But someone was. Kwame’s strong arms were around me. His strong body was pressed against mine, solid as the life I’d given back to him. He would give me the oblivion I’d craved after Tadeu’s death, when I had used Lord Balam without even knowing that’s what I was doing. When I had taken from him because the sister I needed wasn’t there for me.
“I can’t,” I blurted, breaking Kwame’s kiss. “I can’t use you like this. I did it before, and it hurt someone I love. Maybe two someones.” I thought of Tadeu’s hatred, of his anger, and also of Lord Balam’s lack of possessiveness when other men wanted me. I hadn’t understood it, but now I did. Despite him saying he was fine with the way I’d treated him, he’d been protecting his heart—from me. That broke my heart more than knowing I’d broken Tadeu’s.
Kwame stroked my hair back and gazed at me in the flickering firelight. “Itzel, you’re not using me,” he said. “I’m offering. You’re allowed to take as well as give.”
“What if I hurt you?” I whispered.
A smile teased the corner of Kwame’s mouth, and he slid a hand behind my head, cradling it in his long fingers. “I’m strong,” he said. “I won’t break.”
Twenty
I leaned in to kiss the lion prince again. His arms slid around me, warm and comforting and as strong as he promised.
“Thank you,” I whispered.
“You don’t have to thank me for giving you what you’ve always deserved.”
“I want to,” I whispered. “Thank you for letting me have this. For being so good to me.”
“Anyone who’s hurt you deserves worse than death,” he said. “You’re a queen. You should be treated as such.”
I kissed him, and this time, I didn’t pull away. I tasted his mouth, diving into him and letting myself fall, trusting that he would catch me. His long fingers caressed my sides, tickling and teasing, until I had to smile into his kiss. It felt like freedom, that smile. It had been a long time since I’d had fun with a man in a sexual way.
I pressed deeper into the kiss, moaning at the sensation of his tongue sliding rhythmically against mine. Kwame’s hands moved down my back, tightening on my waist. In one swift motion, he lifted me and brought me into his lap. I straddled his hips, rising up and cupping his face between my hands as I knelt over him. I devoured his mouth, hungrier now as a tingling sensation spread through my body and settled between my thighs. I hovered above him, not sinking down yet. The cold air snaked between us, teasing our hot bodies, urging us to move closer.
Kwame’s hands tugged gently, but I resisted, letting the tension build between us instead. I’d never been in control like this, and I found myself relishing the groan that left Kwame’s lips when I didn’t yield to the pressure of his hands. He lifted his hips, but I drew back, not letting our bodies connect fully.
After so many experiences where I’d had no control, kneeling over Kwame like this felt like victory. Like power.
It shimmered along my limbs like magic, sinking into my blood like an addiction. I had the power, and I loved it. I wanted to make him moan and beg the way Sir Kenosi had made me.
I slid my hands up the back of his neck, feeling the corded muscles, the soft knots of his hair, the angles of his cheeks, the cool shell of his ear. My lips found their way along his jawline to his throat, and he moaned softly, letting his head fall back. I moved down, tugging up his shirt until he let me pull it off over his head. His dark skin gleamed like black satin in the firelight, and I sat back to marvel at his beauty. My nails raked down his flat chest to his abs, which tensed under my fingers as a shiver went through his body. More ritual scars marked his chest and shoulders, awakening a pride in me I hadn’t known I felt. He had endured, had proven himself a man to his people.
Now he would prove his manhood to me.
I undid the button on his pants, tugged down the zipper, and slid my hand inside. Kwame groaned softly as my fingers circled his cock for the first time. Like the rest of him, it was long and hard. My mouth watered at the picture it put into my mind.
Kwame reached for my clothes, gently sliding my jacket off my arms before tugging my shirt over my head. He sat back and gazed at me as if I were the world’s rarest gem, more precious than every amulet combined. His eyes heated my body, making it come to life with desire in a way it hadn’t in weeks. I wanted more. More of his gaze caressing my skin, more of the sensation of power and worthiness that I felt when he looked at me as if I were a goddess and he were a mere mortal. I reached behind me to unhook my bra, sliding it from my arms and relishing his sharp intake of breath. I sat back, my top half bared to him and the firelight dancing off my caramel skin.
“You are perfection itself,” Kwame breathed, his hands reaching for me before pausing.
“Touch me,” I whispered, and heat shimmered through me when his cold hands began to move slowly down my back, caressing my soft skin. He stopped when they reached my jeans, and he drew another breath.
I stood, watching as he undid the button and gulped before slowly circling the top of my jeans with his thumbs. Slowly, he drew them down over my thighs. As the cold air hit my hot skin, excitement rushed through me. Kwame and I had slept in the same bed, but we’d never undressed each other, never seen each other like this. He’d never looked at me with desire burning in those eyes that had seen death itself and come back from it. He’d never leaned in and drew a deep breath of my scent as he slid my jeans lower, his eyes fixed on the spot where my thighs met.
When he had my jeans at my feet, I kicked them off and stood for a moment in the firelight, letting him drink me in with his eyes, the way the firelight skimmed along my curves, the hardness of my nipples in the cold, the chill bumps running over my skin. I felt like a goddess standing there, full and whole and charged with power.
I reached for Kwame’s pants, drawing them off as well. But when he stepped closer, I nudged him back to the log. He sank onto it, his eyes still fixed on me as if in some kind of trance. Straddling his knees, I relished his reaction—the shuddering breath he took, the way his lids dropped halfway and the soft groan of torment that caught in his throat. I leaned in, pressing my lips to his collar bone before whispering against his neck. “Can I?”
“I give myself to you,” Kwame murmured, his voice thick with desire. “Take what you need, my love. It’s all for you.”
I slid from the log, kneeling between his feet and pumping his cock with one hand while working my lips down over the smooth plane of his chest to his nipple. I flicked my tongue out against it, a shiver of desire piercing through me when he growled in pleasure. I sucked harder, nibbling at the bud of his nipple until he growled again, his hands rougher as they seized my arms.
“I’m not done,” I protested, and Kwame’s hands relaxed instantly. I let my lips trail down his abs, tasting his cool skin. Gripping his cock, I sank lower. It was smooth and dark like the rest of his skin, but as I gripped it and drew back the skin, the tip emerged dusky pink as if I’d unwrapped a piece of the most exotic candy. My clit throbbed at the sight of his bare cock aching for me. Saliva pooled in my mouth as wetness pooled between my thighs. Again, the sensation of power swelled in my chest, filling me with a heady rush.
I scooted back further, my knees wide on the ground and my ass toward the fire. I could feel the heat of it across the space, the cold air licking my skin and the flames heating my sex, and an erotic thrill went through me. Lowering my lips to Kwame’s cock, I kissed the straining head. He shuddered, and I opened my lips, running my tongue around the glorious tip. Lust shot through me, and my lids dropped closed as I began to lick in earnest, spreading my tongue over the cool head and then swiping around it like an ice cream cone.
Kwame moaned, his fingers tangling in my hair and his breath coming faster as I lowered my mouth over him, pumping up and down. A drop of saltiness spread over my tongue, and triumph swelled within me.
“You’re driving me crazy,” Kwame rumbled. “I want to be inside you, my love.”
“My god, I can smell your sex,” he gasped, gripping my hair tighter. “Let me taste your sweetness.”
I popped off his cock and stood, sliding over his lap again. This time, I slid all the way in, so our hips locked together. “Not this time,” I said. “This time, I lead.”
I rose up, reaching down to grasp his shaft and guide it to my entrance. Inside me, Sir Kenosi’s cheetah growled like a wild animal, prowling under my skin and longing to break free, to fuck wild and animalistic. I hadn’t been with anyone since his cheetah had come out of my body, since I’d been a shifter. I could feel a difference in my body, too, a slickness and heat between my pussy lips that was beyond my human wetness.
Kwame felt it, too. With a groan, he sank his teeth into his bottom lip, his body trembling with the effort of holding back. I smiled and pressed my lips to his for a second before sitting back, not holding back my triumphant grin as I watched his face while I sank onto him. Pleasure shuddered through my whole body at the sensation of his cold cock burying itself in my hot flesh.
“Oh,” I gasped, a shiver racing across my skin. He was cold as his ghost had been in the grass that first night. I hadn’t fucked him since he’d been human again, and I had forgotten the coldness of the undead.
My slick coated him, and pleasure gripped my body as his cock glided in effortlessly. I pressed down, spreading my knees and watching his dark black cock disappear inside me until he reached my depths and our hips locked together. Gripping my hip and bracing one hand beside him on the log, he lifted his hips to push his cock in to the hilt, his pelvic bone grinding against my clit. I gasped in pleasure and a dart of pain as the bare head of his cock hit just a bit too deep for comfort. Kwame growled low in his throat, and I let him guide my hips to find their pace as I began rising and sinking onto him in a slow, sultry rhythm.
“My god, you’re so beautiful,” Kwame murmured, watching me pump my pussy over his straining, hard cock. I looked down, too, captivated by the sight of his long, black length sinking into me over and over. I began to move faster, riding him harder. Our bodies moved in rhythm, our hips slamming together and drawing a gasp of both pleasure and pain from me each time he hit my depths and my clit at the same moment. The pleasure spiraled higher, fueled by the pain that darted into me. I had learned to love pain, to crave it, to need it. And now it was mine.
I fucked Prince Kwame harder, relishing the pain, using it to fan the flames of my pleasure until I reached the crest of what my body could contain. I cried out, my walls clenching around him as my climax gripped me. I raked my nails down his arms, throwing my head back and crying out my pleasure, my pain, my power to the stars in the inky cold night.
My calm, gentle mate threw back his head and roared like a lion as he thrust his hips upwards, gripping my body and holding me pinned as he expanded further still. Pain clenched my walls tighter, and he roared again as he pumped a burst of icy cum into my depths. The cold of it shocked me, and I cried out again as another orgasm crested just as the last one subsided.
Still, my entire body throbbed with energy, so much I felt like I was vibrating, about to burst into the sky and streak across the Milky Way in a shimmering band of gold like I’d seen swirling in the amulet.
“Itzel,” Kwame whispered, gripping my hips.
I couldn’t answer, though. I was still coming, my body still gripped in the throes of climax. I slid a hand over his mouth, blocking out any protest as my body writhed against his, my toes digging into the dirt, the stones, the cold earth. My pussy gripped him, milking the seed from his throbbing cock until every drop was gone. I cried out again and again, wordlessly, feeling the perfection of our bodies together as his cock stayed hard and driven deep into my center, filling me and completing me, joining with me in some sacred, primal way.
“Itzel,” he said again, this time more urgently, turning his face away from my silencing hand. “Look.”
I couldn’t find words, but Kwame nudged my shoulder with his palm, and I turned, my brain still dizzy with the aftershock of our union. A gasp escaped my lips as a shock hit me like icy water thrown in my face. Surrounding us on every side, emerging from behind stones and bushes like spectral spirits drawn by some siren’s song, were at least a dozen snow leopards.
Twenty-One
Tadeu
Shifter, Tiger Nation
“We have two very simple goals on this mission,” Princess Camila said, standing in the center of the circle of tigers and other guides and guards she’d brought to her base camp in the Himalayas. You’d think we were climbing Everest from the number of people she’d paid to join her entourage, but we were currently in a small, barren valley with only a bit of snow on the northern slopes around us.
In addition to her team, Camila had allowed the cheetah reality show host and her cameraman to accompany us. Sir Kenosi himself would have been proud to land a role on this reality show. Even an idiot like me knew it would be ratings gold. Especially since Camila was sure to come unhinged when something didn’t go her way. I’d known the ditzy princess for most of my life, and I’d never seen her so close to the edge. I couldn’t wait to see her go off it. Maybe I’d be lucky enough to give her a little nudge.
“First of all,” Princess Ocelot continued, “We’re here to obtain the snow leopard amulet. Shah Tiger says a monk named Gao Jetsun has it, which means we need to hit all the monasteries in snow leopard territory in search of him. Everyone understand?”
A few people nodded or murmured agreement, including our guide, a snow leopard named Li.
“I have programmed my name and number into each of these phones. You are to keep them on you at all times.”
She began handing out small phones. When I got mine, I saw that it had only one number. Well, at least I had a phone now. The shah hadn’t done much beyond letting me crash in his giant palace, most of which was used for visitors only. He hadn’t shown me around, or gotten someone to teach me the language, or done shit for me, really. Besides having me arrested for killing the princess, he didn’t seem to know I existed.
And why would he? There were thousands of tiger shifters. I was just one more of them, some asshole who’d been shipped here when his home country didn’t want him anymore. They’d gotten rid of a convict, shoved me off on the shah. He didn’t want a convict. He’d only let me stay because King Ocelot had already flown me to his empire, and he didn’t want to spare the expense of shipping me back.
Camila went on as she handed out the cheap phones. “Once we find Mr. Jetsun, you are to notify me immediately. I’ll come and negotiate for the amulet.”
“It’s Mr. Gao,” Gabor murmured. “Your Grace.” He kept his voice low, glancing sideways at the cameras with a fierce scowl. He obviously didn’t want them to hear, and from the eager expression on Ebele’s face, it was clear she’d heard and was hoping the mic had picked up his words. I’d already heard Gabor trying to talk Camila out of letting the camera crew tag along, but she’d stomped all over his objections the way she always did when someone contradicted her. She had to have her way, and she wouldn’t even look at someone else’s idea, even if it was better. Eventually, Gabor had given up, but not before she’d used her favorite persuasive technique—the threat of execution.
Like father like daughter.
Camila narrowed her eyes and glared at Gabor. I couldn’t figure them out. Was she in love with him, but she couldn’t get the stick out of her ass long enough to admit it? Was he in love with her, but he couldn’t tell her because she was his master? One thing was for damn sure. He wasn’t afraid of her. He had corrected her in front of her entire new guard, and it was bound to go viral and turn into a GIF on
top of it.
From the look on her face, Camila sure as fuck hadn’t missed the disrespect. Was this their little power play that they’d hash out in the bedroom later? Or was he really challenging her?
It wasn’t any of my business. My business was staying alive, and Gabor was an ocelot guard, which meant I slept with one eye open. The only reason he wasn’t a convict like me was because the king hired him to kill all those people. He had a hell of a lot more blood on his hands than I ever would, that was for damn sure.
He hadn’t been the one who dragged me out to be killed, so I didn’t have anything against him personally. He’d watched me walk into Itzel’s room the night I’d been murdered, the night I’d seen her fucking that other asshole, but I didn’t blame him for any of that shit. He was a pawn just like the rest of King Ocelot’s servants. He’d been busy eating the king’s shriveled old ass that night just like every other night. I knew I’d had it good just shoveling horse shit all those years. I liked horses. There was no fucking way I could have done Gabor’s job. I would have slit the king’s throat a long time ago.
And even though I would have rather the king died, I grudgingly admired all the palace guards. They either believed in what they were doing and stuck by that conviction, or they had a hell of a lot more restraint than I ever would. I respected that in a man. I might have been a criminal, but I had morals. An eye for an eye.
Hunted Princess: A Paranormal Dark Romance (Feline Royals Book 3) Page 15
