Page 56 of The Death King
“So…” She stared at her hands in her lap. Silence trickled by. She never finished the sentence.
“Continue.” I hadn’t been this patient with anyone in a very long time. She pulled out a version of me I thought was long dead.
Her eyes remained down, like a frightened child afraid to admit she’d gone through my private belongings, that her hand had slipped into the cookie jar when she knew it was forbidden. This uneasiness was a contradiction to the confidence she exuded at other times. “You have whores who know how to give you what you want. I have no experience…and you’ll be disappointed.” She started to fidget with the blanket in her lap, rubbing her thumb along the seam of the stitching, her cheeks ablaze from the light of the fire. “You’re the first man I’ve ever kissed.”
“And it was a good kiss.”
Her fingers stilled on the blanket.
“I want to show you how it could be. I want to replace the scars with kisses. I want to erase your pain and fill it with pleasure.” I didn’t care about many things, but her tale moved me when it shouldn’t. Something about it…made me feel. Made me experience an emotion I couldn’t explain. “Let me be your first.”
Finally, her eyes left the blanket and looked at me. No longer distant, the gates were wide open, and I could see everything she tried to hide. Underneath that fire, she was a broken soul, just like I was.
“Let me erase him.”
Her eyes flicked away again, like she realized she was actually considering my offer. Her breathing changed too, quicker than it’d been just a few seconds ago. A tint moved into her cheeks, a flush that had nothing to do with the heat of the fire.
I knew I was close. So fucking close. Adrenaline dripped into my bloodstream, and my heart started to palpitate. Just the idea of kissing her again, of feeling her soft thighs squeeze my hips, was enough to make my mouth go dry. I felt like a man who had walked through the desert for months without a drop of water—and she was a waterfall.
I left the armchair and walked toward her, seeing the way she tensed at my approach, the way she released a shaky breath at my proximity. I sat beside her and watched her avoid my gaze, watched her try to be as small as possible, as if I would forget she was there.
She was a whole different person.
I grabbed her chin and forced her stare on my face, seeing the way her eyes glowed like emeralds in the fireplace. I stared for a moment as I brushed my thumb along her bottom lip, tracing the succulent lips that I could still taste.
She was nervous, but she didn’t fight me. Her eyes flicked down to my mouth, but she didn’t kiss me.
“Let me prove it to you.” I usually took what I wanted without warning, but I had to slow down for her, to verbalize things that should be kept quiet. I’d never been good at words or expressing my intent, but I somehow figured it out when it was necessary.
She watched me, her eyes showing the internal fight she was having with herself.
I leaned in and kissed the corner of her mouth. Then the other. Then my hand dug into her hair, and I planted a hot kiss on her neck. “Trust me.” I kissed her neck as I made my way down to her collarbone, tasting the warm flesh in front of the fire. My hand tangled in her hair and cradled her head as I kissed the other side, as I listened to her heavy breaths close to my ear.
Her hand finally made its way into the back of my hair, and she fisted the short strands as she let me kiss her everywhere, her breaths growing deeper and more desperate.
I laid her back on the couch, moving on top of her as I continued the kiss, only taking her neck and not her lips. My dick was barely restrained inside my trousers, so desperate to pop free and slide deep between her thighs.
I moved down her jawline toward her mouth then caught her lips, my heavy body suspended on top of hers, the fever between us hotter than the fire that burned nearby. Her mouth hesitated with inexperience, but it was still full of passion and desperation that made my spine tighten. I took my time and caressed her upper lip before I turned my head to give her my tongue. I hadn’t kissed a woman this thoroughly in many years, just kissing her with no other agenda, but I slowed down everything for Calista, so she could enjoy a kiss that should have happened a long time ago.
Her fingers dug into the back of my hair before she cupped the nape of my neck, mirroring my movements and picking up on the moves I was teaching her. Minutes passed, and the kiss became more passionate as she mastered my lips and tongue. One of her hands had moved to my back, and she let her nails test my flesh and muscle. She tilted her head and gave me her anxious breath, her arousal in the searing heat of her lips.
Instead of rushing to the end, I forced myself to slow down, to earn her trust rather than demand it. My hand moved to her hip and gripped her trousers before I started to tug them down, to reveal her underwear below.
She broke the kiss when she felt me tug down her bottoms. Her eyes still burned in desire, but the flames were masked with uncertainty.
“Trust me.” I pulled them down the rest of the way until they left her ankles. She was just in her underwear, so I hooked my fingers into the cotton and started to pull those down too.
Her hand went to my wrist before I could expose all of her.
My hand steadied, but my eyes pushed on. “Come on, baby.” I felt a twinge of pain when I said that because baby wasn’t a name I threw around lightly, but it slipped out in the heat of the moment. “Let me show you.”
Her fingers released my wrist.
I pulled down the material the rest of the way and exposed her pussy, the dark hair that had never been shaved. The curls were thick, and her glistening sex was hidden underneath the wildness. I preferred my women bare, but my cock practically burst out of my trousers at the sight.
Her breathing was elevated for a different reason than desire, and she lay there in tense anticipation of my next plan.
My arms hooked behind her thighs as I tilted her pelvis back and widened her knees. My stomach hit the cushions of the couch as my mouth lowered to her sex.