responsibilities, these hours of giving themselves over to someone else’s control are a blissful reprieve, a release on every level. Of course, I’m only guessing.” With a smile at him, I tucked my hand in the crook of his arm again and we walked on.
“Why only guessing?” he asked. “You haven’t done that?”
I laughed, but it came out wistful. “No. When would I have?”
“With your ladies,” he supplied, surprising me a little. He arched a brow at my expression. “Did you think I hadn’t guessed that you had sex with them before me?”
I did think that, because I’d never told him as much, at least not directly. While it wasn’t exactly a closely guarded secret, my reputation as a chaste virgin queen awaiting the emperor’s touch to truly make me a woman—such a bilious thought—had meant that my ladies and I never openly discussed the many ways they tended me.
“Not all my ladies,” I replied, “and we never played games like that.” In truth, while I’d enjoyed their ministrations, it had been a pleasure on the level of a good massage. Deeply relaxing, but without the emotional component I had with Con. Not even with Tertulyn, though I’d thought we’d shared a certain affection. Perhaps not.
“Why not?”
I thought he meant Tertulyn at first, then realized he meant the sexual games. We’d come to a brightly lit arena where naked men wrestled one another, the winners pinning the losers and taking them with masculine roars of triumph. Pausing on the outskirts, I cast a coy glance at Con. “I’ve heard a number of whispers speculating that you would be especially well suited to this game. A champion, even.”
Con looked momentarily startled, a rabbit facing the sudden appearance of a predator, then he laughed softly, shaking his head. “I can safely say no to that one.”
“Because you’re not interested in men?”
“I’m not, it’s true.” He pulled me under a nearby tree, its weeping limbs blossoming with white trumpet flowers that made a veil all around. Under the soft globes of golden light hanging from the interior branches, he pressed my back against the trunk. “I’m not much interested in anything that doesn’t involve you, Lia.”
He bent his head and kissed me, the sweet heat moving through and dissolving into my blood and bones. When I’d drunk his blood, he’d become part of me in a fundamental way. I slid my good hand around his neck, under the queue of hair, clinging to him as he kissed me even more deeply. He cupped my breast through the silk, thumbing my taut nipple, and I groaned.
“You didn’t answer my question,” he said against my cheek, his lips moving hot to my ear, taking the lobe in his teeth and gently nibbling.
I had to think, which wasn’t easy with my body yearning for more. “With My ladies, it wasn’t like that. And besides, I can’t do that sort of thing.”
“Not even in the Night Court, where anything goes?”
I sighed, and not only for the delightful trail of his lips coursing down my throat. “It’s not for Me.”
“Because you don’t want to?” He slid the narrow strap of my gown down my arm, easing the silk over my nipple, teasing so I shuddered with the sparking need. “You could’ve been speaking of yourself—the person who can never set down her responsibilities, who’s always in control, who maybe craves a release from that, if only for a few short hours.” His hot mouth closed over my nipple.
“Ohhh…” I let my head fall back against the smooth green trunk, grateful the light, close fit of the new crown allowed for that, moaning for the feelings his words stirred in me as much as for the delight of his mouth on me.
He lifted his head, replacing his mouth with rough fingers, brushing my temple with a kiss. “I think you want to.”
“I can’t.” I sounded like I was begging, though I wasn’t sure what for. “It would be irresponsible.”
“Even a queen deserves time for herself.”
“It wouldn’t work, anyway. Delilah is right that everyone must obey Me, games or no.”
He kissed me, harder than usual, then broke away to stare into my eyes, fixing me with that hot golden gaze of the predator. “I don’t have to obey you.”
The intensity of his expression had me catching my breath.
“And you trust me,” he continued. Taking my hand from the back of his neck, he lifted it and pinned it high above my head against the tree. My breathing quickened, tightened, and