Roma Queen (Roma Royals Duet Book 2)

by Callie Hart

For a second, I think she’s going to tell me to go fuck myself; the insubordinate flare that lights up her eyes is a clear reminder that she doesn’t like being told what to do. But, like a good girl, she eventually does what I’ve asked of her and sticks out her tongue. Her left brow arches in silent question: What now, Asshole?

  I press the pad of my thumb onto the flat of her tongue and slowly draw it down toward the tip, spreading my pre-come over her taste buds, and Zara’s breath catches in her throat. No, she wasn’t expecting that. She wasn’t expecting me to be quite so direct. She’d better get used to it, and quickly, otherwise the next hour or so is going to be quite a shock for her.

  Sliding my thumb into her mouth, I push it all the way in until her lips meet the knuckle. “Suck it,” I command.

  Her eyelashes flutter like crazy, but she closes her eyes and wraps her lips around my thumb.

  Fuck me.

  So hot…

  So wet…

  I show the restraint of a saint as I slowly draw my thumb out of her mouth and slide it back in again. I know what it’d feel like if it was my dick I was thrusting into her mouth—It would feel fucking phenomenal, but I won’t allow it. I won’t take that for myself. First things first, I want to give Zara what she needs. What she’s been craving for years, even if she doesn’t know it herself yet.

  “Take off your clothes. Give them to me,” I demand, removing my thumb from her mouth. Her eyes fly open, and a charge of energy passes between us. Electric. Alive. Dangerous. Her lashes are much darker than the red of her hair—they’re thick and curled like doll’s lashes, as delicate and beautiful as the vanes on a feather. She remains on the bed but removes her clothes with deft, sure movements. Her body is fucking breathtaking as she gathers up the material into a bundle and passes it to me.

  I’ve been tattooing people since I was a kid. I always had an affinity for shape and form, and my family and other members of the Rivin clan would come to see me whenever I was back from school on break, asking me to ink them up with this design or that symbol. I fucking loved it. It was challenging, and it was fun. It wasn’t until I was banished that I took things deeper, though. I didn’t just want to be able to do a good job with a tattoo gun. I wanted to be able to paint. To draw. To become an expert at…at fucking something besides ripping people off and taking advantage of them whenever I could. I went to a live art class every day for a year—the roughed up, bruised-knuckled fighter in the torn-up jeans—and during each session, another beautiful woman would pose naked to be drawn.

  I’ve seen hundreds of different body types. Long, lean, dancer’s bodies. Strong, toned, muscular frames—the kind you find on gym junkies. Corded, graceful, yoga goddesses. Curvy, voluptuous women with feminine hips and breasts. Women with thighs you just want to dig your fingers into as you fuck them, and girls with asses you could watch bounce all day long.

  But not once during my time attending those classes did I come across a body like Zara’s. I could say that she’s perfect, but perfection is so subjective. One man’s ideal is far from another’s. The way the plane of her stomach slopes to meet her legs. The way her hip bones protrude just a tiny, tiny bit. The way her left areola is slightly oval and tilted on an axis compared to the almost perfect circle of her right areola. The way her bottom lip is just that bit fuller than her top lip. These small details that complete her form might not excite another man the same way they excite me.

  She isn’t perfect.

  But she is my perfect, and I would take her over a fake, flawlessly symmetrical, faultless robot any damn day of the week.

  I discard her clothes, dumping them into the open blanket box next to the bed, and then I slam the lid closed. Her skin is pale and vivid. She looks like she’s radiating moonlight. My dick throbs with painful urgency as I place my hands on her shoulders, pushing her back down onto the mattress.

  “Are you planning on punishing me with that belt, Pasha Rivin?” she whispers.

  I bite the inside of my cheek, hoping to keep the surprise from my face. “No, Firefly. I’m not a monster. I’d never use a tool to hurt you. I’d certainly never take a leather strap to you. Jesus Christ.”

  She laughs softly, curling a strand of my hair around her finger. “Then why isn’t it on the floor with the rest of your clothes?”

  “Because I’m not planning on holding back. I’m about to fuck you so hard, you’re probably going to need to bite down on it, Zara. Just trying to be a gentleman.”

  She picks up the belt, pouting at me. With her slender body stretched out diagonally across the bed, my palms are tingling like crazy. I can already imagine what the smooth, satin of her skin will feel like under the roughness of my hands, and trying to control myself right now is a serious practice in patience.

  I just told her I wasn’t a monster, but perhaps that’s not true. I sure as hell feel like one sometimes. I’m so much bigger than her. When I lie on top of her, my body engulfs and restrains her. She’s fine boned, her wrists so narrow I can easily encircle them between my thumb and my index finger. The line of her neck is graceful and elegant like a swan. She reminds me of a ballerina, every part of her poised and controlled with absolute precision, every muscle trained and held in place—a vastly difficult task, made to look so effortless by the serenity on her face. She’s as intricate as a swiss watch. Expertly constructed like a ’69 Sting Ray, all flowing lines crafted to conceal a powerful, fierce engine beneath the hood.

  I, on the other hand, was built with far less finesse. I was constructed with brute force in mind. I’m a sledgehammer. A fucking Sherman tank. I’m brash, and I’m direct—a pot on the verge of boiling over, twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week.

  I like the glaring differences between us. I like that she’s so small. I like that she’s so vulnerable in situations like this. I would never fucking hurt her. Never in a million years. But there’s a darkness in me that relishes her surrender. She knows I’m stronger than she is, that I’m fucking dangerous, and I wouldn’t bat an eyelid over killing someone if I had to, but it doesn’t matter to her. She turns herself over to me willingly. She places her care into my violent hands, trusting that I’ll be careful with her, no matter what.

  This isn’t some testosterone-induced macho bullshit. I don’t like the fact that I’m bigger than she is and she’s so delicate because it makes me feel more of a man. I don’t understand that mentality. I don’t get why other guys would even feel that way in the first place. I like it because of that trust.

  I like testing the boundaries of it. Seeing how far I can push her and waiting to find out where the limits of that trust start and end. I’ll never stop challenging her. There’ll never come a day when I cease to explore her bravery, or the mettle of her lion’s heart. I’ll never make life easy for her, because easiness breeds complacency.

  Maybe all of that does make me a monster. If that’s the case, then it’s a cape I’m willing to wear.

  “Is that pretty little mouth of yours going to take me again, Firefly? How badly do you want my cock? Should I shove it right to the back of your throat, hmm?”

  She sighs, breath stuttering and uneven. Her mercurial irises are like twin pools of burning fire. It’s such a fucking turn on to see her desire build like this. She practically panting as she crawls toward me on all fours. “Do it,” she dares.

  Daring me is tantamount to waving a red flag at a bull. “Oh, Firefly…you really shouldn’t.”

  I wind her hair around my fist, baring my teeth and I tighten my hold. Zara gasps. I don’t even need to tell her this time: she opens her mouth voluntarily, and the sight of her pink, wet tongue nearly sends me into a fucking frenzy. “Wider,” I command.

  She opens wider.

  I grab hold of my cock, squeezing it to the point of pain, and then I slide it slowly into her mouth. It pulses like a fucking red-hot poker, harder than when I was a fucking teenager, and I drive her head down onto me, cursing through my teeth. “Holy fuck, Firefly. Holy fuck, ye
s.”

  I don’t stop guiding her head down until I feel the pout of her swollen lips around the base of my shaft. She lets out a moan—a combination of need and warning—and I know I have her right on the edge. She can barely breathe like this. Her mouth and her throat are so fucking full of me that I’m robbing her of the oxygen she needs to survive.

  I rip myself free of her, and the sound of her desperate draw of air is like music to my ears. My dick is wet with her saliva, and so are her lips.

  I tighten my hold on her hair, and Zara’s eyes widen. She knows what’s coming. “Again,” I command.

  Her lips slide all the way down to my fucking balls, and I can feel the back of her throat spasming; she’s on the verge of gagging, but I pull back a little, feeling the tension in her shoulders ease. That’s not what this is about. This is not an act of degradation. I don’t want her coughing and spluttering, eyes watering, make up streaming down her cheeks. I want us both walking the tightrope between too far and not enough.

  She looks up at me, her mouth filled with my cock, eyes issuing a challenge all of their own, and it’s just too fucking much. I have to. God, I fucking have to. I rock my hips forward, holding her head in place, and I fuck her mouth. Hard, fast and barely controlled, I grind my teeth together as I shove myself past her lips, over and over again.

  She moans, panting down her nose, her tongue massaging the tip of my dick every time I jerk back, and I feel like a fucking god. When she presses back, resisting against the pressure I’m applying on the back of her head, I release her. If she needs a moment, I’ll give it to her. But she doesn’t need a moment. Her chin is wet and glistening as she dips down and takes one of my balls into her mouth, and—

  FUCK!

  —sucks, sitting back on her heels so that it pops out of her mouth, and then she’s licking, laving, sucking on me. Her hand is gripped around my shaft, and—

  GODDAMNIT!

  —I’m no longer in control here. In the blink of an eye, she’s flipped the script and she literally has me by the balls. My hands drop to my sides, my head falling back, and the slick heat of her mouth is all over me, driving down onto me, further, deeper, faster than the pace I was setting a moment ago.

  “Zara. Shit, Zara, stop…”

  She doesn’t. The pleasure she draws from me feels like it’s settling over me in layers, blankets of warmth, ecstasy, fire, one after the other, tingling, aching, and urgent. She’s merciless. Relentless. God, if she doesn’t stop, she’s going to bring this to an end all too fucking quickly. I grab hold of her by the hair and pull back, hinging at the waist, hips withdrawing, and Zara growls under her breath.

  “Hahaha, angry little Firefly. Did I take away your toy? Get that ass up in the air. Now.”

  Her eyes flash, like she’s about to pounce on me, pin me to the bed, and ride the shit out of my dick whether I like it or not.

  Interesting.

  I take hold of her chin, and I fall forward, bringing my mouth down on hers. Feels like she’s trying to fight the kiss, to fight me, but she’s not trying to get away. Far from it. She’s trying to battle me for dominance. I won’t be giving in so easily to her today, though. I tear my mouth away, enjoying the frustrated profanity that spills from her lips, and I take her by the waist, fingers pressing into her flesh as I spin her around in a one-eighty.

  “I said ass in the air.” I bring my palm down on her ass cheek, and I have to catch my lower lip in my teeth and bite down hard as I watch her flesh bounce. Fuck, her ass alone is enough to make a man lose his mind. Like a developing photograph, a red, angry hand-shaped welt begins to emerge from the creamy whiteness of her skin.

  “That fucking hurt,” she hisses.

  “Yeah? How bad?” I move quickly, falling over her, my chest to her back, and then I’m reaching around, fastening my hand around her throat, pulling her back toward me so that we both rise up to our knees.

  I can feel her growl of anger beneath my hand, and it only serves to make my dick even harder. With my other hand, I stroke and grope at her breasts, a fire raging inside me as I knead and gouge my fingers into the swell of her tits.

  Just enough.

  Not too much.

  Never too much.

  Zara trembles against me as I rub the roughness of my stubble against the back of her neck. I kiss, I lick, I bite, and Zara shakes harder, and harder, and harder. “Pasha,” she pants. “God, please…” She arches her back, leaning into the hand I’m still holding around her neck, and I catch on quickly. She wants more.

  I flick at her nipple, roughly pressing my fingers into her breast again, and she moans louder still. Out of nowhere, she’s grabbing my hand and sliding it down her stomach, guiding me in between her legs. My fingers instantly find her hot, wet and pulsing. Her pussy is dripping wet. She’s so desperate for me that she cries out when I touch my fingertips against her clit.

  “I see,” I rumble into her ear. “Don’t worry, I understand. I know what you need, little Firefly.” I release her neck, shoving her forward, and she lands back on all fours on the bed. My hand comes down on her ass again, and the cry of pleasure that echoes through the vardo is tinged with an element of pain.

  “Ass up, Zara,” I order. “Last time.”

  She complies quickly this time, arching her back, presenting her ass to me, and I have to stifle the roar that’s building in the back of my throat. So damn pretty. So damn pink. So damn wet.

  I rub my hand over her, spreading the evidence of her need all over her, using my thumb to rub her slickness up between her ass cheeks. Zara whimpers, and the sound is like a trigger inside my mind. I’m gone. I’m lost. I’m fucking done.

  She tenses as I push myself into her. I hold her by the hips, pulling her back onto my dick, and Zara lets out a startled gasp. “Yeah. Feel it. Feel me filling you up,” I snarl. “You can try and hold it back all you like, but I am going to make you scream. I promise, your throat’s going to be raw by the time we’re done here.”

  I intend on keeping that promise.

  I can’t be slow, and I can’t be gentle. Not possible. I slam myself into her, and Zara’s hands clench, fisting the sheets. “Fuck, Pasha. Oh my god. You’re so deep. Please. Please. Please…”

  There’s a difference between a woman begging for more and begging you to stop. Right now, Zara’s pleading me to give her my dick…and I give her what she wants. Her back bows and arches, flexing as I thrust myself into her. It’s my turn to be merciless. Again, and again, and again…

  Zara’s hand fumbles on top of the bed, and then she’s sliding my belt between her teeth, clamping down on the leather. She’s the most incredible, fierce, most beautiful creature to walk this earth. I worship her as I fuck her, carefully teasing her asshole with my thumb, applying the slightest pressure, just enough to make it feel good, and Zara bites down harder on the leather, sweat breaking out across her back, glistening in the groove of her spine.

  She’s fucking magnificent.

  It’s not long before she’s screaming as she comes, and I grasp her hips tight, my jaw feeling like it’s going to fucking shatter as she bucks and moans against me. I come with her, and it’s more than just a release. It’s more than just a brazen moment of pleasure.

  It’s the sun exploding, and the sky falling, and the world as I know it fucking ending. With my heart slamming in my chest, I lie down beside her, and Zara’s hazy, endorphin-clouded eyes meet mine.

  Right then and there, I know my old life is in ruins, and there is nothing to go back to if I don’t have her.

  Ten

  ZARA

  The world is so, so still. Holding its breath.

  When I wake up, crushed against the side of the vardo, with Pasha’s heavily muscled arm locked in a tight embrace around my body, it feels like my ears are blocked. It’s almost as if I’m wearing a pair of noise cancelling headphones and the ambient sound has been sucked out of the world. All I can hear is the steady, slow, even push and pull of Pasha’s breath
over my head, and the soft rustle of the blankets as I wriggle back, closer to the warmth of his body and away from the frigidly cold side of the wagon.

  My body hums with pain—an over-stretched, deep ache in my muscles and my joints, reminding in a very pleasant way of the workout I got last night. Memories flicker through my head—Pasha’s hands on my breasts, his fingers gouging into my flesh one second, gently stroking and teasing the next. His talented mouth drawing sigh after sigh out of me, followed by his name, repeatedly and breathlessly called out as I pleaded him for release.

  I’ve always found that such an eye-roller in movies—that moment when the couple finally get down and dirty, and the woman is a hot mess, gasping the male lead’s name on every other breath. It’s always just seemed so over the top and unnecessary to me, like the heroine’s trying to use the guy’s name a lot to make sure she’ll remember it later. Last night, I learned my lesson, though. I couldn’t fucking stop myself. His name was a prayer on my lips. A plea. An exaltation. The smell of him overrode my olfactory senses. My skin came alive under his meticulous attentions. His voice, stone on stone, arrogant and humble, rough and gentle, was a song in my ears. He demanded every part of me, and I gave myself to him willingly. I suppose it makes total sense that the only word I could utter was his name.

  He stirs behind me, his fingers twitching against my stomach, and then he nuzzles his face into the back of my neck. My cheeks ache with the effort it takes to keep the small, secret smile from my face. I shield my mouth with my hand, hiding the traitorous grin as it spreads without my permission, but in the end I give in to it, giving it free rein as I beam to myself, giddy over the fact that I’m being held by a man I…

  A man I…

  Wow. What the hell? I screw my eyes shut, shaking the thought out of my head before it can take shape and solidify. I am not in love with Pasha Rivin. I can’t be. There are social norms that have to be observed here. A waiting period. I need to discover every single little detail there is to know about him before I can claim such a thing. And then I have to wait some more, just to make sure, before I let such a risky word venture into my vocabulary. That’s how these things work. This is what I tell myself as I lightly stroke my fingers over the fine, dark hairs on the back of his arm, wondering over the sheer miracle of the man.