by Lazu, Sotia
She couldn’t. Yet. As if they had all the time in the world. Why was she refusing to see what was at stake?
No. She’d love him for him, not for the world. He wouldn’t have her any other way.
He should get back into bed and claim her again. Keep torturing her with pleasure until she had no choice but to love him.
That would be coercion, and he was above using such methods to get his own blasted female to choose him. She’d choose him. But until that happened, he really needed to punch someone.
His cock throbbed. It took but a whiff of this female to make him painfully hard. He’d sate his hunger for her soon, but not now. He squared his shoulders, and with one last glance at Nikoleta’s sleeping form, strode out of the room.
“Nerites,” he bellowed, as he reached the stairway. “Prince Nerites,” he corrected himself, “I am at your service. Use me to guard Vythos. Give me something to kill.”
The prince sauntered up to him as he descended the final step to the ground floor. “I expected you to be in a less murder-happy mood by now. Are you bonded?”
Coeus shook his head. “It’s a matter of time.”
“So is the end of the world.”
Coeus wanted to wipe Nerites’ smirk off his princely face with his knuckles, but this guy wasn’t his enemy. “There are two more Hecatoncheires on Kronos’ side. Unleash me on them while they’re out of my brothers’ range.”
Nerites studied his face, then gave a slow nod. “Briareos is attacking Vythos from the northwest. Can you handle him?”
Briareos—it meant the strong one. Coeus smirked. “With one arm tied behind my back.” Not really. The two of them were rather evenly matched, which worked out nicely for Coeus. A worthy opponent was the only kind worth fighting.
Nerites waved his fingers, and a shell on a golden chain appeared between them out of thin air. He held it out to Coeus. “Until you have your powers under control, this will bring you back here. Just make sure it’s touching your skin when you wish to return. The chord will magically adjust to your size.”
Coeus took the offering with a mumbled thanks and clasped it around his neck. Despite his protests that Titans could blink between places they’ visited before, or that they had a clear enough view of, actual or mental, Nerites had a sea daimon deliver him past the barrier that hid Vythos from mortals.
The giant Hecatoncheiras was almost completely free of the seabed that had covered him for millennia. If Coeus had been few minutes later, the mortals above the surface wouldn’t have to guess at what was causing the whirlpool in the harbor.
Coeus could work with this. It’d keep him from unraveling, until Nikoleta bound herself to him. He didn’t know how his tremors worked, but they intensified when he got riled up. Emotionally riled up. For the next couple hours, he’d be a killing machine, no room for emotion. He’d push Nikoleta from his mind until he’d wiped the seabed with Briareos’ dead husk.
Only things didn’t turn out exactly that way. Sure, he annihilated the second Centimane, but it took longer than a couple hours, and by the time their fighting was done, the island of Sphacteria, luckily uninhabited, was fully submerged underwater.
The sea was black with Briareos’ blood, but the darkness would dissipate in the few moments it would take for his remains to solidify into rock.
Coeus used what was left of the Centimane to restore the island to its previous formation—almost. Between the Titans, Titanesses, remaining deities, and the sea witch, they’d probably figure a way to spin this whole thing so it kept the immortal element out of the public eye, but he’d worry about that later. For now, he was bone weary and impossibly even harder than when he’d left Nikoleta huddled under the sheets.
It might be the excitement of the battle, but it was probably that he couldn’t get her out of his mind for a single moment during his underwater match. Not when he repeatedly smashed Briareos’ multiple heads against a reef, not when he got punched by a couple-dozen giant fists that sent him flying through the air, and not when he manipulated the wind at the last minute, to hurtle himself into the sea instead of allowing his landing to destroy the Pylos harbor.
And they’d have to erase that from mortals’ heads and phones too.
Briareos had used no weapons, but his talons and teeth had caused some damage. And maybe he’d bruised a rib or two. Nothing serious, and the gazillion cuts were already healing, but Coeus washed them carefully. He had to be clean for his lady, because he was going back to her—for her—and this time, there’d be no not yet.
He’d reclaim what was stolen from him, and he’d start with his woman.
He shrunk his body and clasped the amulet Nerites had given him. Thank Chaos he hadn’t lost it during his battle with Briareos. “Take me to Vythos,” he thought. To Nikoleta.
Nereus’ palace took shape around Coeus. He was in the corridor, outside the door of the bedroom he’d left her in. He took a moment to compose himself, then closed his palm over the cool metal of the doorknob and pushed inside.
He expected Nikoleta to be asleep, but she paced beside the unmade double bed, the green robe hanging loosely on her frame and swirling when she turned, to reveal her shapely legs and a teasing glimpse of what was between them.
She stopped in her tracks when she saw him. “You’re back.”
He wanted to tell her he’d always come back, because with her was where he belonged. That she was his. That she needed to accept his claim and bond with him so they could get started on the rest of their lives.
She wasn’t ready to hear any of it. Wouldn’t be, until she accepted who she really was.
He nodded.
She approached him with slow, unsteady steps, and reached for his face but didn’t make contact. Her fingers hovered over his cheek bone. “You were hurt.”
Good thing she hadn’t seen him ten minutes ago, when raw slashes bled across his chest. He nodded again, unable to take his eyes from her. “It’s nothing.” But her concern warmed him up inside.
Without warning, she threw her arms around his neck and rose on her tiptoes, pulling him down for a kiss. Her lips burned him, feverish with hunger, as her thoughts reached him. She worried about him. She wanted him. She...
She broke the kiss. “You have to stop running head-first into battles. It’s not safe when we’re not bonded.”
A harsh laugh scraped up his throat. “I’m about to fix that,” he thought at her, clasping her ass with both hands and raising her so his hard length pushed against her. Sex didn’t make everything right between them, but it was a start. If her body burned for him, her soul might follow.
She rubbed her cheek against his and wrapped her legs around his waist, pressing her wet, glistening center to his shaft. She swiveled her hips and smirked at his groan, obviously aware of the effect she had on him. “How do you plan on doing that?” Her voice held a challenge, and Coeus never backed down from one of those.
He spun toward the closest piece of furniture—the vanity to his right—and perched her ass on its edge.
Bottles rattled, and Nikoleta let out a squeal. Her legs dropped from around his hips, as she steadied herself. “What—?”
He was done talking. He spread open her robe and let his gaze slide from her eyes to her lips, down her full breasts and the soft curve of her belly, to her pussy. “Mine.” Holding one of her thighs to the side with one hand, he fisted his cock with the other and pushed inside her so hard, the wood beneath her creaked.
Sinking inside her felt like returning home. Her flesh yielded to him, her eyelids heavy with lust, staring into his, as her inner walls scorched and squeezed him until holding back was unbearable. He angled his hips, slipping out of her, and then slammed forward again, bottoming out inside her and making her cry out. He searched her thoughts for a hint of discomfort, but only touched upon glee and exhilaration. And the desire for more.
And what his woman desired, his woman got.
Chapter Thirteen
NIKOLETA LET
HER HEAD fall back against the polished silver plate acting as a mirror above the vanity. She’d been so worried about him when he rushed off. She’d seen his anger, and it scared her. Not because he might hurt her—she never feared him, even when he was big enough to hold her in his palm. She was afraid his anger would get him killed. That she would get him killed.
But now he was here. Taking her hard enough to bruise. It felt so right.
And she ached for more.
Her nails dug furrows in his shoulders, and she wanted to lick the angry red marks. Lick all of him. Taste the power wrapped inside his tanned skin. She pushed into his thrusts, barely recognizing the keening wails that made it past her lips. The rough driftwood tore the robe beneath her buttocks and bit into her flesh, but the pain only added to her pleasure.
She tried to wrap her legs around him again, but the force of his thrusts made it hard, so she tilted her pelvis and let her legs hang limply, to sway and thud against the front of the vanity as he plunged into her. Her body was at his mercy.
He twisted his hips and upped his tempo. Something rolled to the floor, to crash with the tingling sound of shattering glass.
His to play with.
He palmed one breast and squeezed. Bit her nipple, then soothed the sting with his lips and tongue.
His to fuck.
Her head rolled back again, and he let go of her breast to close his hand over her throat. His grip wasn’t tight enough to hinder her breathing, but knowing he had the strength to break her sent a tingle down her spine.
“Look at me,” he ordered in her head, not letting go even when she met his gaze.
His to control.
“You are mine, Nikoleta. Your body knows it. Your pussy is crying for me. See?” He skated his palm up her inner thigh and pressed his thumb to her clit in a tight circle. “See how you come for me?” He rubbed his thumb over the sensitive bud, pumping his hips faster.
His to pleasure.
His eyes were wild, irises a pure, liquid gold. She loved his eyes.
Love?
He said she only had to give in to their bond. But did he love her? She had no experience with lovemaking in this lifetime, but shouldn’t it involve a languid, slow merging of bodies and souls? Could this fierce coupling come from love? She hated the part of her that suggested it couldn’t. Hated even more that she wondered if there was something wrong with herself, for enjoying the wild hunger in his eyes. For thrilling at the slapping of his balls against her thighs and loving his grip around her throat. Her cheeks burned, and she lowered her eyelids, unwilling to let him see her embarrassment.
“Nothing is wrong with you,” he whispered, making her snap her gaze back to his face. “All of this is us. The soft and the hard. The slow and the fast. The wooing and the fucking. I love you uninhibitedly, and I love that you love this.”
She moaned, as his hushed words nudged her over the edge and pleasure flowed over her like a current, taking her under and drowning her in a sea of sensation.
“Say you’re mine,” Coeus ordered.
When he was inside her body and her head, there was no doubt she belonged to him. No other man could take his place, even if she lived forever. “Yo—” She clumped her mouth shut, the rest of the word stuck in her throat.
“Yo? Really?” Coeus pulled out of her and let go of her throat, to slide his fist slowly up and down his shaft. “You were all I thought of, while I fought the Hecatoncheiras. I wanted to return to you. To save this world for you. Tell me what’s holding you back, and I’ll end that too, like I did Briareos.”
Nikoleta bit her bottom lip, gaze drawn to the drops of clear liquid pumping out of the slit at the tip of his cock. She wanted to slide down to her knees and take him in her mouth until he came. Who was this brazen hussy she turned into when he was around?
She forced herself to look back into his eyes and focus on what he was saying. “How? How can I be so important to you? How can I mean so much?” He didn’t know her. Then again, she didn’t know him, and the thought of not being able to touch him again pierced her heart.
He stepped back and helped her to her feet, then steered her toward the bed. Her legs wobbled, and her heart skittered in her chest. He hadn’t orgasmed. And it was her fault.
And her stupid headache was back, thrumming in her temples the moment he let go of her hand and told her to sit on the bed.
She half-sat, half-fell on the mattress with a wince, and he was on his knees in front of her in an instant, concerned brown eyes searching her face. “Your head again?”
She nodded and immediately regretted it.
Coeus reached for her knee, and the pain vanished. Her body was pulling all the stops to get him to keep touching her.
“It’s better now.” She covered his hand with hers. “I’m sorry we... that you... had to stop.”
He rolled his eyes. “I didn’t have to do anything. I stopped because you weren’t there with me. So tell me, what’s holding you back?”
She wanted to tell him he didn’t know her, but she’d said so before and had nothing to tell him about herself when he asked. Was that the problem? That she was afraid he would know her, and it wouldn’t be worth the effort?
He made himself comfortable, sitting naked on the floor, legs crossed, all casual, as if his bare ass wasn’t on the cold stone and his penis wasn’t staring up at her. “Talk to me.”
“You said, no more talking.”
“I’m a Titan. I get to change my mind, and nobody is allowed to call me on it.”
She narrowed her eyes. Was that a joke? The twitch of his lips made her smile. “Okay, I’ll talk. What do you want me to say?”
“Tell me about you. About Nikoleta,” Coeus said. When she remained silent, he asked, “Did you have a nickname growing up?”
Her smile widened at the memory of her namesake, Grandma Nikoleta, in her apron, fists on her hips, begging her to stop talking for five minutes. “My grandma called me tzitziki”—cicada—“because I never stopped talking.”
He grinned. “Some things stick with the soul, huh?”
“I didn’t talk this much as Phoebe.”
“Sure you didn’t.” With his grin stretching his kissable mouth, he looked carefree and happy, as if the world wasn’t about to collapse any moment now. “What else did you do, other than talk? What was your favorite pastime activity?”
She scrunched her nose. How not to sound like a dork? Wait—that ship had sailed when she told him she studied Math. And it felt good, being herself with this male who looked at her like she was his world. “Reading. But I liked riding my bike too. Had a pink one with a basket, and I’d put my first kitten in there and take her for a ride around the neighborhood.”
Chapter Fourteen
HE’D ALWAYS LOVED PHOEBE’S smile, and Nikoleta’s was just as lovely, if not more so. Her entire face lit up with it, when she mentioned her childhood bicycle. He’d have to get her one of those as soon as possible. Steal one, if need be.
She ducked her head shyly. “And I loved to cook. My grandma was a genius in the kitchen and always let me help. I still remember Grandpa asking if she had a backup plan, first time I announced I was cooking lunch. The horror on his face when she said she didn’t... Priceless.”
“What about your parents?” he asked.
The sparkle in her gray eyes dimmed. “Dad died when I was twelve. Mom had to work a lot, to make ends meet.”
“I’m sorry.” He turned his palm in her grasp and tangled their fingers together. “It must have been hard.” Not that he’d know. He was created, not raised by parents, though he had his brothers, even if they weren’t all technically related. Still, her grief licked at the edges of his consciousness.
Nikoleta hung her head. “It was. It broke my heart to always see her so tired. That’s why I started picking up odd jobs right after high school. I’d go to classes in the morning, and then wait at a coffee shop around the corner or help out at the neighborhood market. You know.”
He didn’t, but he nodded anyway. “And what about Math?”
Her head jolted upright, and she gave him a startled look. “You remember?”
Of course he did. “You only mentioned it hours ago.”
She brought the thumb of her free hand to her mouth and chewed on the fleshy part around the nail. She followed his gaze and lowered her hand to her lap. “Bad habit. At least I no longer bite my nails.” She scrunched her nose adorably. “Math made sense, I guess. Dad used to teach it, and it was a link to him, but it was also more than that. It’s... an explanation to everything. It’s everywhere around us.”
“And it provides definitive answers.” It worked with what he’d seen of her square logic that made her second-guess the attraction between them.
Her nod animated her entire body. “Yes. Numbers are set. Nothing ambiguous about them. Not like people.” Her thumb was wedged between her teeth again.
“People have disappointed you?”
Withdrawing her hand from his, she studied her nails for a long moment before meeting his gaze again. “People can’t disappoint you when you don’t expect anything from them.”
That sounded sad and lonely. He wanted to wrap his arms around her and tell her she could expect the world from him, because that was what he’d give her.
“After my grandparents passed, Mom and I only had each other. We couldn’t depend on anyone else. Guys... They didn’t approach me easily.” Her chuckle rang fake in his ears. “Might be hard to talk to me, with my nose permanently in a book. Those who did didn’t seem interested in sticking around once I made it clear I didn’t want something casual.”
Their loss, and he definitely didn’t mind being her first—her only—again. The thought of someone else touching her made his blood boil in his veins. He’d almost ended Nerites for helping her into bed, but how did any mortal have the gall to reject her? Hurt her? Play a part in making her insecure and unwilling to trust her own heart?