Chapter 50 Throbbing
(Adelaide)
Adelaide could still feel the echo of his breath on her skin long after the door closed. It lingered like phantom heat along her throat and jaw, as if the air itself remembered the shape of his mouth.
The room felt too small. Too hot. Too charged. The very walls seemed to press inward, obsidian ribs closing around a heart that beat too fast and too loud.
She sat frozen on the edge of the bed, heart pounding against her ribs as though trying to break free. The black fur had slipped down her arms, pooling loosely around her waist, leaving most of her bare skin exposed to the oppressive heat radiating from the stone walls.
She tried to pull it back up, but her fingers shook violently. Her nails scraped uselessly against the pelt, catching in thick strands as if even the fur refused to obey her.
She curled onto the bed, dragging the fur with her, breathing hard as she tried to settle her racing pulse. The sheets beneath her were impossibly soft—cool and slick like flowing water, whispering against every inch of her naked body. They shifted when she moved, rippling like a dark tide beneath her, the fabric catching on sweat-slick skin in a way that felt both soothing and unbearably intimate.
She should sleep. She needed sleep. But every time she closed her eyes, she saw him leaning in. Smelling her. Hearing the lie in her voice. Calling her “Little Flame” in a voice like smoke and sin. Each memory arrived sharper than the last, as though her mind kept replaying the exact angle of his jaw, the flicker in his eyes, the way his lips had hovered over hers like a promise she wanted to swallow and spit out all at once.
Her thighs tightened on instinct. The ache low in her stomach twisted painfully.
“Stop,” she whispered into the darkness, her breath quivering. “Just stop.”
But her body wouldn’t listen. Not to her voice. Not now. Not with the taste of his presence still coating her tongue like burnt honey. Even her lungs felt full of him, each inhale dragging more of his phantom heat into her chest.
She rolled onto her back, breath catching as the silk sheets slid along her skin—cooling her, then heating her all over again as the movement sent sparks firing through nerves she didn’t want awakened.
Her legs shifted. The sheets stroked the inside of her thighs.
She gasped. “You’re not helping,” she hissed at the bed, furious at herself, furious at him, furious at the traitorous heat blooming deep inside her.
She squeezed her eyes shut, trying to summon memories that weren’t his.
She thought of Liam—the boy from the village she had never spoken aloud.
Her secret. Her quiet rebellion.
They’d met in the forest once a week. Hands held under the canopy. Kisses shy and sweet. Nervous laughter. Breaths shared in the soft half-dark. The world had always felt softer there—moss underfoot, filtered sunlight on their faces, the hush of leaves instead of screaming stone.
She wasn’t a virgin anymore. They had fallen into each other gently—fumbling, warm, careful. He’d smiled against her neck afterward, whispered how perfect she was. And she had believed him. Her body had warmed slowly then, like embers coaxed to life, never this wild, never this consuming.
But the memory didn’t settle the ache now. If anything, it made the contrast sharper, crueller.
Liam’s touch had been soft. Apollo’s had been wildfire.
Liam had explored her like she was a gift. Apollo kissed her like she was a battlefield.
The way her body responded to Apollo—the way fire pulsed through her veins—the way her breath stuttered when he whispered.
It was wrong. It was terrifying. It was unlike anything she had ever known.
She shouldn’t crave it. She shouldn’t want it.
Her back arched involuntarily as another hot wave tore through her, stealing breath from her lungs. The bond pulsed faintly, as though responding to her need—or fuelling it. The mark at her neck throbbed in time, each beat a bright, insistent knock against her veins, like something inside her was answering a call from far away.
Her skin flushed. Her nipples tightened against the air. Her thighs slid against each other again, chasing friction she didn’t understand.
The silk sheet clung to her, tracing every curve of her body like a cool hand.
Adelaide let out a broken sound. “Oh gods…”
She flipped onto her stomach, burying her face into the pillow, trying to breathe, trying to think, trying to do anything but feel the way the fabric teased her flushed skin. The pillow muffled her ragged breaths, catching the damp heat of them as she panted, as if the bed itself were swallowing her noises and keeping her secrets.
The ache deepened. Worse. Hotter. Throbbing.
A need she’d never known before—sharp-edged, hungry, a fire gnawing at her insides.
She pressed her legs together again, but that only made it worse. The friction sent a shock up her spine so intense she bit down on her lip until she tasted blood.
“This isn’t happening,” she whispered into the pillow. “You’re not doing this to me.”
But she knew the truth. The connection wasn’t only one way.
When the demoness had touched him— when he had touched her— when Apollo’s desire had erupted through the bond— It had spilled into her like molten gold poured into a fracture.
Lust wasn’t unfamiliar to her.
But this—this was agony.
She writhed against the sheets, unable to still her hips, unable to stop her body from seeking relief, unable to stop the flush of desire that made her feel dizzy and overheated. Every small movement seemed to ignite another spark, sensation building on sensation until it felt like she was trying to outrun a fire inside her own skin.
Her breath came in quick, shallow pants. Her hands clenched in the sheets. Her back arched again. She squeezed her eyes shut, willing it to stop. It didn’t.
Her body moved again on instinct—and the pleasure was sharp enough to steal her breath.
“Please,” she whispered to no one, voice cracking. “Please stop. Please…”
But the bond pulsed again, hot and low, sending another ripple of need through her. The magic coiled low in her belly, twisting tighter, as if invisible fingers had hooked into the centre of her and were pulling.
Her fingers trembled down her stomach, dragging lightly over the sensitive skin there, her body moving almost without her permission.
The sheets slid further down her thighs.
Her breath hitched.
Her hand drifted lower. Gods, she was soaked. Her arousal coated her inner thighs.
Her fingers trailed higher, to her centre, and she slid them along her moist lips. Her fingers moved higher to her bud. It was just a gentle touch, barely a brush of her middle finger, but enough that lightning shot through her, so intense her body bowed.
She did it again, with more pressure. She rubbed her middle finger in two purposeful circles over her clit.
Her hips jerked. Her head fell back, and a sound like something from a pleasure house came from her mouth.
“Oh gods—” A whimper escaped her as the pleasure spiked, hot and sudden, radiating through her abdomen like lightning.
She pressed herself harder into the mattress as if she could force the heat away.
But the heat only grew.