Chain of Kisses (5 page)

Chapter Eight

The wedding took six months to plan, largely because Arles insisted on an affair grand enough to make clear how much he valued me. In the meantime, Ragnar and my mother waged a ferocious media campaign to transform me from the butt of sexual jokes into the royal heroine who’d saved the prince from assassins.

For once, the media cooperated, interviewing damn near every member of the
Valkyrie
’s crew, along with the grateful residents of various planets we’d helped protect from would-be invaders. Never mind that we’d been well paid to do so.

By the time my friends and allies were finished singing my praises, I barely recognized the heroic woman warrior they’d turned me into. Arles and I found ourselves the stars of an interplanetary romance that had become a mass obsession in the Empire.

No less than four different BioVids were produced, but none of them had a damned thing to do with reality.

Still, the end result was exactly what Ragnar intended. None of his political foes dared say a word against either of us for fear of suffering the wrath of the entire Empire.

I doubted this golden haze of political stardom would last, but I planned to enjoy it while it did.

Isa was charged with conspiring to assassinate an imperial heir. She could have faced the death penalty, had a panel of doctors not ruled her mentally ill. Luckily, the therapy seemed to work. During my weekly visits to the Imperial Center for Mental Health, she seemed much calmer, no longer the shrill psychotic who’d tried to kill me.

Her doctors believed the pressure of life as the royal heir was responsible for her illness, and suggested removing her from the line of succession. My mother readily agreed and declared me the heir to the throne. She and Ragnar then started work on a treaty to bring Swanhilde into the Torrean Empire.

Arles’s brother, Jarrat, finally obtained the divorce from Isa he’d wanted for years. He promptly started enjoying his new sexual freedom with a parade of exotic beauties from around the Empire.

Meanwhile, Arles and I did a great deal of smiling and a great many interviews. By the time the day for the wedding arrived, I was ready to kidnap him, drag him aboard the
Valkyrie
, and flee to the most remote world we could find.

But since I knew the cambots would probably track us down, I resisted the impulse.

* * *

Our wedding day arrived in a sensory assault of color, music and glittering candlelight. The palace throne room was barely recognizable under drifts of rare red roses, shipped all the way from Earth and arranged in exquisite Elderkind urns older than Earth’s pyramids. Every breath I took was scented with perfume from exotic petals.

Thousands of guests from Odin knew how many planets watched as Emperor Ragnar presided over the ceremony in his iridescent robes of state. I barely heard his Imperial blessing of our union, too busy gazing helplessly at my impossibly handsome groom.

A rainbow of military honors glinted on Arles’s broad chest, dazzling against the somber, dark blue fabric of his dress uniform jacket. He’d worn his azure hair loose around those powerful shoulders, emeralds glinting from braided locks on either side of his strong, warrior’s face.

But none of that gemstone glitter could match the happiness blazing from his eyes.

Arles and I repeated oaths of love and fealty to one another before he gave me a kiss so passionate I knew it would lead every vid cast in the Empire for a week.

We then had to endure a reception ball and the attentions of a swarm of cambots. I smiled until my cheeks went numb, and Arles visibly fidgeted with the need to get me to himself. I was chatting up the ambassador from Earth when the prince’s control broke.

“Excuse me, sir. I need to borrow my bride for a few days,” Arles growled, and swept me into his arms, along with several meters of white nanosilk skirt. He carried me out as I called hasty goodbyes to the laughing guests, my lace veil swirling in our wake. How he avoided tripping on my train, I will never know.

* * *

“I thought we’d never escape that lot,” the prince growled, kicking the door to his chambers closed as he swept me inside. He wasn’t even breathing hard, despite carrying the combined weight of me and my wedding gown down half a kilometer of palace hallways.

He put me down on my jeweled high heels, and I got busy trying to untangle myself from the gown’s extravagant, pearl-encrusted skirt. “Yes, well, I don’t think I’m ever going to escape this dress.”

Arles gave me a wolfish grin. “Why don’t I help you with that?”

I lifted a brow at him as I wrestled layers of stubborn fabric. The thin, diamond bangles he’d given me rang together with every tug. “According to the Newsies, you
do
have a talent for getting women out of their clothes.”

“A skill I’ll be restricting to you from now on.”

“Good to hear.”

Moving around behind me, he kicked my nanosilk train aside and went to work on the gown’s countless tiny fasteners. It took him ten minutes and some quiet swearing, but he got them open. I squirmed out of the tight bodice and began hauling the dress over my head.

Arles stepped around me and sprawled in a chair to watch, shamelessly enjoying my struggles.

I finally tunneled free of the gown and its layers of petticoats, then pulled off my veil before wrestling the whole pile over to my new walk-in closet. I stuffed the lot into the auto-fold hamper, which devoured them with a series of chirps. A moment later the unit huffed a blast of jasmine-scented air and spat them all out onto one of the closet shelves, neatly cleaned, packaged and vacuum-sealed.

“Mmm,” Arles purred. I turned to find him eyeing me with predatory interest. A heavy, full-length mirror in a massive, gildwood frame stood just behind his chair, and I realized why he was staring. I now wore only a Victorian corset beaded with pearls, a pair of tiny lace panties, and jeweled high heels that made my legs look endless in white lace stockings. A long pearl necklace draped over my corset-mounded cleavage to swing at my waist.

Even I had to admit the view wasn’t bad.

“I knew you’d look luscious in that corset.” It had been yet another gift from him, having arrived just in time for the wedding gown’s final fitting. The designer had not been happy with either of us for the addition.

Sprawled in the armchair in his dress uniform, Arles gave me a buccaneering smile. “Come here.” An erection looking damn near as thick as my wrist bulged beneath his snug black uniform trousers.

“Well now,” I purred. “Whatever do you have in mind?”

“I haven’t tied you up and fucked you hard in three whole days.” There hadn’t been time. “I find I’m feeling… neglected.”

“Can’t have that.” I sauntered toward him, strutting just a bit on those ridiculous heels.

Arles rose to his feet, lithe as a panther, and pulled the seal of his dress tunic. I watched him shrug out of the jacket, powerful muscle bunching and releasing under a silken thatch of iridescent hair. Bracing his booted feet apart, he tossed the tunic aside and waited for me.

My tiny panties were already wet through. Not that it mattered. They didn’t have a prayer once he got those big hands on them.

Smiling up into his hungry eyes, I stepped into his arms. Just as I expected, he slid his palms over my hips, found the fragile waistband, and tugged. The lace snapped, and he dropped what was left of my panties on the floor.

His mouth came down on mine, hot, wet and famished, in a ruthless kiss of possession and need. I kissed him back, opening for the teasing thrust of his tongue, the nibbling capture of my lip as his hands slid up, cupping my corseted breasts.

When we finally tore away to breathe, Arles smiled down at me, the animal heat in his gaze tempered by tenderness. “Wife,” he breathed.

I smiled dreamily up at him. “Husband.” Neither word had ever sounded so sweet.

Chapter Nine

Arles turned me to face the mirror and wrapped his strong arms around my waist. With a sigh, I leaned my head back against his chest, admiring the contrast between us. I’ve got a mercenary’s body, lean with fighting muscle, but dressed in that corset I looked as lush as any courtesan.

“Take hold of the mirror,” Arles rumbled in my ear.

Lifting a brow, I met his gaze in our reflection and reached upward, meaning to take hold of the carved posts at the top of the mirror’s heavy gilt frame. Before I could touch it, my arms jerked forward until my diamond bracelets clicked against the posts. I gave my wrists a tug, but the bracelets appeared stuck fast to the mirror.

“They’re force cuffs!” I stared at him over one shoulder. “You gave me diamond force cuffs as a wedding gift?”

He grinned like a wolf at a lamb. “It does seem so.”

“Well, that’s a relief.”

Now it was his turn to blink. “Oh?”

“I was afraid we were going to start having boring married sex.”

Green eyes narrowed. “I’ll show you
boring
.”

I smirked. “Oh, dear. Am I in trouble?”

“Yes.” His hand landed on my ass in a swat that made me bounce on my jeweled heels.

I glared. “That hurt!”

“It was supposed to.” He eyed my butt. “Now you have a pink handprint on one lovely cheek. I do believe it needs company.”

“Don’t you…”

Six hard swats landed on my butt until I danced and yowled, squirming from side to side in a vain attempt to avoid the stinging blows.

“Now that,” he announced at last in a tone of relish, “is a really pretty shade of pink.”

I glowered at him, butt flaming. “I married a brute.”

“Poor thing.” Arles slid an arm around my waist and reached down to finger my sex. I caught my breath at the luscious penetration. I hadn’t known I was that wet. “You do suffer so.” His teeth flashed. “Or at least, you’re going to.”

“Oh, good.” He added another finger to the one probing my sex, and my eyes closed in delight. “I hear suffering is good for the soul.”

“Now that you’ve brought it up…” He cupped both breasts, still covered by the corset. To my astonishment, the pearl-encrusted fabric moved, sliding downward to bare my nipples even as it raised the soft mounds.

I blinked. Of course, a nanosilk garment could assume different styles depending on its programming, but somehow I hadn’t expected this. “You rigged my corset?”

“I certainly did.” He caught my long pearl necklace in both hands and started dragging the strand back and forth across my stiff pink nipples. “Backfired on me, though. All through the reception, I kept thinking about what I could do to you with it. That’s why I stayed behind you all night -- I had a hard-on like a blast cannon I was hiding behind your skirts.”

“Pervert.” I sighed, enjoying the sensation of those cool, smooth pearls rolling over my breasts.

“Oh, darling, you have no idea -- yet.” He murmured some command I didn’t quite catch. Pleasure bloomed in my chest like the brush of feathers over sensitive skin. I gasped in helpless delight.

Arles grinned behind me. “The corset is laced with neural implants, just like those nipple clamps I used on you. Which reminds me…”

He brushed his fingers over the pearls covering my bodice. The fabric began to squeeze my breasts like strong, cupping hands. As the corset fondled me, Arles caught my nipples between thumb and forefinger, first pinching, then flicking, then raking his blunt nails over the tight, pink tips. A hot sting zinged through one breast as the corset’s implants added a little pain to the pleasure, like a dash of spice in a sweet dessert.

Soon I whimpered in helpless delight as alternating pulses of pleasure and pain jolted through my body. I could do nothing except watch my reflection writhe in Arles’s arms, my wrists still bound to the mirror as he tormented my breasts and finger-fucked my pussy. He looked so big standing behind me, all hard muscle and demanding eyes, casting a sorcerer’s spell on me with every stroke and pinch.

“Fuck me!” I moaned at last, trembling on the edge of a climax that burned just beyond the next caress. “Arles, for Thor’s sake, fuck me!”

“Yes!” Arles said in a hot growl. He grabbed me by the thighs, lifted me right off my feet, and spread me wide before driving the whole hot length of his cock into my cunt. His open fly ground against my ass as he began to thrust, plastering me against the mirror. The cool glass pressing against my bare breasts only added to the sensory assault.

I threw back my head and screamed as I fought to roll back onto Arles’s meaty cock. I had no leverage, held off the ground as I was, so I hooked my high-heeled feet behind his knees and ground backward, taking that big shaft as deep as I could get it while he pistoned his muscled ass, relentless as a machine, sweat rolling down his brawny torso and slicking his chest hair flat.

His cock bored in and out of my gripping flesh with just the perfect friction, raking pulses of pleasure through me with every pass. The first deep pulse rippled through my belly. I came, my body jerking helplessly against the cool surface of the mirror in time to each blazing pulse.

Arles roared, his head thrown back, fingers digging into my thighs as he rammed me against the glass, burying his cock so deep his balls teased the lips of my pussy, filling me full.

We tumbled into the aftermath locked together, breathing hard, sweat-slick, his big hands still gripping my legs, my feet still wrapped around his calves. The muscles of my thighs jumped and quivered as he finally lowered me to my feet.

“Odin’s eye,” I managed. “If I weren’t bound to this damned mirror, I’d be a puddle on the floor.”

“Then I’d better turn you loose and put you to bed, because I’m no better off.” He reached for my wrists and touched something. My arms sprang free, and I lowered them to my sides, wincing at the ache in abused muscles.

Arles swept me into his arms again, this time with an audible grunt. Apparently I’d finally managed to tire even his gene-sculpted body.

He carried me to the huge, circular bed that ruled the room. A veiling canopy of transparent curtains draped from a single gilded ring set in the ceiling. Urns of white roses surrounded it.

Opposite that stood a gilt-wood armoire near a massive dresser that was damned near bigger than my entire cabin on the
Valkyrie Quest
. A carpet the length of my captain’s launch covered the floor in vivid, swirling patterns of blue and green.

The bed’s sheets felt impossibly smooth and soft against my sweating body as I sprawled on the mattress, stunned limp by pleasure.

Arles did something to my corset, which popped open like a clamshell. He peeled it off me, dropped it on the floor, and started shedding his boots and pants. I ogled him shamelessly, enjoying the revelation of powerful thighs and hard calves. Even spent as he was, there was wicked promise in the swing of his cock. I licked my lips and considered the possibilities. Arles had a short recovery time.

But before I could reach for his tempting length, he slid into bed next to me. Arles spoke the next words in a quiet voice, but the stark truth of them reverberated all the way to my soul. “I love you, wife.”

I discovered I couldn’t breathe, as if I’d taken a hard blow to the chest. Several minutes passed before I could speak again. “And I love you, my husband. I always have. I always will.”

Arles smiled at me, and for a moment I saw the boy he’d been all those years ago. He drew me against the warm strength of his big body and sighed in pure contentment, as if all was right with his world.

Arles of Tor loves me. My paladin. My prince
. My heart filled with such blazing joy, I was amazed it didn’t glow through the walls of my chest. Blinking away tears, I snuggled into Arles’s arms and drifted off to sleep.