by J. S. Scott
“I don’t know what to choose,” she admitted in a soft, hesitant voice.
Her indecision about something as simple as food turned the knife in his gut again. Jesus! She’s like a child trying to decide on her first candy.
He forced himself to answer, even though rage was coursing through his body like a runaway train. “Choose anything. Everything. What do you like?”
“I have no idea. I ate whatever scraps I could get for as long as I can remember. When you’re hungry, you’re grateful for anything edible.”
Kristoff forced himself not to let his anger consume him. This wasn’t about him; it was about Sophie right now. But dammit, she was his radiant. To know that she’d suffered, to feel her hesitation and confusion almost drove him to his breaking point.
He picked up a clean plate and began to pile it high with food. “I’ll make you a plate. You can try different things.”
What he wanted was for her to eat the whole damn buffet so he could manifest another one. Then she could devour that, too.
The indecision left her expression and she laughed. “Kristoff, I can’t possibly eat all that.”
He ignored her and grabbed another plate for the desserts after he delivered the first one to the smaller table. “Go sit,” he commanded, determined to get one of every sweet on the table. “Eat!” All of the urgency he felt to take care of her needs was in his voice.
Sophie put a hand on his arm. “Stop.” She took the dessert plate from his hand and beckoned him over to sit with her. “I’m here. I’m alive. You’re feeding me. I’m fine. Come eat with me. Tell me what to try.”
Reluctantly, Kristoff stopped gathering food and went to sit across from her, really wanting to go back and fill more plates until they overflowed the dining table.
“Now tell me what all this is,” she requested as she picked up a fork and handed one to him.
He shook his head, refusing the utensil. “I can make my own plate. These are all yours.”
He pointed out some of his favorite foods on the plate, watching as Sophie closed her eyes in ecstasy every time she tried something new. He tried not to watch, not to imagine the same look on her beautiful face as he drove his cock home inside her over and over again.
But pleasure was pleasure, and he wanted to put that look on her face.
“I’m full,” she pronounced after she’d tried a few different foods. “I want to keep eating, but I can’t.”
She forked a piece of lobster and held it up to him. Startled, he moved back.
“I’m sorry,” she said hastily, pulling the fork back quickly. “I just thought you might want some since I can’t eat anymore.”
She’d been trying to feed him?
Kristoff hadn’t been sure how to handle that. Nobody had ever really given a damn about whether or not he was content, or if he wanted anything, except Athena. But she’d never tried to feed him. It felt good. It felt…somehow intimate that Sophie was trying to share her food. He hated himself for scaring her off, making her draw back from him. “Give it to me,” he insisted.
She hesitated, which made Kristoff hate himself, so he tried to explain. “I’m not used to anyone trying to do something for me. I’m king, and it’s my job to take care of everybody else.”
She tilted her head and looked at him. “Who takes care of you, then?”
He shrugged. “Nobody. It’s my duty to care for my Sentinels and the humans. I’m more powerful.”
She smiled at him. “Nobody took care of me in the demon realm, but it feels good now. Can’t you just accept the fact that I want to please you because I like you, that I want to share with you?”
Kristoff swallowed hard, touched by the words of the woman across the table from him. Would she still like him if she knew everything about his past? He fucking burned for her, anything she wanted to give him. “Try again. It isn’t that I don’t like it. I’ve just never experienced sharing anything with a woman before.”
She raised the fork again, and Kristoff didn’t hesitate to take the lobster meat from her. “It’s good,” he proclaimed after he’d swallowed. “But since I don’t actually need the food, I’d rather you ate it.”
“I had plenty.” Sophie put a hand to her flat belly and fed him another piece.
Her capacity to eat much more than a little food at one time was probably small. After near-starvation most of her life, rationally he knew Sophie was full. But he’d feel better if she’d been able to clean both plates.
“You don’t like sweets?” he asked curiously as he glanced at the untouched plate.
More than likely she’d never even had something sweet pass between her beautiful lips, so Kristoff took a fork and speared a small piece of chocolate cheesecake. “Try this.”
She opened her mouth willingly and took the dessert into her mouth, which had his cock pulsating, his body craving her. He wanted nothing more than to be directly responsible for the orgasmic expression she was making at the moment.
When the hell did simply eating become an erotic event?
Everything Sophie did was sensual to him, and he knew she wasn’t trying to arouse him. It was his overactive drive to touch her, pleasure her, and bind her to him in the most carnal way possible that was causing his reaction.
He might have more control here at the palace, but his craving to make Sophie his was pounding at his resistance.
A few more bricks of his protective mental wall toppled as he thought about her childhood, about her being cold and hungry in her youth. More fell as he thought about her torture and deprivation in the demon realm.
After feeding her a few more bites of dessert, she held up a hand as she said with a happy laugh, “No more. I’m ready to pop. But it was all amazing.”
“So what was your favorite?” he asked curiously, allowing himself to eat the rest of the chocolate cheesecake since Sophie obviously couldn’t.
“I think I really liked the seafood. And all of the desserts. Honestly, it’s hard to pick a favorite. They were all so wonderful. Thank you. I had no idea food could taste that good.”
Kristoff had never heard anybody sound so passionate about food. But then, he’d never seen a woman who had been starved for so many years.
Never again. Never again. I’ll feed her every hour until she’s satisfied.
“Do you think you can ever forget what happened to you in the demon realm?” he asked cautiously.
She looked thoughtful as she answered, “Some things I think will always haunt me. But the pain of Goran’s beatings and the horror of him draining my power will fade. After a while, he stopped whipping me into submission because I stopped fighting it and accepted that it was going to happen. I couldn’t stop it, and I doubt I’ll ever completely forget how it felt to be drained.”
Kristoff could feel his protective instincts going on overload as he asked, “Was it bad?” He was so pissed off that he wasn’t sure he wanted her answer, but he needed to know.
She nodded. “It hurt like no other wound he inflicted could ever hurt. It felt like every organ in my body was being set on fire by electrical shock, and it seemed like it lasted forever. Eventually, I was able to stop screaming because I knew my pain gave him satisfaction, but it was hard to stay quiet while he kept draining to get every ounce of power he could get. I was always relieved when I finally passed out.”
Kristoff lost it. “I planned on killing the bastard anyway, but I’ll make it so fucking painful that he’ll be screaming for mercy for what he did to you, Sophie.” He was breathing hard, his nostrils flaring, every muscle in his body tense with fury. “I can’t stand the thought of him hurting you. Christ! I couldn’t even deal with the fact that the slimy bastard had laid a finger on you. But knowing how much pain he caused you makes me want to tear him apart piece by piece. He deserves every bit of what he did to you coming back on him.”
> Sophie’s eyes looked bright with moisture as she reached across the table and touched his arm. “Don’t. Don’t take yourself down to his level. It’s over. I didn’t know it would upset you or I wouldn’t have told you.”
“Never keep something like this from me,” he demanded in a graveled voice. “If I fail to protect you, if anybody so much as lays a finger on you, you tell me. Understand? I don’t want anybody touching you except me, and I promise you that I’ll never cause you pain.”
Tears flowed down Sophie’s face freely as she told him, “Just knowing you care enough to avenge me touches me, Kristoff. It humbles me. Nobody except Zach has ever been my champion. You don’t need to harm Goran. The fact that you’re willing to do it for me is enough. Thank you for wanting to protect me.”
Kristoff gaped at Sophie even as the blind rage continued to pulsate through his body. “Did you think I wouldn’t care? Did you think I’d let this go answered?”
“Let it go. I didn’t mean to upset you.”
“I’m not upset. I’m fucking going ballistic. You’re my goddamn radiant, and I wasn’t there to protect you. That’s enough to make any Sentinel crazy. You didn’t deserve any of this. You didn’t cause anything that happened to you. It’s bullshit,” he rasped, trying to rein in his anger because he knew it bothered her. “Your life might have been different if you hadn’t been tied to a bastard like me.”
She spoke of him bringing himself down to Goran’s level. Little did she know he’d sunk even lower, and for a much lesser reason than punishing the demon that hurt his radiant.
“I would have died as a child,” she reminded him. “And I’m free now. I don’t consider being your radiant as a burden. I consider it an honor that I’ll never be worthy of having.”
“You wouldn’t if you knew about my past,” he rumbled. “When I was a demigod, I wasn’t a good person.”
She shook her head. “It doesn’t matter what you were. What matters is who you are now.”
Fuck! How he wanted to believe that was true, but she had no idea what she was dealing with.
“Believe it,” she said, apparently picking up his thoughts. “I have a lot of things in my past that I feel guilty about. I understand feeling unworthy.”
“You could never be unworthy,” Kristoff growled.
“Whether I am or not is irrelevant. I felt like I didn’t deserve you as my mate.”
Kristoff clamped down on his anger as he asked, “And now?”
“Now I’m not sure I’d ever be happy if I didn’t at least consider what I’m missing,” she told him in a blunt whisper.
He rose and pulled her to her feet. “I promise that I’ll provide everything you’ve missed,” he told her gruffly as he pulled her exhausted body against his and cradled her gently.
She sighed and rested her head on his shoulder. “I think I missed this.”
Kristoff moved inside her thoughts, shuddering as he realized that what she’d really missed was simple.
For the first time in a long time, Sophie felt like she wasn’t alone.
Sadly, knowing that he had to give her up, Kristoff realized that Sophie was what he’d been fucking wanting for so damn long, too. For a moment, he savored the feeling of having her in his arms, knowing that it could never last forever, and absolutely certain that he’d missed this, too.
He wasn’t used to tender emotions, but as he held Sophie close, he realized that she wasn’t just his radiant anymore. The brave, courageous woman he was comforting was starting to wreak havoc not only with his mind, soul and body, but with his well-shielded heart.
Ignoring the desperate attempt of his demon nature to take over, Kristoff let himself savor the closeness he shared with Sophie, knowing that she’d caused another portion of his wall to drop.
But he didn’t give a damn.
She felt so incredibly good in his arms that he couldn’t bring himself to even care.
Kristoff waited until his exhausted mate slept before he transported himself to the demon realm.
Once there, he allowed all of the rage inside him to explode, and it felt so damn good that he immediately sought out and found Goran. There was a violence inside him that wouldn’t be denied, all of it caused by the leader of the Evils, the demon who had dared touch and torture his mate.
The minute he appeared in front of Sophie’s tormenter, he wasted very little time with words. “You violated my mate. You die now, asshole,” Kristoff rasped as he stood in front of the ugly, large, bloody-eyed monster.
“Ah, my wayward prisoner,” Goran said in a chilling demon voice. “You’re violating our territory.”
Kristoff lifted his foot and nailed the demon in the stomach, sending him flying across his putrid bedchamber. Even here where Goran slept, the gore and refuse was everywhere, even on Goran’s bed.
“My mate takes precedence before anything else,” Kristoff answered with satisfaction as the demon let out a howl of pain as he slammed against the wall.
Jesus! How Kristoff wished to draw this out longer, but he also wanted Goran dead before he succumbed to the weaknesses of being in the demon realm.
“But you haven’t mated her yet. She’s still ripe for the picking,” Goran answered as he tried to get back on his feet.
The demon leader’s comment sent Kristoff over the edge of sanity. Just the thought of the bastard touching Sophie ever again made his desire to see him dead even more pronounced. He was on Goran before the Evil could even rise, blasting him with bolts of electricity as the demon screeched with pain. “You’ll never touch her again because you’ll be dead, asshole.”
Kristoff could smell the scent of burning demon flesh, and it was the most malodorous scent he’d ever inhaled. But then, he’d never fried an Evil before. Kristoff wanted Sophie’s tormentor to feel what it was like to be sizzled with electricity, the same pain that the demon had doled out to Sophie every time he drained her.
There isn’t enough time for me to give him everything Sophie went through.
His outrage still burning, he began to manifest the sword that would take Goran’s head just as the demon lunged for him.
Goran’s attack was weak, and Kristoff only traded a few hits with him before he had him under him, pummeling the demons ugly face over and over, unleashing his fury on the piece of shit who had tortured his radiant.
Finally, he got around to manifesting his sword, watching the fear on Goran’s wrinkled face as it appeared in his hand and over the demon lord’s head.
“How does it feel to be on the other side of pain?” Kristoff asked furiously. “Feel good to you? ‘Cause it feels fucking fantastic to me.” Even though his central anger was still about Sophie, he hadn’t forgotten Goran’s mind fuck or his torture while he was his prisoner.
Real fear appeared in Goran’s red-eyed expression as Kristoff held the weapon that would take the demon’s head. “Don’t kill me. I didn’t kill your mate,” Goran begged.
“Only because you couldn’t and didn’t want to. She always recharged so you could hurt her again.”
“I-I didn’t kill you either,” Goran stammered, his red eyes riveted to the large blade over his head.
“Because you wanted to keep me barely alive for insurance. Otherwise, I’d be dead right now.”
Kristoff was insane with the desire to make this creature pay for everything he’d done to Sophie, but he knew he was running out of time.
“T-that’s not t-true,” Goran stuttered.
“Bullshit!” Kristoff lowered the blade to Goran’s neck. “You liked it. You get off on causing others pain. You wanted more power. You even killed other radiants for what you could get from them.”
His rage still relentlessly driving him, Kristoff lifted the sword to end Goran’s pathetic life.
It was on his lethal, downward stroke that Kristoff was stopped by a power
greater than his own, his death blow stopped only a few inches from Goran’s neck.
“You can’t kill him, Kristoff.”
Athena. What in the hell was she doing here?
“Don’t interfere,” he warned. “He deserves to die for what he did to Sophie and the other radiants.”
“I agree completely,” Athena said calmly as she approached and dragged Kristoff from Goran. “But unfortunately, he has to live. Both of you are critical to the balance.” Athena glanced at Goran with a look of loathing as she warned, “Remember my words. You’re lucky Kristoff didn’t die. You may not have to follow all of the rules of the gods anymore, but his death by an Evil’s hand will end all of you.”
Kristoff shrugged her off as he watched Goran try to get to his feet as he asked, “What? Why?”
Athena shrugged. “I didn’t make up the rules. They were set by prophecies the gods wrote, and you both need to stay alive. If you kill him, you endanger the Sentinels and humanity. If Goran kills you, the Evils and their realm will cease to exist.”
Kristoff’s fist tightened on the sword, his need to obliterate Goran forever still pounding at him. But in the end, he knew he was fucked, and not in a good way. His vow to lead his men and protect the human world would always win.
“So I can really never kill him either?” Goran asked as he finally rose, supporting himself against the wall.
“Nope. Not unless you’re feeling suicidal,” Athena answered. “Come, Kristoff. We have to go.”
“How did you get here?” he asked Athena, still clutching his sword tightly.
“I can get here alone, but I can’t lead others in like Kat does.”
Kristoff eyed Goran angrily. “Is there any rule that I can’t hurt him badly?”
“No,” Athena answered cheerfully. “Just don’t lop off his head.”
Kristoff stepped forward and wielded his sword, nailing Goran right beneath his chest with his blade. Yanking his sword free, he took another shot at him. And then another. Every impalement lessened his desire for vengeance as he watched Goran gasp and slide down the wall and land on the filthy floor, unconscious.