A Queen of Ruin (Deliciously Dark Fairytales 4)

“Are you trying to dominate me, princess?” His voice was rough and wild, raw and full of danger.

A thrill of warning zinged up my spine.

“I’m going to suck that cock until you are hopelessly writhing on the floor and begging to come down my throat,” I said, full of bravado I wasn’t sure I felt.

Fire lit in his eyes and burned through the bond. Power coiled around him; he’d heard my challenge and needed to answer. Needed to do what was in his nature—force me to submit.

Suddenly I couldn’t get enough air. I felt like running. Whimpering. Rolling over and spreading my legs.

Fight that fucker until we come, my dragon growled.

Sounded good to me.

I crashed my will down on him, flattening him to the ground. He grunted as I pounced, using all my strength to rip him over onto his stomach and tear the shirt across his back. His golden scales, broken down his back, glittered in the low light in the room, so fucking beautiful.

I straddled his hips, tightening my body to keep him put in case he tried to buck me off. I leaned forward to shove his hands over his head, holding them there for a moment while my brain tried to catch up to my body. I probably needed a plan or something. He was much stronger than me. More ruthless. Pinning him to the ground probably wasn’t the best idea.

He clearly thought the same thing.

I heard his low, dark chuckle. The sound caressed my skin with little shocks of pleasure. I shivered with the feel of it, the promise of it.

“Ten…” he said in a low voice, not fighting me. Not moving, his hands above his head, the muscles on his big arms flared. “Nine…eight…”

A shock of adrenaline coursed through me.

Oh shit, my dragon thought with the equivalent of a squeal of excitement. Get his clothes off and get the fuck to the other side of the room. We can’t fight him on the ground. We need to charge into him with a running start.

Not a great game plan, but it was better than nothing. She was right about one thing—I needed to fight on my feet. I wouldn’t do much on the ground, not against this huge slab of lethal muscle.

Wasting no time, I scrabbled off him and rolled him over. He complied easily, his eyes hooded and a lazy grin drifting up his face. Fire bled through the bond, the thrill of a challenge about to be met.

“Seven…six…”

I grabbed two fistfuls of his ripped shirt and yanked. More fabric tore across that muscled, scarred, and tattooed chest. Goddess help me, I loved the play of violence on his flesh. I loved to see the evidence of his hard-earned prowess, and his utter confidence in it. He wasn’t hiding what he was—he couldn’t. I didn’t want him to.

My core tightened and my wetness leaked down my thighs as I slowed down a little, savoring the look of him. Running my hands down his chest and delighting in the feeling.

“Fi—” He stopped counting for a moment, watching me as I bent to kiss between his pecs, then run my lips down his chest.

“You’re so beautiful,” I whispered, licking across one of his nipples and then kissing over his heart. I stayed there for a moment, my lips against his skin, his heart gently pulsing back against me. “Calia was right when she said you were beautiful in a terrifying way.”

I drifted down his chest again, unbuttoning his threadbare jeans, a remnant from a different time. It didn’t need to be anymore. We could trade for more of them, or send people into the human lands to buy or steal them, depending on whether we could work out how to get at that last bit of gold in the reserves—the gold Dolion hadn’t been able to steal. Now that the curse had been broken, the world and all its spoils were once again open to us.

“The parts that make you terrifying,” I murmured, unzipping and kissing downward, “are incredibly sexy.”

I worked around to his hips, my fingers in his beltline, and pulled his jeans lower. He lifted, allowing me to tug them down to his ankles before finally getting off his shoes. I climbed back up his body slowly, licking and kissing my way, savoring the salty taste of his skin. The warmth on my lips and tongue.

“Your scars…” I ran my tongue across a jagged scar that must’ve hurt something awful when he got it. “Your ink…” I sucked in his flesh over an intricate design, wondering who’d applied them for him. Wondering how. I’d never thought to ask. And honestly…I wasn’t in a rush to learn everything about him all at once. I wanted to savor some of the secrets so that I could unravel him little by little over the years to come. We had all our lives. “Your passion…”