Smitten (17 page)

The solid length of him throbbed in her hand, the silken skin soft beneath her exploring fingers. She stroked up and down in long, languid strokes, delighted in the way his eyes squeezed shut.

“Be selfish, Maximilian.” If she had her way, they’d have many, many more couplings and many centuries to enjoy every carnal delight their imaginations could create. She wrapped her legs around his body and drew him close.

“Will you do the same?” he asked, voice a low, husky growl.

Taking control, Ēostre guided him between her thighs and dragged his sensitive head between her slit, rubbing him against her entrance. Then he slid forward. Her body resisted at first, so long a time passing since her last sexual encounter she’d almost forgotten what it was like to make love. Turbulent emotions became a storm of sensation, physical and emotional, her love for him and the sheer weight of her desire.

The second nudge came with the delicious sensation of being stretched. Her body yielded to his girth, and then Max set his brow against the pillow beside her head. “Now I’m the impatient one,” he breathed out.

“No more waiting then.” She tightened around his tip, squeezing with silken muscles until he groaned and his eyes blazed with lust.

“Is there a rush?”

“Yes,” she cried. “I need you now, fast and hard, Bel. Be selfish.
Take me.
”

Ēostre didn’t care. They could go slow the next time. Every time after. But this time she needed him now and she couldn’t wait another moment.

The headboard thumped against the wall with the next thrust. He surged deep, seating every inch to join them in the exquisite union Ēostre had craved. He pulled out, almost making her weep, only to ram in anew.

Max created a fast-paced rhythm that resulted in the frenetic slap of skin against skin, of perspiration beading against his brow. Her breasts heaved and the rosy nipples at their tips became victim to his hungry kisses. One tip then the next was claimed between his lips, sending hot jolts of pleasure streaking to her core. She clenched around him and groaned, twisting on the bed sheets.

“More!” she cried. “I want more of you, Bel. I need… I need…”

Without parting their bodies, Max leaned back and drew her legs up. One long limb after the other came to rest against his muscled chest, ankles hooked over his shoulders.

And then he wasn’t Max “the man” any longer, but an animal instead, claiming her with a reckless rhythm, his groans and low growls driving her wild.

Her breasts jostled and quaked, her fingers spasmed against his thighs, flexing their grip, and her entire body drew tight. Molten passion burned through her veins and her skin tingled.

On the cusp of orgasm, her head tilted back to the pillow and she keened his name. Her breath was stolen away and her heart raced so fast it was a wonder it didn’t burst from her chest.

And then he was gone, gliding backwards from her pussy without a word.

“Max? What are — what are you doing?”

Hands on her hips, he answered by flipping her over on the skewed sheets. She barely had a moment to push up on her knees when he dragged her back and reclaimed her body’s tight embrace.

“Will you accept me, Ēostre?”

In all of her many centuries, she’d never heard of a dragon bonding to a second lifemate. And she’d never dreamed she’d find a male wanting the tangled remnants of the soul left in her after Fafnir’s death. Max changed everything, and now that his instincts had taken hold, she couldn’t deny him.

Her body behaved of its own accord. The slightest brush of his fingertips over her clit returned her to the breaking point, until she was teetering at the edge and waiting to careen into ecstasy.

“Do you accept my claim, Ēostre? Are you mine?”

She responded with a brazen moan as he dipped forward again, his cock plowing so deeply they seemed to become one in every definition of the term. She bowed her spine beneath him and exposed the expanse of shoulder blade perfect for receiving the mating brand.

Her original scar remained, a faded, unrecognizable remnant of a time long past. At first she tensed, waiting for Max to withdraw in disgust or even disdain for the permanent brand Fafnir had left on her.

“Mine.” Max lowered his teeth and clamped down hard in response to the unspoken invitation.

A jolt of electricity sizzled through her body, the current flooding every nerve, down to the tips of her toes. It was like liquid fire coursing through her, conducting pleasure instead of burning agony.

As the arm encircling her waist tightened in a possessive hold, Max growled against her skin and came. Her entire body spasmed before her channel clenched around his length in a series of methodic shudders, milking each hot pulse. An elated scream tore from her throat. “Yes! Sweet Ancestors, yes! I’m yours, Bel, I want to be yours!”

The wave of pleasure coursed through Ēostre until the tide swept her further and further away, until she could barely see the pattern of the expensive pillowcase beneath her, until the world bloomed bright white and she was shuddering in the throes of passion. Max leaned over her, drove in deep, and rode her through every second while her features contorted in ecstasy.

Once he was completely spent, she realized only her grip of the headboard and Max’s arm around her waist had kept her from collapsing to the mattress. She clung to the former, chips of wood beneath her nails, scraped off the splintered wood frame of what had probably been an antique. She’d broken it. Max glided his palm down her tummy and stroked in calming pets.

He kissed the fresh brand, setting off an explosion of aftershocks in her core. She shuddered and arched again, then his half-hard cock tensed. He felt as good the second time as he did the first. Testing her heat, he pumped a few times.

“Mm… Before… we start again… I need a drink,” Ēostre murmured. Her voice had gone hoarse. She cleared her throat to no avail then regretted her own request when Max slipped free.

“Champagne good enough for you?”

“Yes.”

Max slipped out the bed as she settled amidst the cool satin sheets. Her body was still humming with pleasure. Giggling a little, she stretched out in his bed, her limbs languid and weak with euphoria but flooded with endorphins.

The glasses clinked against the bedside stand when Max returned a few minutes later. Ēostre opened her eyes to the sight of him pouring fresh glasses, a beautiful Adonis in the golden glow emitted from the nearby lampshade. Playful as a kitten, she wiggled up against his side and claimed the glass from his hand.

“Congratulations, Mr. President.”

The champagne soothed her raw throat, but it didn’t quench the rising heat between them. He was still hard, after all, and they had a long night ahead of them to celebrate.

There was no going back. Things would forever be changed between them, and Ēostre wouldn’t have it any other way.

Chapter 12

Maximilian awoke after a rare, peaceful night of sweet dreams. He didn’t have a scrap of the satin sheets on his body, and the cool air raised goose bumps on his skin. It didn’t take long to figure out where the covers had gone.

Ēostre lay beside him, a beautiful mattress hog wrapped in a cocoon of sheets. She’d taken all of them, whether by intention or not, and left him with so little space he practically hung from the edge.

Instead of leaving the bed, as he would have if she were only a mortal to warm his sheets for a night, he moved closer and enfolded her in his arms to reclaim the stolen space.

What had he ever done in his life to deserve such fortune? He buried his face in her silver waves, breathed her in, and thought,
I have always wanted you, Ēostre. Since the first day Fafnir brought you to meet me, I coveted you.

Fighting amongst the other males for a heartless female beast had never appealed to Maximilian, and in his luckiest hour, Mahuika had come to strike a deal. A child in exchange for gold and gems. As payment, the fire dragon had given her half of his worldly treasures on the day she arrived with Brigid, their newly weaned cub. He’d waited thirty long years.

Then Mahuika walked out of their lives. She’d only wanted the money and his jewels after all.

“Mm… I ache everywhere,” his lover murmured beside him.

“Was I too rough?”

Her gentle laughter sent a chill over his skin. “No, Belenos. You were perfect,” she assured him. “My complaints are in the best way possible.”

“Good.” He dropped a line of kisses down her neck to her shoulder. “Perhaps I can ease your suffering with a lengthy soak. The tub is practically a pool.”

“Perhaps I’ll let you.” Chuckling, Ēostre wiggled away to settle on the edge of the bed with her back to him. The sheets pooled around her hips as she opened the nearby curtains, and light washed over the dimmed bedroom.

The bruised, deep purple outline of his teeth marred the back of her right shoulder, discolored as much from the magical brand as the physical injury it caused.

“Did you plan last night?” Ēostre asked gently when she saw him looking.

“No, but I don’t regret it,” he said quietly. “Do you?”

Ēostre shook her head. “I wouldn’t have chosen last night to accept your pledge,” she said as she raised her fingers to the mark on her shoulder. One touch awakened the new bond between them, stiffening his cock in an instant.

Max’s nostrils flared. “Then you wish to allow it to lapse. After all, you did not mark me in return to seal our bond.” Breathing in the scent of her morning arousal was its own kind of hell. Wanting to touch her, wanting to drive into her and reclaim what was his, but listening to her dismaying words at the same time. Max maintained his neutral expression, but his hope dwindled. “I understand. It was foolish of me.”

Ēostre shook her head. “No, Bel. Allow me to finish my thoughts.” When she shifted to face him, the sleek satin sheets fell away completely, revealing her body to him anew. Long, lean thighs, full breasts, and a stomach only soft enough to remind him she’d once borne a child. She slipped one thigh over his hip to straddle him.

“I had planned to reveal my heart to you last night, yet you beat me to it. I don’t regret our coupling, but I had not expected a bond. As for my claiming you, as you asked me last night, is there a rush?” A mischievous smile touched her lips as she gazed down at him.

“No,” he whispered, intoxicated by the very sight of her. The sunlight gleamed over her fair skin and lit her platinum blonde hair aflame in color. If it was lavender in the moonlight, noontime made it spun gold in the presence of the morning sun. The tips of her hair skimmed over his chest, tickling wherever they touched.

“Why not?” Ēostre lowered over his cock, trapping it between the slick, wet folds of her pussy and his pelvis. She moved her hips back and forth. “Am I no longer to your liking?”

“You are. In every way, Ēostre.”

“I thought you to be a man who knows what he wants, Belenos.” Her hips rolled and teased, but she didn’t take him inside the receptive sheath he longed to feel again.

“Don’t tease me,” he growled up at her.

“I’ll tease you as much as I want, my mate.”

Max’s cock twitched inside her, apparently loving the words as much as his brain did. His physical response brought a bigger smile to her face.

“My mate,” she repeated.

“Fuck, what are you doing to me?”

“Exercising my will,” she whispered. The playful minx in her emerged as she leaned forward to kiss him, dragging tightly budded nipples over his chest. With a groan, he took a handful of her ass and pressed her down against him.

“Take me. Make me yours as well, Ēostre. Do it.”

“Not yet.”

His skin felt electrified, the fine hairs standing and his skin tingling. A bond could only be initiated at the height of physical pleasure when two souls were connected by bliss.

“I feel how wet you are for me, love. Let me give you what you need.”

Despite her equally pressing desire, Ēostre took her sweet time, raising until the thick inches of his cock glistened between her thighs, only to thrust down and reclaim him again. She did it over and over, taunting him with delicious slowness.

Chiming trills filled the room, breaking the silence.

“Ignore it,” Max mumbled against her breast, wishing he’d left her purse downstairs when he’d fetched them snacks just before dawn. “It’s probably work.”

“And if it isn’t?” Ēostre held her hand palm out toward her discarded purse. It unsnapped and the phone flew into her palm. “It’s Chloe. She rarely calls…”

“Answer it if you must,” Max said, sighing heavily. His cock throbbed within her, aching with the need for his mate to resume the subtle glide up and down his shaft.

“Chloe? Is everything all right?”

Chloe spoke too softly for Max to hear her end of the call, but the overall tone of conversation seemed friendly. No emergency at all. He bumped his hips upward and surged deep inside Ēostre, catching her off guard. Her eyes flew open and her fingers clutched wildly at his chest.

He grinned and slid his hand to the junction of their bodies. One rub of his thumb against her clit made Ēostre’s pussy involuntarily clench. Her body was so responsive to him, reacting to the slightest provocation and touch.