“The first woman I cared for. The first to give me what I needed.” He swallowed hard. “I can’t do this. I can’t risk coming apart and killing you.”
If jealousy over a woman long dead had pierced her heart, his pleading scraped her soul raw. “I won’t die.” Probably. “Trust me.”
He lowered his forehead to the bench. “How?”
“Give me a color, Seth.”
The weight of his decision bore down on her with bone-crushing pressure. Again, she waited him out. It was up to him.
“Green,” he croaked.
With a wave of her hand, the candles around the room lit. She retrieved a blindfold and fought against the tightness in her chest as his breaths came faster. “Close your eyes.”
Securing the blindfold, she grabbed a short leather paddle with a squared end and stroked the blunt edge along his thighs, tracing his scrotum, across his ass and up to his nipples. The dark buds hardened. She dragged the side of the paddle down his side before flicking each nipple with her fingers.
He jerked and arched his back, rattling the restraints.
A short, soft slap of the paddle to the back of his thighs earned her a gasp.
Returning to the toy box, she picked out the two items she wanted. The long feather made him shiver as she used the tip to trail the paddle’s stinging path, dual sensations undoubtedly creating a sense of confusion and overstimulation. And that’s just what she wanted—to confuse his awareness, scramble his circuits and blow his breaker. She had no intention of breaking Seth. That didn’t mean she wouldn’t drive him to the brink of madness, though.
If she could get him there, the very walls that held his emotions in check and kept his element barred would come down.
Chapter Ten
Seth’s world had been reduced to two brutally complex realities. Sensation—touch, smell, sound, taste—and emotion. So much emotion it clogged his throat, his nose, his mouth. He choked on that emotion. It smothered him. He railed against it. Began to succumb.
The directives, while delivered gently, battered his sense of self, his understanding of his internal makeup. It shamed him to realize he might not be able to take this, that he desperately wanted to call red. Yet every time he would open his mouth, she seemed to know. She would be there, kissing him, feeding him bits of fruit, stroking him or taking him closer to the precipice he’d never been brave enough to face.
Her smell drifted around him—so rich and riotous and out of control. He’d never smell rain again without thinking of her.
Something soft and warm traced his lips. A fingertip? “I need…” A hard tremor raced through him.
“You need to let go.”
Licking his lips, he tasted the sweet honey of woman. He groaned. His tongue lapped up the arousal and he parted his lips, silently pleading for more. One more taste. That would get him through this. How could he have possibly gone through the evening without tasting her? She was made of heady stuff, this witch.
A soft slap across the backs of his upper thighs caught his perineum and testicles and he cried out.
She did it again.
His composure slipped. Hands fisting, he strained against the bench. Breaths came in short, hard gasps.
The eye of the brewing internal storm moved toward him in a slow but steady advance, centuries of living in a void about to catch up to him. He could see it happening. No way could he emerge unscathed.
During brief moments of lucidity, he swore to himself he was going to get even with the woman. She’d centered him in his own personal hell. Payback was guaranteed, and it would be a real bitch.
The rest of the time he was simply a slave to sensation, caught up in the most fundamental self-realization he’d ever experienced.
Something soft skated across his testicles. Involuntary movement had him almost popping his hips out of their sockets as he tried to grant better access. A sharp point dragged up the swollen ridge behind his sac. A series of vile curses left him in a rush.
That damnable voice, husky and demanding, whispered in his ear. “Feel, Seth. Experience. Let me take care of you.”
Nails raked across one nipple. Soft fingers traced up and down the ridges of his abdomen. They brushed the head of cock. He sucked in a breath as he rolled his hips toward the touch he craved. “More, damn you.”
“That’s three.”
Sounds of hard plastic rattling and latex squeaking violated the room’s silence, save for his harsh panting and the occasional clink of restraints as he strained. Something—scissors? knife?—cut plastic.
Slick fingers probed his ass and he clenched.
“Don’t make me give you the breathe-through-it speech.” Undisguised laughter wrapped around her words.
Gods, he really was going to kill her. Still, he breathed and fought to relax. A soft pop and something hard passed his sphincter.
“One.”
Arching his back pressed the object against his prostate, the pressure un-freaking-believable. The second pop surprised him.
“Two.” Soft pressure, then a strangled, “Three.”
The third left him feeling full. Every way he moved made the anal beads shift and roll, brushing and rubbing his prostate. He rocked his hips. The heavy weight of his building erection pulled toward the floor and he involuntarily groaned. Tightening his butt cheeks made things worse. Or better. It just depended on how one looked at it, he supposed. Either way, sensations intensified. He fought the urge to beg her to touch him, to let him take her. Something. Anything.
As if she’d read his mind, she gripped his balls and gently pulled down.
Tender strokes along his rigid length countered firmer tugs on his scrotum.
His eyes rolled back in his head. Gods, this felt so damn good.
He moved to reach for her, needed to touch her. Now. His arms wouldn’t move.
Seth jolted hard enough to rattle the restraints. His restraints. Restraints. Panic began to build deep in his chest, chilling and spreading, his blood turning to slush, his heart crystalizing. He had no control, couldn’t stop what was happening to him. Biting his cheek hard enough to draw blood, he tried to count out his breathing. It didn’t help. Anahita’s voice rose from the graveyard of old memories to shriek at him for killing her. He shouted a denial, losing himself in the feel of cuffs around his wrists once again. No matter that these were fur-lined, versus iron hammered in Osiris’s forge. Without his element, he was as weak as a human. He still struggled. The cuffs still held.
Soft words that didn’t belong with the memory reached him. Promises of pleasure, rewards for giving her what she wanted, more tender touching—they all accompanied the sultry timbre of that voice. The witch.
“Please.” The choked cry ripped open every old wound. He experienced one rolling emotion after another, every evil ever held in Pandora’s box bleeding through damage that had never properly heeled. He purged old regrets, older hatreds and, oldest of all, anger. On and on it went, his cries answered every time with a touch. Soft, persistent forgiveness he could no more deny than he could go back and change the road that led him here.
“Come back to me, Seth.”
He heard her but couldn’t articulate anything more than a grunt, couldn’t drag himself up from the lake of darkness he thought might drown him.
Metal clinked and his feet were free.
Soft buzzing began to fill his head.
Sounding farther away, more clinks. His wrists were free.
“I want you, Seth. Need you to lose yourself in me.” Gentle fingers untied his blindfold. “Come to me, Seth Setekhis. Love me. Take what’s never been mine to keep.”
He spun on her, confused. Then his eyes focused, found her—the hope that truly remained. “Eden.”
* * *
She froze. He’d called her by name. Not witch. Not Red. Eden. Stepping close to him, she traced her fingertips over the marks left by the blindfold. “Seth.”
Carnal hunger that had simmered on a slow burn now f
lashed out of control. She leapt at him.
He met her halfway.
Mouths tangled together. His tongue thrust against hers, both giving and taking. She nipped his bottom lip and swallowed the resulting growl. Her sex ached, the throb of anticipation driving her higher. Hiking a leg around his thigh, she reveled in his strength as he picked her up and drove her, back first, into the nearest wall. His cock ground against her clit. There was nothing tender in the moment. White-hot need fueled shared desires that raged out of control.
Power surged through her. A faint wind whispered against her skin. Notnownotnownotnow. Bearing down, she wrangled control of the swirling elements. Merriam-Webster would undoubtedly choke at her definition of control, but it was the best she could do.
Seth thrust against her.
She arched into him, seeking consummation. “Take me, Seth.”
Pinning her to the wall with his chest, he reached between them and angled the head of his cock.
“Do it,” she screamed as her tenuous grip over her power slipped.
He gripped her hips and yanked her onto his hard length.
Nothing had ever felt so good. She burned for him, inside and out.
Seth cupped her head, met her gaze and began to move. Skin slapped skin as he drove into her with thoughtless force. Heartbeats pounded out counter rhythms. Sweat slicked their bodies as they slipped and slid over each other, every touch frenzied.
Eden grabbed Seth’s neck and pulled him in for a searing kiss. Her orgasm was fast approaching, and if she didn’t take him there now, she was going to lose herself in him and forget—forget to do this. Forget to issue the only command she’d make in this moment.
“You’ll take back what has always been yours when you come for me.” The whispered words wrought a shiver from him that passed straight to her core. She lay her cheek next to his, her lips by his ear, her palms pressed to his throat and heart. And then she said the words she hoped would change everything. “Come for me, Seth Setekhis.”
“Eden.” Her name again, though this time it seemed violently ripped from his throat. “Eden!”
His orgasm rocked through him. Hard fingers dug into tender skin and she fought not to cry out in distress. Instead, she isolated the element of fire and pushed. The flame refused to split in two, instead beginning the total transfer to Seth. Instinct kicked in and her magic fought the separation. She couldn’t help it. Instead, she went with it, trying to distinguish the sources of flame and keep only what was hers. It was like trying to isolate each individual color in a flame, though. Impossible.
Then she felt him. His magic, the source of what he was, brushed against her. For the briefest moment, their souls touched. The intimacy of the moment wrecked her. She let go.
The elements went wild, whipping into a frenzy that drove her passion out of control. An inferno surrounded them. Her head fell back and she shouted, half in ecstasy, half in fear. She’d made her choice, though. She’d experience this—him in his rawest form—and the fallout would be what it was, the consequences hers alone. Her orgasm surged through her. Heat like she’d never known boiled the blood in her veins. She clamped down on Seth’s cock. Her heart thundered so loudly it drowned out everything else. Riding it out, she knew she’d crossed some line, gone to a new level of consciousness she could never not know. Until she met her end, Seth had ruined her for loving anyone else.
Loving. Did she love him? It was too large a question to answer, too impossible to contemplate in the moment. All she knew was that she loved his skill. That was enough.
For now, it was enough.
Chapter Eleven
Seth wondered for the briefest second if he’d died because there was no way could he experience that kind of physical release on this plane without dying. The thundering in his chest affirmed he was very much alive. That, or his heart was about to explode. Shaking and fighting not to drop the sprite in his arms, he went to his knees. He hit the wood floor—the charred wood floor—with a sharp crack that stole a groan from his raw throat. His brow furrowed. “Did I yell?”
Eden’s forehead thumped his chin when her head tipped forward. “You were louder than a high school cheerleader at Friday night homecoming.”
He pinched her ass. “I’m not a cheerleader.”
“You should be. Hell of a set of lungs, Seth.”
He took her chin and lifted it at the same time the shakes took over. “F-f-fucking h-hell.”
She eased him to the ground and stumbled into the kitchen. He managed to avoid the fetal position until her feet reappeared. Then he gave in to the impulse.
Curling into himself, he shivered. “Sh-shock.”
“You did a lovely job as a reluctant sub, you beautiful man.” She cocooned him in the cashmere of the blanket he’d given her earlier before rolling him onto his back and supporting his head. “Slow sips.”
“Aftercare—”
“Is important in a good Dom…or Domme. I read up on this stuff before seeking you out, you know.”
He sipped the water, not sure anything had ever tasted so good. The weight of reality slipped over him. “Smart girl, my Eden.”
“Yours?”
The breathy question would have terrified him before. Now? Not so much. He was uncomfortable, though. No, not uncomfortable exactly. Tugging the blanket higher, he fished around inside himself and jerked upright. He housed two distinct flames. His eyes widened and he scrambled to his knees, inadvertently knocking Eden aside. “What did you do?”
“Experienced the best orgasm of my life?” Her innocent avoidance spoke volumes.
The elevator dinged and the doors whooshed open to reveal two very morose men. They hesitated at the sight of Eden and him crouched on the floor, clearly unsure whether to stay or go.
Eden squeaked and dove for the edge of the blanket.
That decided it for Seth. “Later.”
Dominic immediately turned around.
Not Griff, though. He stepped into the room. “Your element?”
“It’s a little confused at the moment.”
Thunder boomed nearby, rattling the apartment’s floor-to-ceiling windows. Rain lashed the glass in wind-driven torrents.
Eden’s shaking grew worse as the storm raged.
“Hey.” He lifted the blanket and peered down at her. “You okay?”
“F-fine. Why w-wouldn’t I b-be fine?”
Fear fouled the still air. “You tell me.”
She curled into his side. “I need a minute.”
Tucking the blanket around them, he peered over the edge. “Give me a few minutes, guys. Things are fine.”
“Hell of a storm,” Griff murmured, never taking his eyes off the little lump of woman under the blanket.
“She’s not responsible,” Seth growled. “Now go. I’ll call you when you can come back up.”
“No long-distance goodbyes,” Dominic said quietly.
Seth’s chest tightened and his eyes burned. He looked up at the ceiling and swallowed repeatedly. “No goodbyes at all.”
“Good.” Griff stepped back into the elevator and the men disappeared.
“Eden?” Seth folded the blanket back to find her eyes squeezed shut. “What’s going on, baby?”
“I still have your flame. Oh, goddess, I’m so sorry, Seth.” Twin tears slipped free to trail down flushed cheeks.
“No, you don’t. I don’t understand it, but I seem to have two distinct flames now.”
Her chin snapped up and cracked his chin, clacking his teeth together. She fought to untangle herself from the blanket and kneel in front of him. “Say that again.”
“The I-don’t-understand part, or the I-seem-to-have-two-flames part?”
She paled. “Two flames. It’s not possible.” Fisting one hand, she parked it between her breasts and closed her eyes. Her skin took on a translucent tone that seemed to emit a faint light as she slowed her breathing. Gentle winds caressed his body. A faint mist shrouded her and softened the contours of
her luscious body. The pungent smell of damp earth surrounded him. Sulfur, as strong as a freshly lit match, tickled his nose.
“Eden?”
She opened her eyes and peered up at him through the thick fringe of dark lashes. Cupping her palms, two distinct flames hovered there. “I have two fire elements. That shouldn’t happen.”
But Seth knew it could. Seth closed his eyes and traced the length of his lineage to his father. The king was the Keeper of all ifritis and could be called upon in times of need. What Seth encountered, though, made his breath hitch. His lineage had been—
“What have you done?” The whisper of fury blazed through the room. Candle flames surged two feet into the air, wax puddling in the intense heat.
Seth shot to his feet, pulling up Eden and placing her behind him as she struggled with the blanket. “She didn’t mean to.”
Eden’s gentle touch rested at the small of his back. “What did I do?”
“She is heka, a priestess. Their way is to steal that which is not theirs.” His father materialized a few feet to Seth’s right.
“She took nothing from me.” Seth bowed his head both in deference and to guard his true feelings. He hadn’t seen his father in centuries, and here the man was. No greeting. No threats. No anything. Asshole. Seth cringed, waiting for a blow that never came. His eyes widened. His father could no longer hear his thoughts on a whim. Raising his face, he stared at the king. “She took nothing I did not give freely.”
This time the blow came.
His father’s rage was palpable, the heat of it creating a mirage on the air.
Seth had been through this so many times, endured so many beatings. But now, after experiencing Eden, the control he had over his emotions had shattered. Shame, anger, resentment and diluted love, all for this man, coursed through him.
Eden stepped in front of Seth at the same time the king’s next blow descended.
* * *
Hands up and hackles raised, Eden spoke quickly and angrily. “Stop.” Power circled her in a heady rush.
The king’s hand glanced off the air she’d hardened between them.
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