Kiss of a Demon King

24

What are you going to do about my sister?' Lanthe demanded of Omort. Only her concern for Sabine gave her courage with the monster before her.

He didn't even seem to be a man any longer, just per­sonified wrath. Hettiah knelt at the foot of his throne, with her head bowed, constantly shuddering as if with cold.

Over the last several hours, he'd killed again and again, Inferi, revenants, even rage demons abducted from their towns.

But nothing could appease him. Bodies had piled up all around the well, with sightless eyes and tangled limbs on a canvas of blood. The stench and flies were becoming unbearable.

"You've got to send the fire demons after her. They can teleport-"

"You think I haven't considered that?" he yell "Rydstrom will have taken her to Grave Realm-there are ways off-plane there. And none of the fire demons or vampires have been there before!"

Demons and vampires could only trace to places they'd previously been. Lanthe didn't know if Omort was aware of this, but whether or not the vampires could teleport to Grave Realm was irrelevant. None were allied here any longer.

The covenant tablet between the factions had broken, and when Lothaire's legion disappeared, it had become obvious who had betrayed Omort-and Sabine. The fire demon king remained allied, but for how long?

Truthfully, Lanthe wasn't worried about Rydstrom hurting Sabine. In fact, she believed he would protect his female with his life. What she was worried about was Sabine's morsus. "Omort, if we can't find her, when will the poison hit?" Lanthe asked.

He gave a humorless laugh. "A week before she expects it to."

"You lied to her about that?" she cried.

"It matters naught," he said. "You'll open a portal to Grave Realm. The revenants will scour the area and retrieve her this eve."

Lanthe swallowed. "I don't . . . have a portal to give you."

When Omort had called for Sabine's Inferi to tor­ture and kill, Lanthe had made a command decision,

opening a threshold to save the servants under her and

Sabine's protection. Lanthe honestly believed her sister was safer with the demon than any being inside Tornin.

And the sisters had made a pact that if anything should

happen to one, the other would provide for and protect her Inferi.

Omort faced her with confusion in those yellow eyes. "What are you saying to me?"

"I can't generate a threshold for several more days." When he shot to his feet, storming toward her, she scut' tied back from him. "If you do anything to me, you'll never get Sabine back."

"Or, I could take your power." He raised his palms, sinister heat rising above them. "And butcher your use-less body. ..."

Sabine flailed and coughed as the demon lugged her to

a beach.

"It took you long enough!" She'd thought she would drown again, was sure of it, until she'd felt his hands clamping her sides.

"I dove straight down!" Glowering at the metal as if it were to blame, he took hold of her headdress, unlock­ing it from her collar.

"No!" she cried.

But he tossed the piece over his shoulder toward the camp. Once he'd removed her choker and spun it away like a Frisbee, he clutched her ankles. Before she could react, he'd snatched her feet out from under her. When her back met the sand, he was already yanking a boot off.

"Stop this, demon!" Fighting him was futile, but she still tried. She kicked out, aiming for his recently injured chest, connecting a couple of solid hits.

He didn't even seem to notice them, flinging her boots away. "You're my captive. My responsibility. I'll make sure you're clean."

After her spanking, Sabine had noticed that Ryd-

strom had calmed, that wild look diminishing-but in no way disappearing. Now it was back full force. His very voice was altered, his language and bearing decid­edly not kingly. He'd held himself rigid and aloof before. Now there was a fluidity in the way he moved.

Glaring up at him, she said, "And I suppose I don't have any say in this?"

He shook his head slowly, his attention already on her bustier. He stood, hauling her to her feet. With his brow furrowed in concentration, he began unlacing the intricate knots of her top, unraveling the swollen leather ties.

He was getting aroused once more, that thick shaft rising. His movements became unhurried, as if he rel­ished this task and didn't want it to end.

Once he'd removed the bustier, his gaze was trans­fixed by her breasts, rising and falling with her hectic breaths. He seemed to give himself a shake, then worked her skirt down her sandy legs.

"Enough!" She bucked against him again, thrashing her body, but he looped an arm around her waist to still her.

With a slap on her still burning ass, he gave her a look of warning so menacing, she decided she might heed it. "Stand here. Do not move." He tugged down her panties and mesh hose, tossing them into a pile.

After he'd stripped her completely, he began unbraid-ing her plaits. His countenance was fierce, but he han­dled her hair with infinite gentleness.

When he'd finished, he pulled her into the water up to her knees. There he laid his hands on her shoulders,

pressing her down to kneel, putting his jutting shaft right in front of her face.

Just when she thought he was going to try to force her to take him with her mouth, he knelt before her.

Once he'd rinsed the sand from her, he began invests gating her body. He traced her collarbone with those big demon hands, his eyes following his movements, then his lips. When his gaze dipped to her breasts she knew what would follow. He grazed rough palms over them, kissing her nipples with the merest brush of his lips.

Somehow, he was being gentle with her, his caresses so out of place with the anger she could feel still seeth-ing inside him. His touches were . . . tender. Consola-tory. But did he want to console her over what he'd done-or what he was about to do?

He scooped water over her chest, licking it from her breasts, sucking drops from the tips. He used his teeth to nip at her straining peaks, then he drew back to stare at them. His eyes were riveted on them, as if he was fasci­nated with this part of her.

She cursed her body for responding once more. But she was unfulfilled from their earlier encounter, and from nights of yearning for him even before her abduc-tion. Her lids grew heavy, her earlier alarm and rancor

ebbing.

He ran his lips over her ear, nuzzling it as he said, "I've waited a long time for my female. Fifteen centu-ries, I've gone without her." He gently ran his horns against her neck. "Without you. No longer."

He clasped her shoulders and turned her so he could drag his lips down her damp back. When she shivered,

he rasped, "You still like my touch." He drew the backs of his dark claws across her sensitive ass. "You always will."

By the time he'd turned her to face him once more, his kneading and kissing had put her in a daze of lethar­gic arousal. When he eased his hand between her legs, cupping her, she rested on him, pressing herself into his palm, leaning her forehead on his shoulder.

A daze . . . do what you will. . . She didn't care. Until he raised his other hand to her face.

She stiffened and scrambled back. In a deadly tone, she said, "Don't ever touch my face, Rydstrom."

Nine times out of ten, when a man had his hand raised in the vicinity of her face, it was either to cow her or kill her. In her five hundred years of life, this had proven true.

"I do as I please with you." When he grasped her chin, she flinched, and damn him, he noticed the weakness.

"You don't have any right-"

"You gave me that right with your treatment of me."

He ran his other palm lightly over the front of her neck. When he frowned as if he'd perceived the raised scar that was still invisible, she fought to get free, but he held her tightly. She had only so long before her illusions faded. Soon he'd see the white streak in her hair, the scar at her neck. She'd never imagined she'd be powerless near him.

"Are you going to want sex with me now?" she hast­ily asked to distract him. "Because I already gave at the office-"

: '"No."

"-and it was a debacle . . . what did you say?"

"I'll make the same deal that you offered me. You'll concede something to me before I'll take you. Some­thing you'll never want to say."

Parity for the wedding vow she'd forced him to give her.

"You'll say: 'I beg you to claim me. I need you as my master and surrender my will to yours.' And when you do, I will reward you."

"So, then . .. never."

"I vow to you I won't take you until you say these words to me. And I won't let you come until you either beg me for it or until your three nights have passed."

"If you're not going to demand sex from me, then you're keeping me only because of your revenge?"

He stared down at her with eyes dark like night. "And because I keep what's mine." With his hands clasped behind her head, he rubbed his thumbs over her cheekbones, then leaned in to kiss her.

Their last real kiss had been frantic, maddening. Like a drug to her. Now he licked her bottom lip before tug­ging it between his teeth.

When he finally took her mouth, he slipped his tongue in, tempting her to meet him.

She soon did, lapping at him, making him groan. His shaft prodded against her belly, and her hips began rocking toward it. Her back arched to get her nipples against his warm body.

But he broke away, leaving her breathless. She was still blinking for focus, dizzy from his kiss, when he swept her up in his arms, lifting her from the water.

"What are you doing now?"

Without a word, he carried her to the pallet beneath the tree, then laid her on it, still wet, with water drops trickling down her sides.

He untied the rope between her wrists-but only to lead it toward the mink. "Wait. . . No, demon!" But he forced her arms over her head, binding her to the tree.

Then he knelt before her. "Spread your legs."

"Go to hell."

With his big palms covering her inner thighs, he forced her legs open, then gazed at her for long moments.

She wanted to look away, but she couldn't draw her eyes from his compelling face, his scar lit by the fire.

"Do you know how bad I've wanted to taste you?" When he licked his lips, she almost whimpered. "Mouthwatering," he rasped. "So beautiful." Again, his voice sounded unfamiliar.

He bent down and nuzzled her curls, making her cry out. Then he brushed his mouth against her sensitive lips, his breath hot on her.

She drew her knees up around him. "Rydstrom! Ah, gods ... do it!"

"Do what?" He spread her flesh with his thumbs.

"Taste me ... kiss me," she breathed.

When his tongue first dipped to her, he groaned against her so hard, she felt it. She moaned with abandon.

Pressing his mouth to her core, he delved his tongue, licking her deeply, thoroughly. He was making her melt for him . . . exploring her with his lips, his fingers- nothing was sacred.

Never had she been kissed like this.

"Your taste . . . drives me mad," he snarled with a firm lick over her throbbing clitoris. His tongue snaked over it again and again, without mercy, until she was helplessly undulating to his mouth. Getting close . . . so close.

She could see he'd begun pumping his fist over his shaft, the gold band on his bulging bicep glimmering with his movements. The rhythm grew more furious with each flick of his clever tongue.

The demon was wild with her. The corded muscles of his body visibly tensed for his orgasm. He growled against her just before his semen began lashing over her hip.

"Hot. It's so hot," she gasped, on the brink of release herself.

But once he'd finally finished spending, he drew his head up from her. She gazed at him, realizing he was pleased that she'd watched him come, excited by that.

With a satisfied groan, he collapsed onto his back. As she watched his penis still pulsing over his rigid stomach, she hungered for it, shamelessly rolling her hips for it.

Had she actually wanted to forego sex? Now she was desperate for another try.

As soon as he'd caught his breath, he said, "Back to the business at hand," repeating her words from the first night she'd captured him. He leaned down to her once more. "I could do this all night. Think I will..."

"Yes!" He began devouring her again. "More," she moaned, going out of her head. Just when she was about to come, he pulled back.

"No, no, no." She stamped her feet. In a gasping voice, she said, "You are seriously . . . making me . . . want to kill you!"

"Uh-huh." He leisurely grazed the backs of his fingers all along her body, making her shiver. Just when her breaths had calmed somewhat, and she'd closed her legs, he said, "Wider."

Gritting her teeth, staring at the branches above, she let her knees fall open.

For hour after hour, Rydstrom kept her on the brink. He'd come twice more, but then he'd begun to pace himself, determined to outlast her.

He'd never seen a woman in this kind of frenzy. Her head thrashed, her mane of red hair drying and spread­ing out over the blanket. Her nipples strained up to the sky as her back arched.

Illusions of flames burned all around them.

Withholding her pleasure was punishing for him as well-it took all his will to disobey the driving instinct to sate his female. But her reaction also excited the hell out of him.

Yet she wouldn't break. Though he ached to mount her pale body, to ride her relentlessly, this was a battle of wills, and he simply didn't lose them....

By the time the moon had begun to set, she was panting, her body sheening with sweat. Her nipples were puckered and swollen.

As he lay beside her, she earnestly gazed into his eyes, whispering, "J-Just hold me, demon. I can move against you."

The image her words conjured made him want to groan. Him clasping her little body tight, with her rubbing her sex against his shaft-until she quivered in his arms....

He bent down and swirled his tongue around one of her nipples, murmuring against it, "Beg for me, sweet. And I'll make you come till your eyes roll back in your head."

"Never!" She thrashed her head, crying, "You don't understand-"

"Don't I?" he grated, sitting up.

Arms still tied above her, she collapsed over on her side, her small body trembling, her knees drawn to her chest. While he watched, her eyelids fluttered closed as she finally passed out in exhaustion.

It was still dark when she woke. She was alone on the pallet, with no idea how long she'd been out. She frowned down at her body. He'd released her from the tree and cleaned her?

When she glanced up, she found him naked, lean­ing back against a boulder, his arm on his raised knee. He was watching her with an inscrutable expression. Though he was still demonic, it was fading, his obsidian eyes not so frenzied.

She'd never forget the possessiveness in his gaze tonight. Shivers coursed over her skin when she recalled the pure masculine pride on his face when he'd realized she'd watched him spending.

He stood then, a magnificent male in the flesh-with a body made for sex. The demon belonged out here in the harsh wilderness, a being from myth, a male from legend.

And he was her husband.

When he joined her on the pallet, her body was still aching, but she was too exhausted even to contemplate

release. He drew her to his chest, then wrapped his arms around her, pulling her tight against him.

She stiffened at the unfamiliar embrace, realizing he meant for them to sleep together. Like this.

But when he rubbed his face against hers, her eyelids grew heavy. He was shockingly warm against her as he kissed her neck, her ear. His touches were tender again. It was as if he regretted that she hurt, even as he was the one punishing her. Gods, the demon confused her!

Though he hadn't released her hands, she could still cast scenes from her dreams. Right now, she would give her finest headdress for a stay-awake potion from the Hag. The idea of Rydstrom knowing her private thoughts, her memories....

Sabine worried what this demon would think about her past if it were laid bare for him to see. She didn't want him judging her, or worse pitying her. Her mother used to say, "Gods give me anything but a good man's pity."

Yes, Sabine was anxious, but her muscles were sore, and his body felt so incredibly good against hers. Warm, hard ... safe.

Don't dream . . . don't dream. . . .

Sabine drifted off once more, and then she slept like the dead.