Total pages in book: 161
Estimated words: 162269 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 811(@200wpm)___ 649(@250wpm)___ 541(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 162269 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 811(@200wpm)___ 649(@250wpm)___ 541(@300wpm)
“All right, my prince,” I whispered.
“All right,” he grumbled, the storm in his eyes retreating.
“Perhaps I shouldn’t have led our evening as I did when I walked into this tent,” I muttered.
“If you need to release your pain by taking a lash to my flesh, I will endure it.”
I blinked down at him.
He was not finished.
“If it takes you out of your mind and your hurt to use my body, riding my cock, climbing on my face, yanking at my balls, fucking me in my arse, you will do it. You will turn your mind, ease your pain, and I will come for you, I will shoot for you again and again, I will bleed for you, whatever you want to take from me to give you what you need, I will offer it to you. You own me, Elena. I love you and I am yours in any way I’m needed.”
“I love you too, sweetheart,” I whispered, moved beyond reckoning at the power of his words.
However.
“But I’m not sure I’d take a lash to make you feel better,” I went on to admit.
“I would never mar your beautiful skin,” he growled, openly annoyed, as if I thought he might someday actually do that.
“Well, I wouldn’t yours either,” I returned.
I watched him calm as he murmured, “Just know you could.”
“It will never come to that. I just needed to feel…I just needed to feel you alive, all around me, inside me. I just needed you.”
His arms left me so he could capture my head in both his hands.
“I am right here.”
I closed my eyes and dropped my forehead to his.
He shifted so he could press his lips there then he moved me to press my face in his neck.
He then resumed holding me.
After some time, I noted quietly, “You said the words.” I paused and added, “Now, twice.”
He gave me a squeeze and not quietly, replied, “I did.”
“It is quite unfair, the first time you did that and then raced off into battle without allowing me to return them.”
“I’m not racing anywhere now.”
I lifted my head and looked down at him.
And without delay, declared, “I love you, Cassius Laird, my warrior, my prince, my future husband. And I love that you love me too.”
A small smile quirked his mouth as he stroked my cheek tenderly with his knuckles.
“Jasmine, I think, would approve of me falling on your cock in my grief,” I remarked.
Another smile quirked his mouth before he replied, “She would indeed.”
I felt my face crumble as Cassius watched it, which was why it was again shoved into his neck and his arms went around me tight.
I wept even as I asked, “How’s Mac?”
“Undone.”
His word made me weep harder.
“She was loved, darling, and she knew it,” he whispered.
I nodded.
And I was glad for that.
But it didn’t make me feel the slightest bit better.
After a while, I calmed, but Cassius did not move, neither did I, even if I knew I must be heavy, and I also knew he was leaking from me and that had to be aggravating.
“Your seed,” I muttered.
“Ignore it,” he muttered in return.
This was easy for me to do, as it wasn’t aggravating me.
“Cass—”
His voice was deeper when he ordered, “Ignore it, Ellie.”
I sighed.
Cassius started twisting my hair around his fingers.
“She would agree with the dragons,” I told him.
“She absolutely would.”
“She was a warrior to her soul.”
“She was. And she lived every second of every day of her life on this earth to its fullest.”
“She did. And she was the best friend anyone could have.”
“Yes,” he agreed.
I burrowed closer into my prince.
“I love you, Cass.”
“And I you, my Ellie. You own me, body, heart and soul.”
I pressed deeper and the tears came again.
Because I loved he gave me that.
And Jasmine would love it too.
And through my tears, Cass held me.
I loved he did that.
And Jasmine would love that too.
125
The Brother
Queen Ha-Lah
Amphite, Underwater Capital of the Mer
STRAIT OF MEDUSA
The table was long that separated my king and husband, Aramus, from my other king, Jorie of the Mer.
But as long as it was, it was truly even longer, for the two men sitting at opposite ends of it, scowling at each other down the length, were making it thus through obstinacy.
I sat at Aramus’s side, waiting for him to say something.
But once he had regained consciousness after the Mer had dragged him down to their underwater city, he was not best pleased that he’d been pulled under without his consent.
Or that they’d magicked him unconscious.
Not to mention, also mer-napped me.
It took considerable time to calm him down, even though I agreed wholeheartedly this was not the best way for the Mer to begin relations between our two realms.
But we’d been in Amphite, the capital city of the Mer, now for hours. Aramus’s men were probably beside themselves with worry that we’d disappeared.