House of Sky and Breath (Crescent City) (73 page)

“Gods-damn,” Hunt breathed, running his hands over her rear. Bryce writhed.

He hooked his fingers in her underwear, sliding the lace down her thighs, letting them fall between her ankles. She stepped out
of them, spreading her legs wide in invitation. But Hunt dropped to his knees behind her, and before Bryce could inhale, his tongue was at her sex, lapping and dipping inside.

She moaned again, and he gripped her thighs, holding her in place as he feasted on her. His wings brushed her ass, her hips as he leaned forward, tasting and suckling, and—

“I’m going to come if you keep doing that,” she rasped.

“Good,” he growled against her, and as he slid two fingers into her, she did exactly that.

She bit her lip to keep from crying out, and he licked her, drawing out each ripple of her climax. She panted, dizzy with pleasure, clinging to the shelf as he rose behind her once more.

“Now be
very
quiet,” he whispered in her ear, and pushed inside her.

From behind, at this angle, the fit was luxuriously tight and deep. As he had last night, Hunt eased his way into her with care, and she gritted her teeth to keep from groaning at each inch he claimed for himself. He stilled when he was fully seated, her ass pressed entirely against his front, and ran a possessive hand down her spine.

The fullness of him, the size, simply smelling him and knowing it was Hunt inside her—release threatened again. Bigger and mightier than before. Her star began to glow, silvering the shelves, the books, the darkness of the stacks.

“You like that?” He withdrew nearly to the tip before pushing back in. She buried her face against the hard shelf to stay quiet. “You like how my cock feels in you?”

She could only get out a garbled
yesIdopleasemore.
Hunt laughed, dark and rich, and thrust in—a little harder this time. “I love you undone like this,” he said, moving again. Setting the pace. “Utterly at my mercy.”

Yesyesyes
, she hissed, and he laughed again. His balls slapped against her ass.

“You know how much I thought about doing this all those months ago?” he said, bending to press a kiss to her neck.

“Likewise,” she managed to say. “I wanted you to fuck me on my desk at the gallery.”

His thrusts turned a little uneven. “Oh yeah?”

She moved her hips back against him, angling him in deeper. He groaned now. She whispered, “I knew you’d feel like this. So fucking perfect.”

His fingers dug into her hips. “All yours, sweetheart. Every piece of me.” He thrust harder. Faster.

“Gods, I love you,” she breathed, and that was his undoing.

Hunt yanked her from the shelf, pulling her to the ground with him, positioning her on all fours. His knees spread her own even wider, and Bryce bit her hand to hold in her scream of pleasure as he rammed into her, over and over and over. “I fucking love you,” he said, and Bryce cracked.

Light exploded from her as she came, driving back onto his cock, so deep he touched her innermost wall. Hunt shouted, and his cock pulsed in her, following her into that blinding pleasure like he couldn’t stop, like he’d keep spilling into her forever.

But then he stilled, and they remained there, panting, Hunt buried in her.

“No teleporting this time, huh?” he said, bending to kiss her neck.

She leaned her forehead against her hands. “Must need your power to join mine or something,” she mumbled. “Good thing you didn’t do that, though—probably would have burned the building down. But I don’t care right now.” She wiggled her ass against him, and he hissed. “Let’s go home and have more makeup sex.”

Night.

Ruhn opened his eyes, finding himself on the couch on the bridge, with Daybright seated across from him.

“Hey,” he said. He’d passed out on the sectional while Declan and Ithan argued about sunball crap. Flynn had been busy fucking a nymph upstairs.

Ariadne and the sprites had claimed Declan’s bedroom, as the male had planned to spend the night at Marc’s, and gone to sleep soon after a painfully awkward evening meal. The dragon had
picked at her dinner like she’d never seen food before. The sprites had drunk an entire bottle of wine between them and spent the meal burping up embers.

How any of them were sleeping with Flynn’s escapades down the hall was beyond Ruhn.

Day drummed a flaming hand on the rolled arm of the fainting couch. “I have information for you to pass along.”

Ruhn straightened. “Good or bad?”

“That’s for you to decide.”

She watched him intently. He wasn’t sure if he’d see her after that colossal bit of weirdness last night. But she said nothing of it as she declared, “I have it on good authority that Pippa Spetsos is planning something big in retaliation for losing so much ammunition and the imperial mech-suit prototype. Ophion is fully behind her. They believe the unit that sabotaged the shipment has gone rogue, and appointed Spetsos to send a clear message to both those rebels and the empire.”

Ruhn kept his face carefully blank. “What’s she up to? Where?”

“I’m not sure. But given that her last known location was Ydra, I thought you should pass it along to your cohorts in Crescent City, lest she attack there.”

“Do the Asteri know about her plans?”

“No. Only I do.”

“How’d you learn about them?”

“That’s none of your concern.”

Ruhn studied her. “So we’re back to the distance. No more bedtime stories?”

Again, she drummed her fingers. “Let’s chalk that up to a moment of insanity.”

“I didn’t see anything.”

“But you wanted to.”

“I don’t need to. I don’t give a shit what you look like. I like talking to you.”

“Why?”

“Because I feel like I can be real with you, here.”

“Real.”

“Yeah. Honest. I’ve told you shit no one else knows.”

“I don’t see why.”

He rose from his couch and crossed to hers. He leaned against the arm of the sofa, peering down at her blazing face. “See, I think you like me, too.”

She shot to her feet, and he backed away a step. She came closer, though. Near enough for her chest to brush his. Flame and darkness twined, stars turning into embers between them. “This is not some game, where you can flirt and seduce your way through it,” she hissed. “This is war, and one that will claim many more lives before it is through.”

A growl worked its way up his throat. “Don’t patronize me. I know the cost.”

“You know
nothing
of cost, or of sacrifice.”

“Don’t I? I might not have been playing rebel all my life, but believe me, shit has never been easy.” Her words had found their mark, though.

“So your father doesn’t like you. You’re not the only one. So your father beat you, and burned you. So did mine.”

Ruhn snarled, getting in her face. “What the fuck is your point?”

She snarled right back. “My point is that if you are not careful, if you are not smart, you will find yourself giving up pieces of your soul before it’s too late. You will wind up
dead
.”

“And?”

She stilled. “How can you ask that so cavalierly?”

He shrugged. “I’m nobody,” he said. It was the truth. Everything he was, the worth by which the world defined him … it had all been
given
to him. By pure luck of being born into the “right” family. If he’d done anything of value, it had been through the Aux. But as a prince … he’d been running his entire life from that title. Knew it to be utterly hollow.

And Bryce had kept her power a secret so he might hold on to that scrap of specialness.

Ruhn turned away from Day, disgusted with himself.

Bryce loved him far more than she hated their father. Had given up privilege and power for him. What had he ever done for
anyone on that scale? He’d die for his friends, this city—yeah. But … who the fuck was he, deep down?

Not a king. His father wasn’t a fucking king, either. Not in the way that mattered.

“Message received,” he said to Day.

“Night—”

Ruhn opened his eyes.

The living room was dark, the TV off, Ithan presumably long gone to sleep.

Ruhn turned over on the couch, tucking his arms behind his head and staring at the ceiling, watching beams of headlights drift across it from passing cars.

Who the fuck was he?

Prince of Nothing.

54

Sitting in her office at the archives, phone at her ear, Bryce drained the last sips of her third coffee of the day, and debated whether a fourth cup would have her crawling on the ceiling by lunchtime.

“So, um—Cooper’s good?” she asked her mother, setting her coffee cup atop the paper that held the sequence of numbers and letters from Sofie’s arm. Randall had now deemed it safe enough to discuss the boy on the phone. Bryce supposed it’d be weird not to, since her parents had just publicly adopted the kid.

“He’s an exceptionally bright boy,” Ember said, and Bryce could hear the smile in her voice. “
He
appreciates my art.”

Bryce sighed at the ceiling. “The surest test of intelligence out there.”

“Do you know he hasn’t been to school in more than three years?” Ember’s voice sharpened. “
Three years
.”

“That’s awful. Has he … ah … talked about his … previous home?”

Her mom caught her meaning. “No. He won’t talk about it, and I’m not going to push. Milly Garkunos said to let him bring it up on his own time.”

“Milly Garkunos suddenly became a child psychiatrist?”

“Milly Garkunos is a good neighbor, Bryce Adelaide Quinlan.”

“Yeah, and a busybody. Don’t tell her anything.” Especially about this.

“I wouldn’t,” Ember hissed.

Bryce nodded, even though her mom couldn’t see through the phone. “Let the kid quietly adjust.”

“Am I his caretaker, or are you, Bryce?”

“Put Randall on the phone. He’s the voice of reason.”

“Randall is beside himself with happiness at having another child in the house, and is currently on a walk through the woods with Cooper, showing him the lay of the land.”

Bryce smiled at that. “I loved doing that with him.”

Ember’s voice softened. “He loved doing that with you, too.”

Bryce sighed again. “Thanks again, Mom. I know this was a shock—”

“I’m glad you included us, Bryce. And gave us this gift.” Bryce’s throat ached. “Please be careful,” Ember whispered. “I know you think I’m overbearing and annoying, but it’s only because I want the best for you. I want you to be safe, and happy.”

“I know, Mom.”

“Let’s plan on a girls’ weekend this winter. Someplace nice and cold. Skiing?”

“Neither of us skis.”

“We can learn. Or sit by the fire and drink spiked hot chocolate.”

Here was the mom she adored, the one she’d worshipped as a kid. “It’s a plan.”

A ripple of fire, of pure power, shuddered through the building. Silence flowed in its wake, the usual background noise halting. “I gotta get back to work,” Bryce said quickly.

“Okay, love you.”

“Love you,” Bryce said, and had barely hung up when the Autumn King walked in.

“Trash gets dumped in the back,” she said without looking up.

“I see your irreverence has not been altered by your new immortality.”

Bryce lifted her head. This wasn’t how she wanted to start her
day. She’d already spent her walk to work with Ruhn, needing him to explain to her twice about the plan to have Queen Hypaxia escorted by Ithan and the dragon in exchange for the witch-queen contacting Connor’s spirit on the equinox. She’d been slightly nauseated at that, but had grunted her approval before she left him on the street, telling him to give Hypaxia her number in case she needed anything. A few minutes later, Ruhn had forwarded the queen’s contact information.

Her father sniffed her. “Would you like to explain to me
why
you have mated with Athalar, when you are betrothed to a Fae Prince?”

“Because he’s my mate?”

“I didn’t know half-breeds could have such things.”

She bared her teeth. “Real classy.”

Fire filled his eyes. “Did you not consider that I arranged for your union with Cormac out of your best interests? The interests of your offspring?”

“You mean
your
best interests. As if I’d ever let you within a hundred miles of any child of mine.”

“Cormac is powerful, his household strong. I want you in Avallen because it is a
safehold
. Even the Asteri cannot pierce its mists without permission, so old is the magic that guards it.”

Bryce stilled. “You’re full of shit.”

“Am I? Did you not kill an Archangel this spring? Are you not now at the mercy of the Asteri? Are demons not once more creeping through the Northern Rift—in greater numbers than ever before?”

“Like you give a single fuck about my safety.”

Flame rippled around him, then vanished. “I am your father, whether you like it or not.”

“You didn’t seem to care about that until I surpassed you in power.”

“Things change. I found watching Micah harm you to be … unsavory.”

“Must have really bothered you, since you’ve seemed to have no issue with harming others yourself.”

“Explain.”

“Oh, come on. Don’t give me that blank fucking look. The last Starborn Prince. You killed him because he was special and not you, and everyone knows it.”

Her father threw back his head and laughed. “Is that what you think? That I killed my rival for spite?”

She said nothing.

“Is that what prompted you to hide your gift all these years? Concern that I’d do the same to you?”

“No.” It was partly true. Her mother had been the one who’d thought that.

The Autumn King shook his head slowly and sat in the chair opposite her desk. “Ember fed you too many lies born of her irrational fears.”

“And what about the scar on her face? Was that a lie, too? Or an irrational fear?”

“I have already told you that I regret that more than you know. And that I loved Ember deeply.”

“I don’t think you know what that word means.”

Smoke curled from his shoulders. “At least I understand what it means to use my household name.”