“Finally, my wife, you have surrendered.”

He begins to move, pulling out of me just enough to rock back in. My breath leaves me all at once. I was expecting it to hurt. Instead, every slight movement feels so cataclysmically good.

“Wife.” The warlord gazes down at me, his normally violent eyes now full of some gentle emotion. My stomach bottoms out when I realize the emotion isn’t simple desire. “I cannot tell you how I have longed for this. You are mine finally—totally and completely, nothing to separate us.”

The horseman thrusts into me again, as if to emphasize his point.

My nails sink into his back at the sensation, and he pauses, maybe to make sure that he’s not hurting me.

I can barely form the words over my own heightened desire.

“Don’t stop,” I breathe. “Please don’t.”

Again, that roguish smile.

War begins to thrust himself into me, first with slow, meticulous precision, but then with increasing force. I’m arching into each thrust, and already I feel my orgasm starting to build in the background.

The entire time, War watches me, like he wants to own every look, every moment. Every so often he whispers phrases in other languages that translate to my beautiful wife and never have I known such pleasure and this is the closest to heaven I have been in a long time.

This is … not at all like my other experiences with sex. This is the kind of sex that ruins you.

As I feel him stroke me deep within, I finally sense the horseman’s true nature. He cannot be anything other than battle breathed to life. All this flesh holds the violence of eons; I feel it in each thunderous thrust of his hips. And yet, as his hands slip over my body, there’s an unexpected softness to his touch.

He kisses me up the column of my throat, his hips pistoning in and out, in and out.

“So beautiful,” he now murmurs. “How long I have yearned for you.”

War’s pace changes, deepening—and it’s as though the last several minutes have been a tease and this is the real thing.

Instantly my body is coiling, my looming orgasm now building rapidly—too rapidly—

All at once I shatter.

I cry out, pulling the horseman tightly to me as I feel my climax rip through me. Over and over I feel it, and just when it begins to end I feel War thicken inside me.

“My wife, my heart.” He groans as his own orgasm moves through him, his thrusts becoming stronger and faster as he spills into me.

War gazes down at me, his eyes going a little hazy as he rides the last of his orgasm out. What feels like an eternity later, the horseman’s thrusts begin to slow. Eventually, he has no choice but to slip out of me.

I’m sore everywhere; the kind of sore that makes your cheeks flush.

War lays back on his bed and drags me onto his stomach. He cups my core, even as I feel his cum begin to leak out of me.

“To feel that a part of me is inside you still—wife, there is no more thrilling sensation in the world,” he states.

My breathing begins to slow, my sweaty flesh cooling. All my aches and pains are flaring back to life.

Now that I’m beginning to come down, War’s adoration is starting to—well, I’m having a few misgivings.

The sex—I definitely want second helpings of that—but the horseman is looking at me like things have changed. And yeah, my close brush with death had given me some perspective, and yeah, I did surrender to him and all, but now I’m sensing that my words and actions might mean a smidge more to him than they do to me.

I begin to push away from him. “I should clean myself up …” There’s still a tub full of water, and now I’m sticky—

War pulls me back down, luring me back to him with his heated kisses. “Not so quick, my wife.” He brushes my dark hair aside so that he can kiss the nape of my neck.

“But I’m dirty,” I protest, desperate to put a little distance between us.

“Nothing about what we did was dirty,” War says, a bit too fervently. “And I like having myself all over you.”

That’s exactly what I’m having an issue with.

“It is going to be different now,” he adds.

I swallow. Uh oh.

“Um, what do you mean?” I say carefully, keeping my tone light.

“You are mine wholly and completely—and I am yours. For now and always it will be this way.”

Oh dear God. That sounded a lot like a vow to me.

What have I done?

Chapter 40

Despite my misgivings, we spend the rest of the afternoon and evening in War’s bed, getting up only to eat and drink.

I don’t know if he’s aware of my unease, but if he is, he couldn’t have devised a better strategy for distracting me from it. I might be troubled by War’s feelings for me, but I have zero problems with how he makes love.

Not even nighttime seems to quench whatever thirst drives the horseman. War wakes me up twice more for sex.

By the time morning sunlight is streaming through our tent, War’s hand has moved its way down to my clit for the millionth time. He strokes it, and I moan softly in protest. My body feels like it’s been wrung of every last orgasm.

Despite that, I feel myself slicken against his hand. Who would’ve thought I’d have another round in me?

“Cannot keep my hands off of you,” War says, moving his other palm to my breast. Against my better judgment, I arch into his touch.

“So receptive,” he murmurs.

Something I seriously did not take into account earlier—all this skin on skin action has almost completely healed me. And my libido is thanking War for it.

The horseman rolls on top of me. I tilt my pelvis up, and for the thousandth time in the last twenty four hours, my horseman slides inside me.

Much, much later I manage to actually pull myself out of bed and clean myself up as best I can (much to War’s disappointment). Before I can get reeled back in for more sex, I dress and slip outside.

I nearly scream the moment I do so.

The living dead surround War’s quarters.

They stand idly around the tent, weapons held at the ready. Most of them rock slightly, their decomposing features slack. And yet, despite the fact that their eyes are unfocused and their heads don’t turn at the sound of my footsteps, there’s an awareness to them.

So that explains the smell.

I cup my hand over my nose. The stench is much worse out here, and the hot day is doing nothing to help it.

A moment later, War steps out next to me, a smile clinging to his lips. One look at him and the entire camp will know that the horseman got himself some ass last night.

Awesome.

“What is this?” I ask, my gaze sweeping over the corpses.

“They’re for your protection.” His smile slips away. “It seems I cannot trust even my own men to keep you safe.”

Now that my gaze sweeps over my surroundings, I finally notice that the phobos riders that used to stand guard are indeed gone.

In their place are armed zombies, their blades holstered at their sides.

“This really isn’t necessary,” I state, covering my nose again. Ugh, I can taste the rot on my tongue.

“On the contrary, wife, now it’s more important than ever.” Even as War says it, his zombies back away, giving me space to breathe. “I warned you already: I won’t lose you.”