He stayed like that until she calmed. Finally her shoulders sagged, and her head lolled forward. Those midnight wings trembled, glimmering like polished ebony. She was panting shallowly, her bottom lip cut from where she’d bitten down.

When her slumberous gaze met his, he brought his fingers to his mouth and licked at her arousal. He couldn’t get enough of her, didn’t think he would ever get enough.

Her pupils expanded, consuming those hazel irises and leaving only black. Black velvet, smooth and endless. He could lose himself and never care to be found.

“Take off your clothes,” she whispered. “Please. Let me have you now.”

He grabbed the collar of his shirt and tugged, ducking to free his head from the material’s confinement. Her hands found his pecs a second later, her palms pressing into his nipples.

“Your heart is racing,” she said, clearly awed by that fact.

In that moment, his heart beat for her. Only her. He’d never craved a female this much. And that she knew what he was, what he’d done, and wanted him anyway… He moved in and fit his mouth around one of her rosy little nipples, sucking hard then easing the sting with a flick of his tongue. He turned his head and did the same to the other, leaving his mark on them both. Branding her, so that when she saw herself in a mirror she would know she belonged to someone else. To him, only him.

“Let me see the rest of you,” she said.

He shook his head.

“Paris…”

Another shake. To remove his pants, he would have to stop touching her, and he didn’t want to stop touching her. Couldn’t conceive a good enough reason to ever stop.

“Please. I need to see you.”

Trembling, he pressed his forehead between her breasts. He swallowed, found his voice. “You never have to beg. Not with me. Whatever you want, I will give you.” Always before, he’d taken from his partners. With her, he wanted to give anything, everything. “But if I strip, I will lose control. Let me savor you, Sienna.”

“Control is overrated. I want you, however I can get you.”

Such beautiful words. “I wish we were at my home, and in my bed, and I had you splayed on my pillows. You deserve better than a dirty cave.”

She cupped his cheeks and forced his eyes to meet hers. “After everything I’ve done to you, how can you say that?”

He didn’t remind her that this moment had no past. He couldn’t. The past flooded him, too. “Sienna, you ran to me when you were in trouble, when Cronus first enslaved you. Before that, you slept with me to strengthen me despite the fact that you were horrified by our potential audience, despite the fact that I was your greatest enemy. Before that, you were involved in a war and batting for your team, same as me. You did nothing I wouldn’t have done, had the situation been reversed.”

Tears filled her eyes, splashed down her cheeks.

“None of that. Not here, not now.” He captured them with his tongue, kissing them away. Now the reminder came. “Just a man and a woman, remember?”

“I just…I always get emotional after mind-shattering orgasms,” she said with a dry undertone, and he laughed. “Or I must, considering that was my first.”

“Your other man didn’t—”

Her smile was silky, wanton. “What other man?”

Good girl. He chuckled, surprising himself. Genuine humor between lovers wasn’t something he’d ever experienced before her.

“I want you anywhere I can get you.” Nibbling on her bottom lip, she reached down and pushed at his zipper. Her fingertips brushed the weeping tip of his cock, which stretched far past the waist of his pants. “Mmm, no underwear.”

“I was…hopeful.”

Now she was the one to chuckle.

He gripped her under the ass and urged her forward, even as he leaned back on his haunches. She slid from the rocky foundation, held up only by his hands. He positioned her core just over his erection. So hot, so wet, but he didn’t push inside. Not yet.

“Kiss me,” he commanded, even as Sex got his purr on. Guess the demon was so excited, he couldn’t stay quiet a moment longer. At least he wasn’t talking. “Like before. Own me with your mouth.”

“My pleasure.” A shiver rocked her as she meshed their lips without any hesitation, thrusting her tongue into his mouth and feeding him all that she was. Owning him, just as he’d wanted.

“Can’t hold back,” he said. All thoughts of savoring her, this moment, fled. They had here and now, and not much else. He had to know the rest of her, had to join them. “Must be in you. Need to be in you.”

“Yes. You’ll own me.”

He thrust deep and sure, filling her. They moaned in unison. Paris, Sienna, Sex. It was like coming home after a year in the desert, when you were so thirsty, so hungry, you felt as if you were drinking and eating for the first time. As if you were alive for the first time. His senses awoke, aware of her every need, attuned to her every nuance.

This was what he’d yearned for so desperately. Not just a communion with her body, but with her mind. Her soul, their every breath intertwined.

Yes. Yes, yes, yes.

She was tight, tighter than a fist, and he knew he stretched her. Knew he was too big for such a slender body, but that didn’t stop him from moving her up and down, up and down from the root of his shaft to the very tip. She was so wet, the glide was smooth. Her nipples rasped at his chest, creating the most delicious friction. Friction that lanced spears of pleasure throughout his entire body.

He was utterly consumed by her. She was in his mouth, pressed against him, her weight sliding her down on him…down…all the way…her legs squeezing at his, her hands on his back, her nails scraping and clawing at him. Even the ends of her hair acted as a stimulant, dancing over his skin, tickling.

Paris kneaded his hands up her spine and stopped between her wings. Occasionally over the years, he’d had to massage his friend Aeron to work out the stiffness from battle. So he knew just how sensitive the slits in these wings could be. Keeping in mind that she had to be sore, he kneaded gently, rolling the muscles and tendons under his fingers.

A hoarse cry left her. “Paris! Oh, Paris!”

His name on her lips did it for him, totally, completely. He rarely ever told his partners his name, not wanting to hear them say it and increase his shame. But now, with Sienna, he was once again undone.

He pounded into her, harder, so damn hard their teeth banged together when she dove in for another kiss. Their tongues sparred with the same strength, the same intensity. His testicles were drawing up, the skin around them tightening. White-hot waves of pleasure and strength swam at the base of his spine, ready to burst through him, to devour him and brand her.

So badly he wanted to come, but he wouldn’t, not until she’d exploded on him. Her pleasure came first, now and always.

He reached between their bodies and circled his thumb against her clitoris. And, oh, sweet heaven, that’s all she’d needed. Another scream that cracked her vocals echoed around him, her inner walls milking him. He jetted inside her, pouring all of his desire, all of his need and passion straight into her core. Roaring, roaring, so caught up in the incredible sensations, uncaring about anything else.

And when, an eternity later, she collapsed against his chest, her legs lax against his, he continued to hold her, unwilling to let go. Just then, he wasn’t sure he would ever be able to let go.

CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE

HE’D BEEN ABUSED, his skin like pretty pink ribbons curling from a Christmas box.

Violated in the worst ways.

But Kane never gave the female minions what they wanted.

He was ashamed that he couldn’t fight his way free, that his demon had somehow taken him over and held him down as surely as the chains shackling his wrists and ankles. He was a warrior, thousands of years old, with experience honed on the bloodiest of battlefields. This should be child’s play to him. He should have escaped long ago.

More than any of that, however, he was humiliated by all kinds of other things he wasn’t ready to acknowledge or face. The things they’d done to him…

Later. He would deal with it later. Maybe. Right now, all he could do was distance himself from what was happening to his body, as if it wasn’t actually his body enduring the abuse. As if someone else had teeth in his thigh, hands where no others had been.

Drip, drip went his blood.

Kane had been tortured before. Many times, in fact. This was just more of the same, he told himself. Yeah. Right.

Disaster laughed, a cruel, happy sound echoing in his mind. If only that were the first time, but no. Disaster had laughed and laughed and laughed, a never-ending stream of amusement.

Hate utterly consumed Kane, kept him conscious. Every time he felt himself slipping into darkness, he thought about the demon High Lord inside him. Despite his instinct to remain distanced, he wanted to know every deed done to him. One day, he would return the favor in kind—a thousandfold. His demon would suffer this way. His demon would die this way.

Yes, one day.

His gaze pulled from the blood-spattered cavern wall above him and slipped down his body. He was a raw slab of scarlet. Dripping…dripping… Were those his ribs? Yes, he thought hazily. They were, one of them even pointing in the wrong direction.

One. Day.

Distantly he heard the pound of…horse hooves? Maybe. Whatever it was caused the minions on top of him, under him, even those around him who were awaiting their turn, to scatter in the winds, leaving him atop the boulder, naked, still bleeding…still dripping. Crimson, such a lovely yet horrifying color. Life and death, bound together.

He should be in tremendous pain, but there was nothing. Only a strange, welcome numbness.

A horse’s whinny. Booted footsteps. He should care. Someone was here, looking at him, seeing him at his worst. He did care, but there was nothing he could do about it. No way to cover himself or hide what had been done to him. He wanted to kill this newcomer the same way he wanted to kill the minions and Disaster. Anything to wipe away all knowledge of this day. Forever.