Page 61 of Empire of Dark
“Tell me who had your body before me. Who had your heart.” My hand sank through Ada’s hair to the tips, then wrapped a long golden strand of it around my palm.
I’d landed on a club chair by the fireplace with Ada on top of me, our naked limbs tangled, my cock still sunk into her. Catching my breath, I held up her hair to the warm glow of fire next to us. The light highlighted the auburn undertones of her light hair, the color rich, complex.
Damn, I wanted to control her with her long hair. Sink my cock into her mouth, my hands tight in her hair as I pistoned along her tongue. Then flip her onto her hands and knees, holding her in place with these beautiful strands as I rocked into her from behind.
Rough. I wanted her rougher than I ever allowed with women, but something about Ada scratched into the core of me, making me want to imprint myself onto every bit of her I could, and if it took some pain to do that—mine or hers—then I wanted it. Wanted it all.
But then, I didn’t know that she would be opposed to it. She’d been more than game for everything we’d just done. The pain and the pleasure.
The most disconcerting part of finally having her was that she’d wanted me and only me. Not my power.
No one had ever demanded that of me.
All of the females wanted what I could give them through my power, the high of it. But not Ada—even knowing exactly what I could do. How I could make her feel.
I wasn’t sure how to place that fact in the order of things, but I knew full well that demand of hers had twisted a knife deep into my gut, opening up wounds I’d thought had been sealed and buried away a hundred years ago.
Her body stiffened at my question and it took several breaths before her chin shifted against my chest, though she didn’t pull away. “I never said anyone had my heart. Just that I wasn’t an innocent.”
“You were with someone and then no one else for a hundred years. Hiding away from the world.” My hand unfurled from her hair. “You tell me if you loved him or her.”
She sighed into my skin, her breath heating my chest. “I did love him.”
“Then tell me about him.”
She pulled away from my chest and I tightened my left arm around her waist. I wasn’t ready for her to extract herself just yet.
She found my eyes. “Why do you care about someone from a century ago?”
“What sort of man he was tells me about you. So I want to know.”
Her hands went together just below my ribcage, her stare dropping to her fingertips twisting against each other. “He was someone I loved dearly. The only one.” Her gaze lifted to me and I could feel the spike of energy, manic, scatter through her body.
Her eyes hardened as they settled on me. “Your kind destroyed him. Tortured him until he was nearlyunrecognizable. After his death, Triaten recovered his body for me…what there was left of him. It’s why I’m here—what I owe Triaten from long ago. It’s why I agreed to come.”
“When you had no intention of actually letting me ever touch you?”
She expelled a breath, her mouth pulling to the side. “No. This—us—was not part of the plan. This was never supposed to happen.”
“You already regret it?” A challenge I threw out just to see how it would fly, as she was still sitting on top of me naked, her pliable body a contrast to her intentions.
She shook her head, truth I could easily see reflected in her eyes. “No. But give me a day to rethink it.”
“How about you don’t rethink it.” My hand lifted to her face, my thumb tracing the line of her jaw. I had to hold myself back from darting forward and licking the exquisiteness of it. “Did he have a name? When did he die?”
What the hell was I doing? I never asked about the past of anyone I bred with. Their pasts, their futures—both inconsequential to me save for the time period that they carried my babes.
Yet I wanted to know Ada, understand her in a way that I never wanted to understand anyone. Even with my closest allies, I could care less on their personal lives—save for information I could use as leverage against them.
That was what my world consisted of. Leverage and dirty secrets and deals meant to keep my family in power.Mein power. Meant to keep the malefics from ravaging the world and leaving it in torn, dusty decay that was no good to anyone.
Maybe it was because of what Ada had asked of me—not to use my powers. Maybe it was because she’d been so good at resisting me. Though if it was the latter, the challenge was over.I’d had her. Would have her again, no doubt on that. Challenge gone.
Still, she fascinated me.
A panthenite breeder that had been hidden away for a hundred years. Probably because of her power—her skin. I’d never seen anything like it. Never even heard of anything like it.
Her fingers shifted to rest along the top ridge of muscle on my belly. “His name was Lyle. He was a panthenite my same age and we grew up together.”