by River Starr
“I hate that my brothers lost their lives, and now you’re telling me the person responsible is someone I can neither punish, nor strangle to death in vengeance without hurting you. I’ve also seen no proof of her.”
I gulped as his dangerous words left his lips. “You may have met her if you visited my cell at night.”
His lips pressed together in a thin line. “Is that so?”
I nodded. “She has the ability to surface whenever I’m asleep or unconscious.”
Silenced fell between us for several moments.
“It doesn’t matter, does it?” I asked. “That I’m innocent and you believe me?” If he couldn’t imprison and punish Eos separately, doing so to me was the next best thing.
“No.” The word was said firmly.
I found the courage to glare up at him despite his words. “Your brothers’ deaths are not on my hands, but my sister’s will be on yours. You and every prison guard in here. I hope your hatred is worth it.” Venom laced my tone and fire filled my veins. I knew life wasn’t fair, but my sister shouldn’t pay the price for Eos’s crimes. Even if I was locked in here for life, constantly threatened and tormented, Cyra should be able to live.
Zavian wordlessly undid the chains connected to my cuffs but instead of walking me toward the door, he just stood there.
“What’s wrong?” I asked.
Zavian inhaled sharply, opened his mouth as though he were going to speak, but then shook his head.
“Zavian?”
He turned to me and gently brushed hair out of my face. He ran his knuckles down my cheek as our magic danced together, snaking around my body and his. I swallowed hard as my pulse raced in my ears.
“How do you do this to me?” he asked, his voice barely louder than a whisper. “You make me want to throw away duty and vengeance both as if they’re aimless pursuits. You make me quake with the fear of losing you, and I hardly even know you.”
I closed my eyes and turned my face in to his touch. “We’re meant to be together.”
“It’s you, Nyx. It all is.”
I bit my lip, my chest rising and falling with every heavy breath. Anticipation lit a fire in my belly, one that burned lower and lower with every passing second that Zavian spent holding my face.
“It’s both of us,” I murmured. “Fate aligned us, Zavian—”
He leaned down and captured my mouth with his. Our magic slid together in that moment, bursting with fate and purpose and a tingling that coursed throughout my entire body. His fingers slipped into my hair and his other arm wrapped around my waist. I clawed at his back as his tongue explored my mouth. For as cold as this cell should have been, I felt like I was on fire now. There were too many clothes and not enough taking them off, and surely, we would both burn for it.
Zavian lifted my leg against his hip and I moaned as I felt his hardness run up against me through our uniforms. In the next movement, I was unzipping his uniform and pushing down the top half, revealing his broad, muscular shoulders and a dusting of chest hair. He had little scars scattered about, and a set of banded tattoos around his bicep.
This was the first time we’d been this close, this intertwined, with my hands free, and I would not let this opportunity pass me by. I wanted to touch Zavian, all of him, and make him melt before me the way I had come completely undone before him.
He reached up and brought one of my hands into his hair. I held him tightly and clawed his back again lightly with my other hand. He shuddered as my fingernails ran down his bare back. In a ferocious movement, he pulled up my other leg and swept me up in his arms as though I were lighter than air. I wrapped my legs around his waist, relishing in the closeness of us. He walked forward until my back connected roughly with the wall. A chill of excitement tore through me right to my aching core.
Zavian pulled back. A lock of his white-blond hair fell over his face. He lifted one hand to cup my cheek. I kissed his palm. “I can’t help myself when I’m around you. It feels like I’m burning from the inside out.”
I leaned in and brought his forehead to mine. “Me too.”
He kissed me roughly, like a man afraid of watching his love run off forever. After a few moments, he pulled back. “I’m going to make you mine. I’m going to fuck you until you scream my name.”
My arousal throbbed at those words. “Take me, Zavian. I—”
He swallowed my words with another kiss and ground his hardness against me. I moaned into his mouth and clung to his back for an anchor in this ecstasy. Passion burned low in my belly, chasing away all rational thought. The only thing I knew for sure anymore was that if Zavian stopped touching and kissing me, I would implode. There would be nothing left of me to put together again.
Zavian’s lips moved down my jawline to my neck. I sighed happily and tilted my head, giving him access as my hips began answering his. Excitement spiraled through me every time he rubbed against me or his lips made contact. I was on fire and would burn at his will. There was nothing else to it.
Zavian unhooked my legs and stood me back on the ground. His fingers touched the zippers of my uniform as he contemplated something that made his smile grow. Then he took a step back and drank in the sight of me with hooded, hungry eyes.
“Take off your clothes,” he commanded, his guard’s tone back.
I tilted my head. Was that what he really wanted?
“Now,” he said.
I complied, undoing the zipper and slowly opening the front. I slid one arm out, then the other, and let the top half fall down around my waist. Achingly slow, I undid my bra and let it fall to the side before shimmying out of the bottoms. Then I reached for my underwear.
“Don’t,” he said. “Leave those. Turn around.”
My mouth parted, my core clenching as I realized what was happening. My fantasy. He must have felt the tension between us that very first day. Maybe even sensed my arousal then.
I spun and faced the wall. In a deft movement, Zavian was behind me and lifting my palms, planting them flat against the wall. His knee nudged mine until I was pressed against the sea stone, my nipples freezing and hard. My heartbeat thudded in my ears with anticipation. That was when I felt the length of him against my ass, bare and ready. I gasped.
Zavian brought his mouth to my ear and whispered, “Is this what you wanted that day? For me to take you right here?”
My answer was breathy and desperate. “Yes.”
His breath warmed my ear as I felt his strong hand cup my ass. “Is that what you still want?” He lowered his hand between my thighs, his fingers brushing the wet fabric there.
“Gods, yes,” I whispered. My breath slid in clouds along the cold sea stone wall. My core clenched and I found myself backing against his hand as much as I could, moving and bucking. Anything to get friction where I so desperately needed it.
Zavian slipped a finger beneath the fabric. I moaned his name and relaxed against the wall. His touches were tortuously light, and as he kissed my neck, I swore I felt him grinning.
I pushed down against his hand. “More.”
“I’ll call the shots here.”
He could call them as much he wanted as long as he was inside me within the next few minutes. I was certain there was no future for me but imploding in a sea of unrequited ecstasy if that didn’t happen.
“Okay,” I breathed as I stilled my needy hips.
“Okay?” Zavian asked as he trailed kisses across my shoulders. “How about you ask for it?”
I didn’t need any more convincing. What I needed was him inside me. “Please, Zavian. Please take me here like I’ve wanted since meeting you.”
Zavian smiled against my back as he increased pressure and speed, adding another finger to my wetness. I gasped as he touched me where I needed most, and cried out his name as his fingers slipped inside. My hips went wild, having a mind of their own. I wanted to touch him, to pull him close to me and never let him go. But Zavian held my grip in his iron-clad hold. All I could do was take
the pleasure he administered to me against this wall and try not to come undone before him in a puddle of pleasure and passion.
Zavian’s speed increased as he pleasured me, another finger added. I couldn’t be quiet anymore, and I didn’t care if anyone heard despite knowing how thin these walls were. I was coming undone and everyone in the world would hear it. Especially when Zavian’s length ran along me again as he moved against me. His lips released a pleasured groan.
Pleasure built inside of me, coiling tight. I arched against his hand as I rode that pleasure to the top of the mountain we were both climbing. Sensing I was close, Zavian increased both speed and roughness, grinding against me with his hardness at the same time. He kissed my neck once more, sucking and pulling on the skin. His hand let go of mine and reached between the wall and me to grip my breasts.
“Zavian,” I cried as my pleasure crested, exploding, spilling closer to the edge and tumbling over it as I moaned.
He pulled me back against him, away from the wall, and pressed his hardness against me as I shuddered and melted before him, completely undone as my hips bucked. He continued his motions between my legs until I could breathe in shallow gasps again.
“You are so beautiful when you come apart for me,” he whispered into my ears with his low, honey-like voice, and I swore I almost came again.
“You need to take me right now, or I swear…”
“You swear what?” There was a devilish, playful lilt to his voice.
“That I will make you wait before this ever happens again.”
“Nyx…”
I swallowed hard as he said my name, my breath growing shaky. Only with him could someone saying my name cause a full-body shudder to course through me along with a need to hear him say it again, to use it as a plea for more.
Zavian growled and turned me around, roughly pulling me up against him again. I jumped and wrapped my legs around him. He slammed us back against the wall. With a deft maneuver, he had my hands held between one of his once more, while his other tore away my underwear. The sound of the fabric ripping echoed in my ears as my eyes met his again. The amount of devotion and hungry need in his blue eyes made my breath hitch and my heart stop. No one had ever, not once, looked at me this way. Zavian was in control and he liked that. Craved it.
Zavian lined his length up against me. I shuddered with the feel and size of his hardness, the need for him to fill me until I came again and again. To make me feel whole and satisfied and safe. Without another breath, he slid slowly inside of me, inch by thick inch. I gasped and arched against him, my body stretching to accommodate him. The entire time, Zavian never looked away, so I didn’t dare. He wanted to watch my face as he claimed me, and I let every single emotion and ripple of pleasure be visible to him.
He held us there for a moment, letting me adjust, before leaning in to kiss me. I moved my hands, but he held them tightly. I wanted to claw at his back again or tangle my fingers in his hair. But this was his show now—it really always had been—and any complaints I had were swallowed the moment he drew out and drove home again.
I cried out loudly as pleasure barreled through me. Again and again, he had his way with me, cycling between moments of wild, rough, chaotic need, and tender slow moments filled with kisses to my lips and neck.
Finally, he let go of my hands and I grabbed on to his shoulders.
“Please, Zavian.” A fire burned again within me, and I needed release. Craved it.
He picked up speed, driving deeper and deeper each time. I sunk my fingernails into his skin, trying to anchor myself as reality slipped away. Zavian dropped a hand between us and ran his thumb over my most sensitive spot. My pleasure burst immediately. I arched against him and called his name as I drowned in utter euphoria.
Zavian grunted and bucked wildly, driving into me faster and harder until with one last thrust and an almost pained groan, his release rocked him hard and he cried out my name. “Nyx…”
That was the way I’d been waiting for him to say my name.
We came together, crashing down afterward in a sea of heavy breaths, sweat-coated foreheads, and impassioned moans. He held me there against the wall for a long moment, just staring into my eyes with our foreheads pressed together.
Holy. Hell.
“You make me fall apart,” Zavian said.
I smiled and ran my knuckles along his warm cheek as he had mine earlier. “You put me back together.”
He smiled and kissed me once more before unhooking my legs, pulling out, and setting me on the floor once more. My breath ran ragged and my heartbeat raced as a realization came slamming into me.
There was no life without Zavian in it. Whether that was here, imprisoned for life, or even after escape to the surface. I needed Zavian in my life. I craved his touch as much as air itself.
But with his brothers’ killer stuck inside of me, we may never find peace as mates.
21
Nyx
I kept my head up as I was escorted back to my cell, although my vision had clouded over. My thoughts raced. Zavian now knew the truth about me and apparently even believed it. But his own unwillingness to go against the sea court’s ruling of my case meant that my mate had doomed me to life in prison after all—and my sister to certain death.
I wanted dinner, and to sleep uninterrupted for as long as possible. But as I returned to the cell and to Frost’s questioning glance, I somehow instinctively knew neither was going to happen.
Zavian slid the door shut behind me, locking Frost and me inside our cell. After a moment too long spent watching me, he turned and walked away.
Only when he was out of earshot did Frost pounce and close the distance between us. “What was that about?”
“Nothing.”
“Oh? Was he that bad a lay?”
I shot her a look, sure that she could see right through me even as I said, “That’s not what that was about.”
She lifted her hand between us. “Are you sure? I mean, it’s not uncommon in prison. Kinda sucks he has no endurance, though. You weren’t gone all that long. Shame. He looks so hot, too.”
“Drop it. Please.”
Frost put her hands on her hips and tossed locks of her silver hair out of her face. “Make me. What else am I supposed to think with him constantly ferrying you off places? Protecting you from the other guards? Saving you from being fed to the Deep One when any other inmate here”—she gestured wildly to the other cells nearby—“would have long ago been disposed of?”
I shrugged. “Think whatever you want to, Frost. Just get out of my way.” I nudged past her so I could lie down on my bunk.
Frost grabbed my arm. “You’re making a deal to get out of here alone, aren’t you?”
My brow furrowed. “What? What gives you that impression?”
Frost crossed her arms and I noticed the tips of her fingers had begun gathering ice. “All of the above. You’re obviously protected by him to some level. I think you made a deal for special treatment or exoneration. I don’t think you were really in solitary confinement for all those days but were actually fucking—”
“Just shut up!” I shouted.
Inmates egged us on with whoops and hollers from somewhere down the cell block.
“Ladies,” Dax said from the bars on his side of the corridor. “Maybe take it down a notch.”
Frost shot one arm out and a small pile of snow went flying for Dax’s mouth. He narrowly avoided it. “This is between Nyx and me. Although that’s been pretty weird too, the two of you. I have to admit, no matter how I look at it, things don’t add up with you, Nyx.”
Yeah. That might be because I have another soul in my body.
I pulled in a deep breath and tried to find a way to appease Frost. “Zavian—”
“The prison guard,” Frost amended, her eyebrows raised as if she’d caught me in the act.
I clicked my tongue. “The prison guard took me into an interrogation room and asked me questions about my crime.”
Frost turned to the guys’ cell. “See, she even gets a chance to prove her innocence and we didn’t!”
“Frost, please,” Dax insisted. “Calm down. There’s no reason for this.”
Frost pointed to Titus. “What about you? What do you have to say about this, Titus? You claim to be innocent, and yet Nyx, a murderer, is over here getting it on with a guard to get out of here.”
Titus scowled but otherwise ignored Frost in favor of watching the sea stone wall of his cell.
I wrenched my arm from her grasp. “Frost, stop.”
She leaned in, taking up all my space. “We were supposed to escape together.”
Her voice had traveled too far when she’d said that. “And we will, so shut up,” I hissed.
Frost reeled back her hand and slapped me across the face. Pain exploded across my cheekbone from the impact. That was no normal slap. Frost had collected enough ice around her palm that it had dug into my skin. I bit my tongue when she landed the blow, too, and now a coppery taste filled my mouth.
“Bitch.” I stepped back, only to gain enough momentum to punch her back.
She caught it and swung her other hand at my head. Her punch connected. My ears rang and black spots danced along the edges of my vision. Something deep inside me began crawling to get out.
Eos. No. Not right now. Gods, no.
“Come on,” Frost declared, her arms held open wide. “Your precious guard isn’t going to save you now.”
I wiped my bloody nose on the back of my hand and stood my ground. “What if I was making a deal. What then? How do you know it’s not to get us all out, and here you are ruining it?”
She inclined her head. “I wonder how many guards you’d have to sleep with for that to work.”
“I didn’t—”
Frost swung again. I ducked in time to avoid this hit and came up with a punch in her gut. Frost sputtered and stumbled backward. I was quick. Too quick for her most of the time. But I’d clearly gotten rusty. Just because I didn’t enjoy fighting didn’t mean I hadn’t gotten into my fair share of altercations doing my thieving.