and gives me a heated look as he throws it open and carries me over the threshold with all the ceremony I could wish for.
So romantic!
“We have this tradition too,” I murmur to him.
“Don’t utter anything that will incite me to disparage your backwards people,” he warns me levelly as he stalks towards his bedroom. “It would bring shame to my bloodline if I insulted my mate on this night.”
I curl my arm tighter around his neck and pet his flexible dorsal spines. “You are such a sweet grouch.”
“Kick off your boots,” he orders.
“Oh, yes,” I say, toeing them off with only a little difficulty as he holds me aloft. “I don’t want them to make anything dirty.”
“And I don’t want you to be shod and therefore provide you with a more-speedy escape.”
“This is just like a fairy-tale,” I sigh. “So creepy and romantically twisted!”
He sets me beside the bed.
So hot!
Bash draws away. But not before planting a soft kiss on my forehead. So sweet. “Now, as hopeful as my hearts want to be that you’re accepting this change in circumstance beyond my every prayer and expectation, a part of me can’t trust it.” He moves to a work table in the corner of his room where there’s much the same tool spread as he has at the blacksmith station in the quarry. He raises a hoop of metal. On the hoop is a ring. On the ring is a long, long chain. And then Bash turns, his eyes glowing as they light on mine.
“Is that a shackle?” I ask in disbelief.
CHAPTER 35
ISLA
“This is your leg cuff,” Bash confirms.
“Oh my land, you’re going to cuff me to your bed?” I’VE HIT THE JACKPOT: nothing says true love like turning your spouse into your captive! “This is the hottest thing that’s ever happened to me!” I whoop, sticking out my leg like I’m Cinderella waiting for the prince to fit me with my long lost slipper.
Bash eyes me warily the whole time he works to snap my new commitment jewelry around my ankle, clearly not trusting my capitulation.
I pat him on the shoulder reassuringly, then I leave my hand on his solid muscle to brace myself, because it turns out that having your new husband/mate raise your leg in the air so that he can chain you in his den means your balance is a bit off. Not a big gripe or anything, just a caveat.
“What are you chaining me to?” I ask happily. “And how did you know my anklet size?” I ask in wonder when he sets my foot on the floor and strokes his hand slowly up my leg. Oooh, nice. The weight of my cuff settling on the top of my foot is making warmth pool in my stomach. Or maybe it’s the way Bash is caressing my skin. Could be that.
“I’ve chained you to our bed,” Bash answers—still watching me for a reaction, still not trusting that I’m really okay with this. “If you follow the chain, you’ll find it’s already anchored—”
“Our bed!” I marvel. My eyes light up as I gaze into his pretty, pretty-distrusting lush green beauties. “You anchored me to our bed!” I bounce my eyebrows, which makes him twitch. “Does this mean we are finally going to have the crazy hot monkey sex?”
“—and my tail,” his tail wraps around my other ankle to demonstrate, “has spanned your ankle often enough that your size has been burned in my mind. That’s how I knew to craft a fitted cuff…”
A moment passes before Bash’s translator parses out my blurted question. His face scrunches up with distaste. “Monkey…?” He shakes his head violently, making his ears flap and his horns swing back and forth.
“Wait—did you make this yourself?” I hold out my foot like I’m showing off a toe ring and decorative ankle jewelry, not my new mate’s way of keeping me chained to our marriage bed.
Bash’s nose goes up a fraction, and his eyes narrow. Like he’s expecting this is the moment I’m going to snap. “I did.”
“When?” I ask, starving for details. “How long have you known that you were crazy about me and wanted to keep me as your forever and ever sex slave?”
“The day I told you I was quit with wooing you. I decided that the simplest way to make you mine would be to just take you and keep you my captive.”
I fan myself and stare up at the cave ceiling of Bash’s den. “I wish you’d told me