Unfaded Glory (16 page)

“I don't care anymore, Byron. You said if I wanted to see anything to just ask. I want to see
everything.
”

“Then let's go upstairs to the bedroom where there's no camera.”

She'd forgotten about the cameras. She was so used to being on display, to being watched, that she'd put them right out of her mind. Damara took his hand, rough and calloused as it was, in her own soft one.

Then she closed the door behind them.

Desire warred with nervousness. “Show me,” she commanded, leaning against the door for support. She wasn't going to back down now.

“You like being in charge so much, maybe we should play princess and the bodyguard.” He arched a brow.

“Isn't that what we're doing?”

“Not like this.” He pulled his shirt off. “See, you give me commands and I'll do anything you want. I'm at your service.”

Service.
Made her think of all the ways she could require his talents.

“Is this a thing? People do this?” She blushed thinking about it.

“People do lots of things to get off. We could switch it up. You could be
my
bodyguard.”

He was totally naked under his jeans, but she knew he would be.

She didn't know it was possible for her mouth to water and go dry at the same time. Every inch of him was gloriously perfect. Even the scars from knives, bullets and other violence. That was what she'd liked best about his hands—that they were scarred.

He was a weapon, and he was offering to let her wield him as she wished.

“As if anyone would ever believe that.” She snorted.

“I would.” He stood proud, unabashed in nakedness. Allowing her to drink in all of him.

“Only for pretend.”

“No, I saw you handle that guy in Carthage. You know how to fight. You're small, but you're strong and fast. With the right training, you're capable of doing anything I can do.”

This was why he was dangerous. He believed in her. Not just what her name could do or her position, but the woman underneath.

Oh, she was in so much trouble. Her eyes were drawn down to his arousal.

She wanted to touch him, taste him, own him and
be
owned by him.

“What's it going to be, Your Majesty? How shall I serve you?”

“Maybe all I want to do is look.” Her voice was hoarse, guttural and completely unlike her.
That didn't sound very commanding at all.

“Maybe. And maybe you want me on my knees between your thighs.”

Jolts of white-hot lust scalded through her. “Yes, I do.”

“Then what is your command?”

She couldn't find the words. She was still afraid of what it would mean for her—for them. She didn't want to tell him to fuck her, but she couldn't ask him to make love to her either. And “take me” was too trite.

But he didn't move forward, didn't take control. Byron waited for her.

He wasn't letting her off easy. She'd have to articulate exactly what she wanted from him to get it.

She understood now what it was like to be on display. Damara thought she knew, but she didn't.

“Worship me. Make me believe I'm the only woman you'll ever touch again. Make me feel like being your woman is better than being a princess.”

“As you wish.”

“You keep saying that to me.”

“What should I say?”

“It's just... It sounds like it means something different than the way you speak it.”

“Do you want to talk about my vocabulary or would you like me to demonstrate my cunning linguistics?”

“Demonstrate.” That was the easiest answer of the night.

He moved toward her, and she was entranced with every part of him that was on display. Byron held out his hand in invitation to the bed. She sat on the corner gingerly, feeling more inexperienced than she had that night in Barcelona. He hooked his fingers around the waist of her pants. He held her gaze as he pulled them down her body.

She decided she liked him stripping her much better than stripping herself.

“You can still change your mind,” he said, his lips hot on the inside of her knee. “You should change your mind. You should tell me to stop, because you deserve better than this.”

She shivered with need. “No, I think we're both getting exactly what we deserve.”

Next came her panties and still he didn't look away. No, he met her stare—all dark intensity—even as he dragged her forward to the edge of the bed and drew her feet up onto his shoulders.

Even as he dipped his head.

Damara remembered how much pleasure he'd wrought with his tongue in Barcelona. She knew what he could do to her, and the anticipation was an erotic treat all on its own.

She was torn between wanting to watch his every motion and hold that connection with him and surrendering to the sensation. He pulled her farther forward so that he supported her weight and she couldn't see him but for his dark hair.

He was like a bird of prey, flying higher and higher until he dived in for the kill. Even as she flew with him, they were twisted in some death spiral toward culmination. Making love with him was like watching a master paint on canvas. His hands and mouth the brushes, her body the canvas and her ecstasy the paint.

It would be a masterpiece for them both. She writhed and arched, moaned for more.

Again, as before, she felt as if she were a bowstring that had been strung so tight she'd snap, but he pushed her further until her whole world narrowed to a tiny pinpoint of light collapsing in on itself until it exploded outward in a bomb blast. She experienced every sensation, every bliss, all at once.

He eased her legs down and rose up to kiss her on the mouth. She tasted herself—sweet.

“I want to do the same for you that you did for me,” she offered shyly between kisses.

“You don't have to.” He almost sounded afraid.

“I want to, Byron. I really want to.” She took him firmly in hand, as she had in Barcelona, but this time, she was going to do all those things with her mouth.

Damara reversed their positions on the bed.

She realized that for Byron Hakwins, a growl could mean so many things. Usually, it meant he was angry, but that low rumble in his throat when she took him, the jerk of his hips and the way his fingers curled gently but firmly around her shoulders told her everything she needed to know.

Damara still hadn't finished exploring him, so she decided to indulge. She traced his length, learning what was sensitive, what he liked and what he didn't as she went.

“Damara—” Even though he growled again, it was as though her name were a curse or a blessing—she wasn't sure which. But she hoped for both. She wanted to make him feel so much pleasure, he thought he would shatter, and maybe she did want him to shatter. Just a little bit.

And she'd pick up the pieces again, the same as he'd done to her in Barcelona.

Being as new to the love game as she was, she might have been unsure of herself, but Byron wasn't. Byron believed she could do anything.

So maybe she could.

“What you do to me—” His whole body was taut even as his hips surged forward. He tried to pull away, but she wouldn't let him. She was determined to have all of him. Even his culmination.

He spasmsed and cried out her name as he spent his seed.

Damara was very satisfied with herself, indeed.

She'd given him these moments, this bliss. This was something that the future couldn't steal from them. It would always be theirs. Damara slid down into the crook of his arm. That had become second nature to her. She tried not to think about how she'd miss sleeping next to him when it was all over.

She'd miss a lot of things. The way he touched her, the way he made her feel...not just in the bedroom, but as a woman. As a princess, too.

He made her feel as if she could do anything.

CHAPTER FOURTEEN

T
HIS
MOMENT
,
RIGHT
HERE
,
was the best thing Byron had ever experienced. It was better than sex, better than his first kill, even better than when he'd finally realized what his purpose was—killing. Destruction.

Simply lying in bed with Damara Petrakis— No, his wife. Damara Hawkins.

Guilt bloomed.

She'd told him no, but he'd pushed and coerced and seduced until he'd gotten exactly what he wanted and made her think it was her idea.

Yet he continued to bask in the warmth of her arms, the softness of her body pressed against him and the comfort she offered.

For him, this was happiness. Or as close as he'd ever been. The worst part was knowing it couldn't last. Part of him wished he'd never had it at all. Then he wouldn't be able to miss it when it was gone.

He tried to remind himself that she was just a mission and this heat between them was a bonus, but he knew it was more than that. So he had to cut it out like a cancer before it had a chance to spread.

Even though he didn't want to break free from the cocoon they'd wrapped themselves in, he forced himself to get up.

“Where are you going?” she said sleepily.

“Shower.”

She stretched lazily. “I'll join you.”

“I don't think that's a good idea.” He swallowed hard, hating his own words.

Damara sat up and pulled the blanket around her. “Why not?”

“You know why not.” He didn't want to do this—he didn't know if he could.

“Look, you don't get to make these choices for me.”

“No, I don't. I get to make them for
me.
”

He tried to turn away from her, but the soft defeat in her voice cut him too deeply when she spoke. “So, you got me. You got through my defenses and got me to surrender. Now you don't want me anymore?”

It would be easier if he could say that he didn't, but he couldn't hurt her that way. Not with the sorrow that already tinged her voice. “I want you too much.”

“Then why can't we have this?” Her eyes were wide, her mouth drawn as she waited for him to explain it to her.

“It'll make it harder for us both when it's over.”

“Why does it have to be over?” she cried.

“When your brother is deposed, who is going to lead your people?” His voice was gentle, but the meaning behind his words was like an anvil.

“They will.”

“Damara, they trust you and they need you. The whole point of all of this was to keep you safe until you could return home. Don't you want to go home?”

“More than anything.”

That was the only answer he needed, and the one he expected. He nodded. “The world loves you and your people love you. Don't demand I love you, too. Because I can never have you, not really.”

He didn't wait for her answer. Instead, he turned on the water in the shower and tried to ignore the ache in his chest.

But he wasn't alone. She didn't listen. She crept into the shower with him anyway.

“One day, Byron. Just give me the rest of this day. Maybe if we do everything, feel everything, it'll be enough. Maybe we'll stop wanting each other like this.”

“It will never be enough.”

Now she was the one pushing, demanding, manipulating his weaknesses as he'd done to her. He supposed it was only fair that it was her turn to take what she wanted from him. She wanted this day, and he'd give it to her.

“Make love to me, then fuck me and then make love to me again. Fill me up with memories so I don't forget.” Her words were a transgression, something he'd never thought he'd hear her say. It was illicit but intimate, almost at cross-purposes.

The water cascaded over them, and he pushed her hair out of her face gently. She twined her arms around his neck, her skin slick and warm.

Every touch was more intense, every breath was somehow sweeter.

He couldn't let this, or her, mean any more to him. Byron had to think of this as a mission. The best course of action would be to deny her, but he couldn't—wouldn't.

He had to step up his timetable so he could finish this mission.

Byron turned off the water. “This shower sex works in fantasies, but in real life, it's not so much fun.” He guided her to the bed.

* * *

D
AMARA
MEMORIZED
THE
taste of him—it was different now than in Barcelona. The first time he'd kissed her, it had been wonderful, but now there was familiarity to the act that added another layer to the sensation.

He kissed down her neck slowly, nibbling and nipping at the tender skin of her throat. She clung to him and pulled him even closer. She wanted her body to remember what it was like when he held her—the way it felt to press her breasts against the wide expanse of his chest, his flesh inside hers and the thunder of his heartbeat under her cheek. She wanted all of those things to be absorbed on some primal level that she wasn't even sure was possible.

He moved down to her collarbone and then the swell of her breast. Byron gave every inch of skin his undivided attention. There was no centimeter more important than any other. He filled his hands with her pert breasts, but he didn't linger. It was as if he sensed what she needed, or maybe his body had accepted what her mind already knew.

That this was indeed the last time.

Or maybe he was just that skilled at giving her what she wanted from him.

He moved down her chest to her belly and veered over to her hip, the outside of her thigh. Every place his lips touched was brought to stark and vibrant life, each touch receptor vibrating with bliss.

Byron moved his way down her leg, all the way down to her ankle and then back up to the inside of her knee. She giggled, but he didn't stop. He pressed his lips to her mound, then continued his journey to her other leg, her other hip, all the way up her ribs to her shoulder. Down the inside of her arm.

He was making love to her with his lips. Not getting her off, not to drive her higher; this is what he would do with her if he knew he could never do it again.

He was committing her body to his memory the way she'd done with him.

She didn't think her heart could break more than once, but it did. Over and over again.

Byron reached over to the nightstand for a condom, but she stayed his hand. “I don't want any barriers between us tonight.”

“Are you sure?” His tone was gruff, his lips swollen from their explorations.

“More than anything.”

He went back to his pursuit, kissing and tasting, exploring her body.

The arousal was secondary for her. Yes, he made her want and he made her wet, and she knew her release would be dazzling—fireworks and symphonies. But this part, where the emotion dwelled, that was what she needed, what she drank like a wanderer did water in the desert.

She didn't want to wait anymore. She wanted the next level of this sensation. “Please, now.”

Their gazes had joined when he sheathed himself inside her, and it was like a kind of trespass to experience these feelings while looking each other in the eye. It added yet another layer to the insanity, the connection.

And it felt like nothing else. She felt so full of him, but still she wanted more. She'd never get enough of him, or the sense of fulfillment she got only when she was in his arms like this.

She locked her legs around his waist as if that could somehow draw him even nearer to her, pull him deeper or give her more of him than she already had.

He gripped her hips and rolled them so that she was on top of him, and she got exactly what she was looking for. She'd taken him as deep as he could go.

Damara braced her palms on the mattress and pushed down with her hips. His hips thrust up to meet her, but still he didn't look away or close his eyes.

Her hair fell like a curtain around them and it was almost as though it was hiding them from the rest of the world. If only.

If only what?

If only she wasn't a princess and he wasn't a ranger? Then they wouldn't be who they were. Then this might not be so perfectly imperfect.

She didn't hold anything back from him now. She didn't try to hide from him; she let him see whatever he wanted as he looked into her eyes. Damara loved the play of expressions on his face as he neared completion. The way he sought it out but fought it at the same time. The tight cords of muscle in his neck as he strained against the pleasure and against her.

Even the slightly tender spots on her hips from where his fingers had gripped her just a little too tightly.

Every time she touched the tender flesh she was reminded of what had transpired to make it tender.

He grabbed her hard around the waist.

“Roll over.”

She complied without question, lifted herself off of him and lay on her stomach.

“Up on your hands and knees,” he commanded.

Damara did as he instructed, and his arm wrapped around her waist, his chest hot against her back. She shivered, waiting to see what he would do to her.

“You said you wanted me to make love to you, then fuck you, then make love to you again, right?”

“Yes.”

“This is the fucking.”

She gasped when he entered her again with a powerful thrust. At this angle, it hit a new place inside her that made her cry out.

He didn't stop; he didn't ask her if she was okay. He knew she was. He knew she wanted more. Already he could read her body like a map.

He drilled into her without mercy, but she wanted none. She met his thrusts, pushing herself back against his hips and thighs. Every time he went deep, sensation spiraled through her belly, her cleft and even down to her toes.

Damara curled her fists in the blanket and gasped.

He tangled his fist in her hair and tugged, just enough to get her to lift her head but not enough to hurt.

She loved it.

“More!” she demanded.

He increased the speed and tempo of his thrusts, slamming into her and giving no quarter. Her sheath spasmed around him as new bursts of sensation ricocheted through her.

Byron swore, and he pulled her back against him hard as he spent.

He dropped down on the bed next to her, a fine sheen of sweat on his forehead and his eyes closed.

She twisted so she could face him, and Damara kissed his cheek. The corner of his mouth.

He moaned. “Woman, are you trying to kill me?”

“It would be a good death.”

“Yeah, but I need a minute.”

“Just one? Or did we break it?” She grinned against his mouth.

“It's unbreakable.”

“Good. You still owe me another round.” She tried not to cry. It would be stupid to cry, but with her body still shaking with the aftermath of what they'd just done, she was wired with emotion. The first time had been a warm-up. The second time had been about lust. And this time, it was about everything.

Byron pulled her against him, his hand a brand on her back.

She nestled into him, fitting perfectly, as if they'd been made for each other. She thought he was just being sweet, but after a few moments he pulled her leg over his hip and angled her so that he could push inside her again.

He pressed his forehead against hers and slowly began to move.

Damara hadn't known he was capable of such tenderness.

Byron slipped his hand between them and brought her to a devastating bliss before they dissolved in each other's arms.

For one day, her marriage had been one of heat and passion. It had been real.

And just like that, it was over.