We’d never been quite like this. I wanted to feel him from every angle before I died.
My fingertips ran down over his bare torso, tracing the lines and valleys of his muscles and scars with something akin to reverence. His played at the hem of my undershirt, and I whimpered my approval against his lips. Heat built between us, in the small sliver of flesh where my stomach met his. But it wasn’t the raging, out-of-control fire of our previous encounters. It was the heat of a fireplace in a comfortable home, warm and familiar.
And yet, dangerous. Dangerous in its safety.
I shifted further beneath his body, my thighs opening around his hips, so his erection pressed against my core.
He pulled away just enough to break our kiss, his nose still brushing mine. His hair dangled around his face, tickling my cheeks. Those magnificent eyes searched mine. They seemed pained and full—full of words that matched the ones I couldn’t bring myself to say.
“Oraya,” he murmured.
“Sh,” I whispered. “We don’t have to.”
And I kissed him again.
Again.
I felt his entire body melt with his acquiescence. His weight settled over me. I yanked at my camisole and he reached down to loosen my trousers. We shimmied out of our remaining clothing, shedding it between kisses, before his weight settled over me again, skin against skin.
I’d never had him like this before.
Never had anyone like this, since the night I lost my virginity and nearly lost my life for it. Even in fantasies, the idea of being so trapped had been inconceivable. And yet, now I craved so deeply the very thing that I’d found repulsive for so long—I wanted him to surround me. I wanted to feel his weight over me. I wanted as much of my skin against him as I could offer him.
Those kisses, soft and searching, never broke. I reached down and aligned him with my entrance.
One push, and he was everywhere.
I gasped against his mouth, capturing his groan. My legs folded around his waist, opening more to ease him deeper. His first stroke was slow and deep, as if he wanted to savor what it felt like, before he withdrew.
“Oraya,” he murmured.
“Sh,” I whispered against his mouth, and kissed him again, languidly, exploring every angle.
And that was the pace he kept, too, each thrust patient and deep and thorough, like he wanted to sear it all into memory—my skin, my body, and what it felt like to be inside me.
How did I know that was what he was doing?
Maybe it was because I was doing the same. Committing him to memory. Making sure that every movement, every breath, every sound he made was marked onto my soul. I wanted to capture him like rainwater. I wanted to savor him like blood. I wanted him to open me and touch everything within me that I’d hidden away from the world. How could there be so much pleasure in vulnerability? How could there be so much pleasure in fear?
My hips rolled with him, wringing that slow pleasure from every stroke of his cock, drowning in the way his breath hitched against our kisses with each movement, each contraction of my muscles.
The slow fire was building, building, into something overwhelming, consuming us both. But never out of control. Never terrifying.
My exhales became moans, matched by his, swallowed in each other’s breaths. I wouldn’t let him go, even when our pace quickened, even when breathing through our kisses grew clumsy and desperate.
I wanted to feel it through my entire body when he came, feel the way his muscles strained, hold him against me in those final moments.
He pushed deep into me now, hard. Goddess, I wanted more. Needed more. And yet, I never wanted this moment to end.
The need to tell him something, everything—Mother, I didn’t even know what, only that it was so big, so important, so overwhelming—rose in my throat.
But I couldn’t wrangle whatever I was feeling into words.
So I choked out, “Raihn,” against his lips, a question, an answer, a plea.
Because that name was all those things, wasn’t it? Raihn. My downfall and my most valuable supporter. My weakness and my strength. My worst enemy and the greatest love I had ever known.
All of that in one name. One person. One soul I knew as well as my own, just as confusing, just as flawed.
Pleasure built, spiked, in the place where we were connected.
I wanted to feel him everywhere. Give him everything.
“Raihn,” I whimpered again, not even knowing what I was asking.
“I know, princess,” he whispered. “I know.”
And then, just as I knew we were both rushing to the precipice, he broke our kiss and pulled away.
I let out a small sound of protest, starting to move after him, needing to taste him in that moment of climax.
“Let me watch you,” he murmured, voice rough. “Please. One last time.”
And Mother, the way he said it. Like it was the only thing he wanted out of his life before he let it go.
I couldn’t deny him even if I’d wanted to, because then he reached down and guided my thighs wider, opening me more for one final push, touching the deepest parts of me.
My back arched, pushing myself against his chest. I didn’t mean to cry out, but the sound escaped me anyway, uncontrollable. My fingernails dug into his shoulder, clutching him through the wave of pleasure—clutching him so I could feel him straining too, riding with me into the end.
But even as we lost ourselves, neither of us closed our eyes. We watched each other, gazes locked, bare and exposed through the most vulnerable parts of our pleasure.
He was so beautiful. Lips parted, eyes sharp, his focus fixed entirely on me. Every angle of his face, every scar, every flaw.
Perfect.
The wave melted away, and with it, so did the tension of our muscles. Raihn rolled off me, and I settled easily into the crook of his arm, surrounded by the cadence of his breathing.
We didn’t speak. There was nothing more to say. I kissed the scar on his brow, and the upside-down V on his cheek, and finally, his lips, and then I settled back into his embrace, welcoming our final oblivion.
64
RAIHN
Oraya and I lay together for a long time, eyes closed, but neither of us slept. I wondered if she knew that I always knew it when she was awake—I knew it when she was a room away from me, and I certainly knew it now, with her bare body against mine and my arms around her, feeling the cadence of her breathing against my chest.
Maybe some might’ve thought it was a waste to just lie there like that, in the hours before our potential death. Hell, the last time I’d faced death with Oraya, I’d wanted to spend every sleepless moment of that day inside her, working my way through a list of pleasures.
But this... this was different.
I didn’t need to collect more carnal moans. I wanted the rest of it. The way she breathed. The way she smelled. The exact arrangement of her dark lashes over her cheeks.
What it felt like, just to be next to her.
Maybe that was why, despite all we had to face come nightfall, I was glad I never fell asleep, not even when Oraya finally—finally—slipped off into a light, fitful rest.