“Wow, thanks,” she cut in softly.
“Darling, I’m pleased you grasped the compliment. However, I’m being deadly serious. Realms do not like other realms sending soldiers in and meddling with their citizens, ever, and perhaps especially not in secret.”
“Yes, I can see that,” she agreed.
“We share a border with Lunwyn. Good relations. Trade treaties that benefit both realms. Should trouble arise, and it always does, our militaries would fight side by side. King Viktor is young. Smart. Stable. His father is a born leader in more ways than anyone on this planet, and a very fine man. His mother is nearly a warrior herself, and almost as cunning as her mother was. But he’s still young. Youth can mean impetuousness. He’s just learning to trust us as his allies and—”
“Baby, baby, baby,” she fussed, pushing up to touch her lips to his. “I get it. Loose lips sink ships. You’re heard.”
“Loose lips sink ships?” he asked, and before she could say anything, went on, “That’s most ingenious.”
“Well, stick around, buddy, I got a million of them.”
He chuckled.
She cuddled closer to him and tucked her face into his chest.
When she did, he thought, this would be their nights. After he had her, they would tangle together to sleep.
In fact, this would be their lives.
They may have a babe squirming between them if it fretted in the dark. Dogs (who would eventually learn better and remain at the foot) when they got them.
But in that moment, with Satrine in his arms, Loren vowed that whatever his future brought, it would not take him away from Satrine and their bed in the nighttime.
He’d sleep by her side every night.
Until he died.
“That’s where the dark started, isn’t it?” she asked his chest, taking him from his thoughts.
He bent his neck and pressed his face into her hair.
There, he admitted, “Yes.”
“Thank you for your service, honey.”
He again went still as her words flooded through him.
Simple.
Meaningful.
More light in the dark before it faded away.
“You’re welcome, my love.”
* * * *
She shifted against him, and this time when Loren opened his eyes, he saw the dawn stealing around the drawn curtains.
He also smelled her.
Felt her.
Was still entirely tangled in her.
And realized his folly of asking her to stay.
As if sensing him awake, Satrine shifted again, stretched, and felt his morning readiness, he knew, for she stilled.
Then (he should have known), albeit gently…
She attacked.
He was on his back, she was draped down his good side, her mouth on his, her hand on his chest, her breasts pressing in.
He pulled his mouth from hers and warned, “Darling.”
Hers was not a warning.
It was a plea.
“So you won’t hurt yourself, you’ll need to be creative. I know you’re creative, baby. Be creative.”
He framed one side of her face with his hand, being both relieved and pleased from her behavior from the first kiss they shared that there was one aspect of life and living it that her mother did not hesitate to be open about. Satrine was not at all afraid of sex. And this was not a surprise to him. She and Corliss had a very close, honest, open relationship.
However, being secluded all her life, she was still a virgin.
“Satrine—”
Her hand strayed down his stomach.
He caught her wrist and chuckled. “My dearest, you know not what you toy with.”
“I haven’t toyed with anything yet.”
He pulled her hand up his chest.
And then he got serious.
“If it is your wish, I will gladly bring you to release.”
“It is my wish, and I will gladly return the favor.”
He felt his eyes widen.
She used hers to roam his face, his neck, then she turned her attention to his chest.
“Gods, do you have any clue how beautiful you are?” she asked in an awed, breathy voice that scored from his throat straight to his cock.
All right.
Enough.
He took her to her back.
“Loren, your wound,” she snapped.
“You wish it, my love, I’ll give it to you,” he promised.
Her gaze heated.
He lost that beauty when he took her mouth.
Then he took her neck, her chest…
Pushing up her shift, he spent quite some time on her breasts.
She was writhing under him, her fingers buried in his hair, so he knew she was ready for what was next.
He ran his lips down the lovely outward swell of her belly at the same time he pulled her knickers down her legs.
She kicked them off.
He spread her thighs.
And took her sex with his mouth.
She gasped a gasp he felt in his shaft, mewed a mew he felt drive up his arse, and after he threw her legs over his shoulders, she moaned a moan that made him bead.
She rocked against him, wanton, abandoned, her taste, sounds, smell, reaction, all of it was more than he’d imagined, more than he could have hoped. And with Satrine, he knew he could hope for a great deal.