A Storm of Flames and Deceit

35. Save For Eternity

"Why else do you think that I don't eat meat?" I taunt, turning around to unbutton his shirt. "Growing up around that will really turn your stomach for damn near eternity."

"Can we not talk about this as you're undressing me," he mutters unhappily.

"Gladly," I answer, slipping onto my toes to kiss him, unbuttoning his pants. My mouth works down his throat as his pants drop to the floor. I break from him, giving a taunting grin over my shoulder as I walk into the tub.

He follows in after me, reaching to grip my hips, turning me to face his heavy-lidded gaze, but I click my tongue before his lips meet mine. "I should get clean before we do any of that, don't you think?" I taunt. It's been a long day, and frankly, I needed a bath.

"You expect me to watch you wash yourself," he counters, brows raised. "And not intervene on behalf of my own sanity?"

I shrug, loving nothing more than driving him insane. "I'll give you a choice," I tilt my head tauntingly up at him, wrapping my arms around the back of his neck. "Either you watch or you can bathe me yourself."

He stares at me quietly for a moment, his lips slightly parted, his nose and cheeks flushed from the warm bath. "So?" I hedge.

He rolls his eyes, reaching along the walls of the bath for those lavender scented oils he knows I love. "You didn't even have to ask," he mutters grumpily. "You knew which one I was gonna pick."

I chuckle, sitting up on the step. "I did, but I love to elicit that look of starvation on your face," I tell him, extending a single leg for him to run the oils over.

He takes my foot in his hands, delicately kissing the inside of my ankle as his eyes flick up from between my thighs before catching my gaze. "Is this what you wanted?" He asks quietly, stroking the oils up my slick leg. "You want me to behave as your servant, submit to bathing you, eager to please?"

I smile down at him, resting my foot over his shoulder, his eyes flicking back down as my legs spread further apart. "I might," I mutter appreciatively, stroking his hair like a master might stroke a dog's fur. "I like giving you orders, I like praising you, making you obey." I know full well he's never been obedient a day in his life. I like gaining that from him.

"One conversation about being queen," he muses, massaging the soap into my skin attentively. "And you've already gone mad with power."

I chuckle, dropping my right leg into the water, submitting my other left to him. "You volunteered to be my consort," I point out as he drives suds up my leg. "You would've taken a job where serving your queen was your only duty. Still sound appealing?" I raise a brow in challenge.

His hands stroke the underside of my thigh warmly, the afterthought of a touch, the flicker in my resolve. "I don't think I'd complain," he murmurs, kissing the inside of my thigh. "Especially if this was my only responsibility."

I roll my eyes, though my stomach flutters. To me, it actually doesn't sound so terrible, but I'd never consider it. Eris was made to rule the same way he was made for me. Still, the idea is arousing to entertain. "And let's say that was your only responsibility," I smirk as he massages my thigh. "To take care of me, to ensure my pleasure, to bathe me, feed me, give me whatever I wanted."

He smirks slipping my leg back in the water as he treads closer. "Isn't it already?" He tilts his head innocently, rising up to meet my lips. I shiver, melting into his warm skin, my hips grinding against the slick porcelain of the tub restlessly.

"You haven't finished washing me," I murmur, breaking a hair away, defiance shining in my eyes as I lovingly push his hair off his brow.

He glances down at my breasts, arched against his chest in the heat of the exchange. "I suppose I missed a few spots," he agrees, lowering back into the water a bit, standing eye level with my chest.

He lathers more lavender body wash onto his slick finger tips, drawing them first over my clavicle. He sweeps the line of the bone, painting the fragrance lower and lower with a patience I do not presently feel. His eyes stay down cast, focused on the task as if it were the most important job in the world, as if he couldn't look away.

As his wet fingers turn the soap to suds, his hands tread lower before they at last reach the peak of my hard nipples. I bite my lip to keep from giving him the satisfaction of a gasp. He looks particularly focused now, tracing a sud around the erect of my breast with teasing fingers.

His palms then find the action, cupping the underside of my breasts and pushing them upwards into my beating heart. My brows draw together as massages my breasts, a sigh of aching relief because suddenly, they feel heavy against my chest, needing him to lift them.

My thighs too ache. They've ached for the past few days since Eris had me for the first time. Encouraging him to have sex with me the second time probably wasn't my wisest move either. "Are you sore, My Love?" He murmurs affectionately, kissing between my breasts, right where my heart beats out of my chest.

It's not something I'd readily admit to him, but I find myself nodding, having trouble lying when he's so near. "A little," I admit, my sadistic legs still spreading the slightest bit, welcoming whatever pain.

"That's okay, Sweetheart," he strokes my waist with those frictionless fingers. "We have time- always and forever if I'm not mistaken. And I only have infinite patience when you're involved."