he finally dips one finger inside me, I cry out.
A testing prod, then a teasing second.
