Chapter 99 Elena Heart- POV
I parted my mouth for him, let him feel the warmth there, and watched his pupils dilate with the same hunger that had consumed us earlier, slower now, banked but burning.
"You have a mission," he said. "Parents demanding your return. A king to—" He stopped, throat working. "You should run. While you can."
I caught his thumb between my teeth, bit gently, felt his whole body tense with the restraint of not taking. "Make me," I whispered against his skin.
Something cracked in his expression. Not his composure, that had shattered hours ago, but something deeper, some belief he'd carried about deserving to be left behind.
He rolled me beneath him with a suddenness that stole my breath, but his hands were tender where they pinned my wrists above my head, his weight settling over me like a vow.
"I can't," he admitted, the words raw. "I've tried. Every time I tell myself to let you go, I—" He pressed his forehead to mine, the intimacy of it more devastating than any kiss. "I become someone I don't recognize. Someone who would burn the world to keep you."
I arched against him, felt his cock stir where it lay heavy against my thigh, and watched his restraint fray in real-time. "Then burn it," I breathed. "Burn it with me."
His mouth found mine with a desperation that tasted like tears neither of us would shed. He kissed me as if drawing sustenance, as if I were the only thing real in a landscape of shadows and masks.
I opened for him, let his tongue sweep through my mouth with the same thoroughness he'd used earlier between my legs, and felt myself growing wet again from nothing but the rhythm of his kiss and the weight of his body pinning mine.
He released my wrists only to map me with his hands, collarbone, breast, the curve of my waist, the flare of my hip.
Each touch carried the reverence of a man who had lost too much and knew, with terrible certainty, that he would lose again.
I could feel it in the way his fingers trembled where they circled my nipple, in the way he paused to watch my face as he rolled the peak between thumb and forefinger.
"Ah—" The sound escaped me unbidden, and his mouth curved against my jaw—satisfied, hungry, still so careful.
"Like that?" he murmured, breath hot against my throat.
"More."
He gave me more. His mouth descended to my breast, tongue flat and devastating as he laved my nipple, then drew it between his teeth with a pressure that made my hips buck against him.
I could feel him smiling against my skin, feel the vibration of his hum as he switched to the other breast, lavishing attention until I was writhing beneath him, my fingers tangled in his hair to anchor myself to something solid.
"Please," I gasped, not knowing what I was begging for, only that the emptiness between my legs had become unbearable, a hollow ache that only he could fill.
He understood. He always understood. He moved down my body with agonizing slowness, mouth tracing the curve of my ribs, the softness of my stomach, the sharp jut of my hip bone.
He paused where my thigh met my core, breathed warm against the sensitive skin there, and I felt myself clench around nothing, desperate and dripping.
"Look at you," he said, and the roughness in his voice sent heat spiraling through my belly. "Open for me. Always so fucking open for me."
He didn't make me wait. His tongue dragged through my folds with a deliberation that made me cry out, broad and flat and impossibly hot.
He licked me like he was starving, like my taste was the only thing keeping him anchored to his body, and I could feel the vibration of his moan where he pressed against my clit, circling, teasing, driving me toward the edge with cruel patience.
"Xavier—" I choked out his name like a prayer, like a curse.
He answered by sliding two fingers inside me, curling them against the spot that made my vision blur, and sucking my clit between his lips.
The dual sensation shattered something in my chest. I came apart with a sound that didn't resemble language, my body bowing off the mattress as wave after wave crashed through me.
His tongue working me through it, his fingers keeping the rhythm until I was sobbing his name, until my thighs were trembling around his head and he had to gentle me with soft kisses to my inner thighs, my hip, the curve of my stomach as he climbed back up my body.
"Again," he demanded, and there was the king in his voice now, the tyrant's enforcer who took what he wanted, but his eyes were tender where they held mine, and his hands were gentle where they positioned himself at my entrance.
He entered me slowly, so slowly I could feel every inch of him stretching me open, filling the emptiness he'd created with his mouth.
We both moaned when he was fully seated, his forehead dropping to mine, our breath mingling as we adjusted to the perfect fit of our bodies.
"Stay with me," he whispered, beginning to move, not thrusting, but rolling his hips in a rhythm that dragged him against every sensitive place inside me. "Right here. Just stay."
I wrapped my legs around his waist, dug my heels into the small of his back to urge him deeper. "I'm here," I promised, and felt him shudder with relief.
He set a pace that felt like drowning and breathing at once, slow, deliberate, each withdrawal a loss and each return a homecoming.
His hands framed my face, thumbs stroking my cheekbones as he watched me come undone beneath him, and I realized he was memorizing this, storing away every expression, every gasp, every moment of connection against the inevitable separation.
"Don't," I whispered, catching his wrist, bringing his palm to my mouth to press a kiss to the center. "Don't think about tomorrow."
His rhythm faltered, then steadied. He brought my hand back to his shoulder, guided my fingers to dig into the muscle there, and rolled his hips with a precision that made my breath catch. "I can't help it," he admitted. "You're already—" He swallowed, throat working. "You're already gone in my head. I'm practicing how to miss you."
I surged up to kiss him, fierce and desperate, tasting myself on his tongue and the salt of something that might have been grief. I bit his lower lip, sucked it between my teeth, and felt his control snap like a frayed wire.