Part of her was annoyed that he’d think that she’d even entertain that thought. “I’m not thinking that! I’m just . . .” Vee blushed. “No one’s touched me there but me, for as long as I can remember. It’s . . . it’s just unfamiliar. I need to get used to it.”
He stroked her seam again, grinning wickedly. “Then it would be my pleasure to get you very used to my touch, my dear Vielle. After all, familiarity only comes with plenty of practice.”
She wanted to laugh at his jest, but couldn’t. Not while distracted by his touch. Two of his fingers deftly parted her folds. The third dipped through the slick wetness between them, sliding it up to coat the pearl of flesh those nether-lips guarded. She choked, stiffening. Her hands pushed at his shoulders, but only because she needed the leverage to lift her hips up into his touch.
“Oh Light! What you’re doing—! I swear, Your Highness,” she growled between shudders as he did it again, “if you stop and don’t follow through, I will hunt you down. You’ll wish those guards had—oh Light and Life!”
He cut off her tirade with a rub of his thumb and a gentle probe of his middle finger, teasing her entrance. “I assure you, I have no intention of stopping. At least, until you beg me to,” he added, smirking. His hand stroked faster, probed a little deeper. “It is said that women have a great capacity for pleasure. In order to prove this theory, I intend to explore your capacity until we find your limits while we stay here . . . and then see if we can expand them.”
It was her turn to grab a pillow, thwap it over her face, and curse into its sound-muffling depths. Chuckling, Kiers dipped his head back to her breasts. The combination of lips, tongue, and fingertips sent her over the edge. Wailing into the pillow, Vee tensed in the biggest crux of her life to date. Every little twitch of his fingers on her nethers just added to it, keeping the pleasure rolling through her nerves like little aftershocks from an earthquake.
Only when she dragged the plump, feather-stuffed pad from her face in the struggle for more air did he finally still his efforts. Lifting his lips from her nipple, he grinned. “Enjoyed that, did you?”
A very unladylike retort nearly escaped her. Except the words she would have used would have encouraged more of the same. Settling on a scowling pout, she muttered, “Oh, give me a chance to rest, already! I need to catch my breath.”
Fingers still gently cupping her mound under the fabric of her knickers, he shifted up close enough to kiss her mouth. “Let me know when you’d like another go, then. Or if you’d rather be tucked under the covers for a good night’s sleep, first.”
As much as parts of her body ached with the need for more of that bliss, just his mentioning the word sleep was enough to make her yawn. She pouted again when her mouth finally shut. “Don’t want to . . .”
Kiers thought she looked utterly cute like that, still flushed and a little sweaty from her pleasure, clad only in her underdrawers with his hand tucked down inside, cradling the wet warmth of her flesh. He could see in her eyes that she didn’t want to go to sleep, but that she also needed it. “Right then,” he sighed, gently withdrawing his hand. “Sleep first. That way we’ll have energy for more, tomorrow.”
Vee lifted a brow at his autocratic decision, but the softness of the bed and the post-crux lethargy in her limbs argued that he was right. They’d both feel better after a good night’s sleep. She did, however, question the sight of his re-hardened shaft. “What about that?” she asked, pushing up onto her elbows so she could nod at his groin. “Don’t you want to take care of that?”
He shook his head. “It’ll go away—keep your knickers on,” he added, shifting off the bed and casting around for his own undertrousers. “I’d rather be fully awake for our next encounter, rather than play with you in my sleep. Or let you play with me, unawares.”
“Mister Kiers, I am hardly likely to . . . to ravish you without fair warning!” Vee argued, climbing off the bed as well so they could draw the covers down. Her jaw cracked in a hastily smothered yawn before she could continue. “I mean, Kiers. I am an honorable woman, you know. All Couriers have to be.”
“I never once doubted that, Mi—Vielle,” he promised her, fastening his undertrousers in place. Like her, he was having difficulty not using the honorifics of polite society. It was a change in their relationship that would take time to implement. “However, desire is so deep-rooted in our minds, it can manifest itself from the depths of our very dreams . . . and I know I’m going to dream about the feel and the scent and the taste of you, tonight.”
“Taste?” Vee asked, thinking of the way he had kissed and licked her breasts.
Lifting his right hand to his lips, he deliberately licked the remnants of her juices from his fingertips, blue eyes gleaming with a mixture of mirth and desire.
Blushing, she tugged on one of her shirts, then climbed back into the bed on the far side from him. “Get the lamps, will you? I stacked extra wood in the hearth to make a good pile of coals and made sure the grates were in place to guard against sparks.”
Nodding, he twisted his left hand in a snatching motion, looking at the lamp on the wardrobe, several feet beyond his reach. The flame instantly snuffed out under the power of his Fire-affinity, leaving only a curl of smoke to climb up the glass chimney. Joining her under the covers, he repeated his efforts with the bedside one, plunging them into a semidarkness lit only by the flickering, golden glow of the hearth fire down below.
For a long moment, neither moved, then Kiereseth sighed and shifted a little closer. With a wordless touch, he coaxed her into rolling up against him, sharing their body heat to warm up the bedding, as well as for a bit of emotional closeness.
Vee looked up at him. She couldn’t really see him in the dark, but she’d grown used to his presence these last few weeks. “Thank you for giving me pleasure, Kiers.”
“Thank you for sharing it with me,” he returned quietly. He pressed a kiss to the top of her braid-wrapped head. “Sleep well, Vee.”
Nodding, she snuggled into his warmth and closed her eyes, letting her post-bliss lethargy carry her into some very muchneeded sleep.
CHAPTER FOUR
Kiers slouched in a very unprincely manner, propping his chin on his palm. His gaze switched back and forth between the slightly incomplete research notes spread over the kitchen table, and the odd, rounded, gun-like device sitting between him and his companion. Vielle had still been sleeping when he had woken, and the air in the cabin had been decidedly nippy. The ex-prince had busied himself with building up a fire, before attempting to re-create a breakfast version of last night’s supper. He did all of that while waiting for her to awaken, figuring she would at least approve of the effort, if not necessarily the result.
Vee had kindly refrained from commenting on his efforts when she finally descended after dressing, aside from pronouncing it, “. . . edible enough, I suppose,” though she did scrape the blackest bits off the tumble of pan-fried roots before eating the rest. And she had thanked him for joining her in scrubbing the breakfast things. Now, they sat on opposing stools, staring at the work ahead of them. By joint accord, they had decided to do some actual study post-breakfast.
Kiers, however, couldn’t focus on the notes he had taken. Not when he had the distraction of the very beautiful, passionate woman across from him, and the enigma of the thing between them. It was either ask her questions about it, or drag her back upstairs.