Dragon Fall: Masters of the Flame 3 (Mating Fever) (6 page)

His jaw clenched. She
was
a weapon. The two stiff, little points of her nipples speared him…

She peered up at him. “I want to feel awake and alive. I want a night with the man and the dragon who saved me. Is that so wrong?”

He had saved her so she could slay him, right now, right this moment. “It’s not wrong. I am yours for the night.”

He couldn’t claim her, but he
would
be hers. For forever, though he’d not weigh her down with that vow.

“Good.” She rose up the last quarter inch on her toes to touch her lips to his.

It was just the lightest brush. Butterfly wings and thistledown would’ve left more of a mark. And yet the contact crashed into him like a meteor, all rock and ice and fire. She breathed out a sigh, almost a moan, and he tightened his hold on her arms, drawing her up closer.

He opened his mouth to capture the sound, and the taste of cherries and vodka flooded his senses.

Ah fuck. When was the last time he’d had a drink? Back in the days of mead, maybe? She was like the last fading memory of a Viking warrior maiden.

Heading into the unknown with a dragon leading her.

And their tongues hadn’t even touched yet.

Chapter 5

Esme knew she was shameless. She was riding his chest like he was a tame little pony when she’d sworn to him she knew he was a dragon.

But it was hard to imagine, with his hair slicked back and the European flair to his attire. Not a beast, but a prince who’d saved her. Still, she knew it was his banked dragonfire that called to her, that understood what it was to live half-buried.

And all of him was all hers. For tonight.

Piper and Anjali would be so proud when she told them. They would giggle and compare baguettes…

And then he swept his tongue between their parted lips.

A tsunami of sensation flooded through her, washed on the wave of his harsh breath. The shocking intimacy of
his
tongue in
her
mouth—it was wrong, it was wicked.

It was wild. And she wanted it.

His grip on her upper arm lifted her higher, forcing her to tilt her head as he slanted his mouth across hers in a deepening kiss.

She moaned as the slick, wet heat seemed to lick
all
the way through her, down to places never touched by pleasure.

That was what he was giving her: the knowledge of desire.

Oh, no
wonder
the devil in the garden had been a serpent.

The muscular writhe of his tongue flicking over her teeth, tracing the inner lining of her lips, sparring with her tongue, teasing her…

Tentatively, she flicked back, a juicy play of flesh and—ouch, a click of teeth.

A chill of embarrassment battled the rising heat. She’d never been any good at this. In this world of gorgeous, assured women, he must think she was the worst bet ever… With a breathless sound of disgust, she turned her head, breaking the kiss. “I’m sorry.”

“Don’t be.”

She tasted a metallic tang of blood. And something else.

Something she’d never tasted in any of the five-star restaurants around the world. Something even more primal than blood.

Dangerous as death, smoldering like the vein of a volcano delving to the center of the earth.

He held her against his chest, his ragged breath gusting across the top of her head.

“It won’t hurt you,” he murmured, as if he knew what she was tasting. His soft rumble vibrated through her. “I won’t hurt you. My ichor can’t touch you…”

He thought he’d frightened her?

She twisted, gripped him harder, and kissed him again. Attacked him, practically. Slanting her mouth frantically across his, she didn’t care that her lips were crushed against his or that their breaths sawed unevenly. Or that the points of his teeth were just a little sharper than they should be.

He was a dragon lord, master of this fire that was rising in her, and she wouldn’t be ashamed or afraid of what she was feeling.

She reached up to tangle both hands in his dark hair, willing him to devour her, to burn away her insecurity and inhibitions. His neck was stiff against her clutching for just a heartbeat, and then he snaked his head down to angle the kiss more fiercely. She felt the moment they locked into place, mouths fused, breathing in unison, the desire between them spiraling higher.

Oh yes, he was a master, and she would be his mistress, in this at least…

He skimmed his hand lightly down her spine, easing over the silk tunic to land at the small of her back. Above her butt. She didn’t have much of a curve there, none of the lush femininity that was only part of the impossible standards she’d always tried to follow. But somehow he knew where to stop, right before she might’ve wondered if he was going to…

Oh, fuck it. She angled her hips forward, instinctively seeking the same snaking muscularity as his tongue but lower down… There. Behind the placket of his tailored pants. He wanted her. She was useless and weak and pathetic and a warlock’s castoff and bad at sex. And this prince of dragons wanted her.

Okay, it was a low bar, considering he’d been trapped in his cavern cage for ages, but the knowledge that he touched her for no other reason than desire was like a fifth of cheap vodka rushing through her veins. No, it was top-shelf vodka.

She broke the kiss again, mid-gasp. “We are so doing this—I am doing you.
Now
.”

He stared down at her. In the amber-tinted light, his dark eyes glinted with warning, bronzing his dusky skin. But for once, she decided the yellow light didn’t mean
caution, slow down, get ready to stop
but rather
go faster, full speed ahead, and damn the consequences
.

She let her fingers trail down from the black silk of his hair to linger at the sharp edge of his clenched jaw. “You want to tell me no.”

“I will never tell you no.”

He couldn’t promise her that. No one could. Or should. But she appreciated the lie because it meant he wanted to get into her palazzo pants. Which was where she wanted him. No one ever bothered lying to her because they always knew she’d do what they told her anyway.

Probably this was not the start of a healthy relationship, but he was dying of a dragon’s disease and she’d been stunted from the start, so maybe healthy wasn’t all that important right now.

Not compared to the fever raging between them.

He clasped her fingers and turned his head to kiss her knuckles. She shivered at the courtly caress, then caught her breath when he turned her hand over to press his lips to the center of her palm. The fire spread when he kissed over the pulse point of her inner wrist, where the veins ran so close to the surface that she knew he must feel the rush of her heartbeat.

Oh yes, he knew what he was doing to her. His dark eyes gleamed at her as he set his teeth to that sensitive, vulnerable spot. One bite…

He threaded his fingers through hers and stepped back.

“Bale…”

He tightened his hold. “Follow me.”

It was just a few steps to the bedroom, but she felt as if she were being led to a mountaintop. Her breath hitched as they stepped through the doorway out of the reach of the amber chandelier and into darkness.

“Let me pull open the blinds.” She tugged at his grasp.

But he didn’t release her. “No.”

In surprise, she let out a little snort. “You said you’d never tell me no.”

“Maybe I’m not very good at this.”

At hearing his thought so like her own, another laughing hiccup escaped her. “Has it been that long for you?”

“An eternity.”

Why did that please her so? “I want to look at you.”

“Why? So you can remember why you should run away?”

“I won’t run,” she murmured. “You make me burn.”

“Then we won’t need the light, will we?” He left the door open as he drew her deeper into the bedroom.

She knew the room well enough since she’d been sleeping there when she wasn’t hiding in Bale’s cavern. And she supposed he knew it well enough too, since the entirely of the Keep was his demesne. But she also suspected the faint glow of light from the other room was sufficient to let him see even though she was all but blind.

“I can’t see,” she said.

“There’s nothing to see.” His voice rasped in the dark, making her shiver. “Just feel.”

She reached for him, arrowing in by the sound of his voice, but he caught her wrist. “Ah no.”

“I want to feel
you
,” she complained breathlessly.

“Hmm. I guess this is another no.”

“Bale—”

“I’m not…” The tone of his voice grew even rougher. “I’m not as pleasing to the eye as you seem to think I am.”

She caught her breath. She hadn’t meant to touch on that tender spot, not if it hurt him. “I wouldn’t be doing this if I didn’t find you sexy as hell.”

“Hell is right,” he muttered. “You haven’t seen me. Not all of me.”

“Then show me and let me decide.”

“No.”

She huffed out an angry breath, and then sucked it right back in, aghast at her rudeness, and clamped her mouth shut.

He must’ve seen her expression, as she suspected, because the roughness in his voice turned to amusement. “You don’t like being told no.”

“Maybe because you’re saying it a lot,” she grumbled.

“Sacrificial virgins don’t usually talk to me like this. You’re too bold for your own good.”

For that lie, she almost forgave his obstinance. Instead of trying to pull out of his grasp, she stepped toward him, closing her eyes to sense the heat and swirl of air between their bodies. She stopped right before she touched him.

“You make me bold,” she murmured.

He shifted his grasp, putting her hand behind her and bringing her snug against his body. She whimpered a little at the heavy thrust of his lower body against hers.

“Will you be good?” His breath whispered against her cheek.

She tilted her head to one side, exposing her neck. “No.”

He set his teeth against the column of her throat, and she swayed into him.

His growl was low, almost subliminal. “Then what will I do with you?”

“Everything,” she whispered.

He whirled her around, and for a moment she wasn’t sure which way she was facing—or even if she was still in the same place—until the mattress pressed against the backs of her thighs. The unexpected pressure almost made her fall, but he held her with that one arm braced at her back, her breasts straining upward toward him.

“I’m not a monster,” he said softly, “but I’m not a man either.”

“Dragon lord.” She leaned into the strength of his arm. “I know what you are.”

“You
think
you know what I am, but we’ll see.”

“We would if you’d turn the lights on,” she snipped.

He laughed, a rough sound, as if he didn’t do it enough, and let her fall.

The soft pillow top all but engulfed her, and then bumped her up again as his weight settled onto the mattress beside her.

Maybe there was more light than she’d thought coming from the chandelier because she could almost—almost but not quite—see his silhouette as he loomed over her. Or maybe that was her fevered imagination. She ached to reach for him, but he didn’t seem to want that.

And if he wanted to pleasure her… Well, she could wait a leeeettle bit longer to start exerting her newfound independence.

She spread her arms to either side and arched her back. It felt silly, but from the hitch in his breath, maybe those pornographic clips she’d watched were onto something. Plus, the silk tightened around her breasts in a way that felt good. She arched higher, squirming against the bind of the fabric. The silk pressed on her nipples.

“Esme…”

“Bale?”

“You aren’t wearing anything under the silk.”

“I don’t have to.” She’d meant that she’d never had the curves to require a bra, but the words sounded bratty and defiant, and she liked them, so she said them again. “I don’t have to if I don’t want to. Is there a problem here?”

“Oh, no. On this I agree with you with all my heart.”

His weight shifted. The mattress thrust her upward again. She realized he was straddling her, though with enough distance that she only felt the heat of his body and his presence, not his actual touch.

Until his tongue flicked across her pointed nipple.

A jolt went through her body, and she bucked upward with a cry, but he must’ve known what she was going to do even before she did it because he drew back at the same pace. And his tongue flickered and teased the whole time. Lightning surged across her nerve endings, hit a wall at the ends of her fingers and toes, and surged back toward her core, brighter and hotter.

She knotted her fingers in the bedspread, clutching tight to stop herself from reaching for him. His mouth trailed down the valley between her small breasts to the other peak and sucked again.

She cried out louder, and his wicked sound of amusement hummed through her. The silk grew wet and slick from his suckling tongue.

And between her legs, an answering damp heat arose.

“Bale…” She couldn’t stop herself now—she had to touch him…

“No.” He caught both her wrists in one hand and stretched her arms out above her head.

She lifted her hips to take the pressure off her shoulders. “But I need—”

“And I’ll give it to you. Trust me. That’s all I ask of you.”

She’d wanted a lover that wanted nothing from her. But this was a torture she hadn’t known existed. She twisted underneath him and realized he’d slipped off her loose pants.

Heavily, he settled between her thighs, stretching her knees apart. A rush of air—hot and cool combined—made her shudder helplessly, her delicate flesh exposed to him. Knowing he could see all of her when she was blind…

He paused, but she splayed her knees wider with a faint keening noise.

He couldn’t leave her like this, he wouldn’t…

His body was hot, so hot between her legs. When had he taken off his clothes? In the dimmest silhouette, she thought he still had the cape thrown over one shoulder, which seemed odd and kind of princely sexy. Awash in sensation, the memory of her nightmares still fresh, she couldn’t be sure that she still knew what was happening. She tensed again at the burning brand centered at her weeping slit, just a touch, no weight, as if they were both floating.