: Chapter 17

Rök looked wild in his lust, a hot, lathered demon rising  above her, one who’d waited thirteen centuries for this.

The chandeliers illuminated the changing contours of his face as he turned more demonic. But the harsh planes were just as stunning to her as his fantasy-worthy body—his brawny arms flexing, his torso muscles rippling down to his narrow waist. The crown of his straining cock glistened.

The prospect of his size and his bite might have given her pause, but she figured both would be as sublime as everything else they’d shared.

Trusting him, she reached up to feather her fingers over the wounds across his rigid chest. He’d earned those injuries fighting her curse. Yet he was also rapidly healing because of her. Already they were connected.

“You are exquisite, mate.” He teased her nipples between his fingers, gently plucking them as she arched to follow the sensations. “I’ll be fighting off rivals for eternity.”

All attitude, she said, “

I sign on.” But she had. Poppy wasn’t just his; Rök had been meant for her too. Fate had it right.

“Have my work cut out for me, then.” When the tip of his cock kissed her damp entrance, he hissed in a breath. He fisted the base of his shaft to guide it home. A tilt of his hips . . . nudging, nudging inside her hungry core.

Her eyes widened at the fullness, but she rocked up for more.

“Dark gods, you’re hugging the head.” As he pressed into her, stretching her, a growl rumbled from his chest. Inch by inch, he fed her his length, sweating from the effort to go slow.

A bead descended from his neck and clung to one chiseled pec. She traced the drop to his nipple, scraping the wet tip with her nail.

Despite his shudder of delight, he grated, “You’re testing my control? A demon on the verge of losing it?”

“Yes! Handle it, merc.”

He squeezed his eyes closed. When he opened them, he nodded and continued his inexorable claim. As an aura of smoke surrounded them, he grated words in Demonish.

“What did you say?”

“I promised myself to you”—his voice was rough—“even if you aren’t yet sold on the idea. And I told you I never want to separate from you again. We do not part, Poppy.”

“You’re swaying me.” With him, her heart was engaged in this act, not just her body, and it was like adding heat to a concoction; now magic would happen as never before. “Keep swaying me.”

Once he’d seated himself as deep as she could take him, he nearly forced the air out of her lungs. He stilled, letting her get used to his size. His gaze held hers as he groaned the word:

She understood. She gasped her answer:

When he ground against her, pleasure radiated throughout her body. Taking a ragged breath, he withdrew and pumped his hips, turning her cry to an abandoned moan.

His expression grew agonized. “Poppy . . .

!” He sheathed himself with a long, steady stroke. And again.

“More, Rök! Don’t hold back.”

He quickened the rhythm. As he bucked inside her, skin slapped skin and sensation scrambled her mind.

He seized her hips, using his thumb to rub her clit with each thrust. His gray gaze locked on her bouncing breasts, his horns swelling. More smoke rose from his heated skin.

Riding her. Rocking her. Working her slippery bud. With that lost look in his eyes.

Sweat dripped from his forehead to ping one of her aching nipples, more stimulation for a greedy witch. “How’re we looking”—he plunged his cock even deeper— “for forever?

“Not yet!” she lied. Sensation melded with emotion, seasoned with magic and fate; she and Rök were one.

Poppy couldn’t hold out against such an onslaught. As his hips pistoned, the need for release reached a flash point. Too much. Too much! She squeezed her thighs around his waist, bracing for a climax so strong she almost feared it.

And still, she surrendered, diving headlong into deep water. “Coming for you, demon!” Her vision blurred as she loosed a desperate scream: “RÖK!

Yes, yes, !” Tumbling over the edge, she pulsated around his thick rod until she swam in ecstasy. . . .

Rök didn’t want this to end, but he couldn’t resist her sultry clench much longer.

He watched enthralled as his shaft emerged wet from her orgasm.

But every other sight increased the pressure.

Those quivering breasts. Her panting lips that had sucked him so hungrily. Her lust-glazed eyes. Her pale neck⁠—

“Can’t . . . can’t hold my seed!” His body was a mass of agony, unequaled in all his battles. The air was redolent with her honey; each inhalation ratcheted up his need.

Between breaths, she said, “You have to hold out . . . I want another! And you still need to mark me.”

He gnashed his fangs, about to spend just from the words . “Forever?”

She nodded eagerly. “Forever.”

He shook his head, his muscles quaking. “I’m too far gone!”

“Think of something else.”

“Like bloody what?”

“Desh?”

Rök froze. “You didn’t.”

“

Will do it all night!” She laughed, and he felt the vibrations around his shaft. Because he was inside his mate, and she was .

Peace and need tangled inside him. “By all the gods, you’re a weird little witch.” But the throbbing in his shaft had relented a touch.

“Soon to be a satisfied one.” She cast him a heavy-lidded look. “You may continue.”

“Oh, I?”

“Do the piston thing with your hips and get that thumb going again. If I were a strategist like you, I’d bite my mate while she’s coming a second time.”

“Your parameters . . . are sound.” Thumb rubbing, he bucked even harder than before, making her eyes roll back in her head, all thoughts of joking aside.

Another thrust. Another. Giving her what she’d demanded as he fought to hold on.

When her thighs tightened once more—his woman’s tell—he grated, “Mine, Poppy. All mine, forever.”

“Do it! Mark me , demon.”

Body still working hers, he leaned down to kiss her neck, preparing her for his claim⁠—

She grabbed his horns to steer him! “Now!”

He sank his fangs into her giving flesh, and a shock wave reverberated through him.

She came from the penetration. He growled against her neck as her fists gripped his horns and her channel milked his cock.

Ungodsly pleasure swept him up. He felt as if he floated—becoming one with the smoke inside him—suspended in the space between fire and air.

All his life he’d been smoke searching for fire—nebulous and disconnected.

He’d found her at last, his flame. She was his reason for being.

Her mindless cries took him to heights unimagined. Seed climbed. No turning back.

So much ravaging pressure.

He released his bite to throw back his head, his roar echoing all around them. His hips jerked above her, cock pulsing.

As that pressure gave way to jets of seed, she branded him, connecting him, lighting his way. . . .

Forever.

The demon lay atop her, his heart thundering against hers. Poppy’s magic and his smoke mingled in the stillness of the ballroom.

Basking in his warmth, she murmured, “You.”

Rök was hers.

Maybe she’d come to this place not only to break a curse but to find him.

He nodded and rasped, “Ah, Red, .”