KINGSLAYER

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"No." It took her a moment to speak when the fingers of his other hand rested against the place on her thigh his mouth had graced moments before.

Only as her hair swept past her shoulders did she realize he had undone her braid. "I haven't touched another woman since I've known you." His lips grazed her neck as he stroked the hair back from her temple. His other hand slipped lower... "I wake up with your name already on my tongue. I think of nothing but you every single day. I would worship you if you let me."

The exaggeration of it snapped Jaylah back to her senses. If she was not entirely prudent, he would manipulate her into always being so senseless. Grabbing both of his wrists, she crossed them over his head and tied her sash around them. "I told you not to lie to me." His smile was gone now; he could only watch her with eyes like stars. The pulse in his neck fluttered with hot blood under her fingertips. "What could Ermalai possibly offer you that I could not?"

Alexander rolled his head on his pillows to stare at her through lowered eyelashes. "I could ask the same of you about his son."

God, she had forgotten about Adrik, and wished it could stay that way. Though seeing proof of his jealousy was enough to put most of Jaylah's feelings to relief, he was too at-ease speaking impudently to her. "Surely you have noticed already that I am torn between two suitors." Beginning at the rumpled collar of his shirt, she began to undo the buttons leading past his stomach, taut with strained self-control. "Perhaps Adrik has less of an impertinent mouth."

"Oh? It seemed like you quite enjoyed my impertinent nature just now." He seemed to be intent on talking back to ignore the fact that her knuckles were brushing the waistline of his pants as she undid the final button. When she dropped the fabric, dim light washed over his pale skin and dyed it gold. Jaylah brushed her fingertips over the scars against his collarbones, the permanent reward for his resilience.

"Perhaps I am not going about this correctly," she went on as if he had not interrupted, pulling her hands away in refusal to give him the contact he wanted. "It seems you will only be loyal to someone much colder, someone that does not actually care for you. Mixing business and pleasure is too much for you?" She cocked her head, letting the smooth tresses of her hair slide down her arm and sweep his bare side. "In that case, I should not be touching you at all, much less in a pleasurable way. I will return to my quarters."

She made to stand up from his lap and fix her clothing for good, but he ground out a hard, "No." It appeared as if he wanted to say more, but her sudden movement against him stole it away.

"What then? Tell me, Alexander. This is your one time to command an Empress." A muscle in his jaw ticked as he simply stared at her in a mixture of great dislike and longing. Surely there were a thousand answers on his tongue, but he refused to say any of them. "I know you want to," she said, then untied the string holding the top of her nightgown together so that it pooled into a short skirt around her hipbones.

"Gods," he breathed, immediately looking up at the ceiling as if she had singlehandedly brought him to religion.

He tried to squirm his way out from underneath her for some reprieve, but the second she rested a hand on his chest, he went still. His skin was hot, near feverish. Tightening her legs around his hips, Jaylah arched her back to sate the desire once again blooming within her. Eyelids fluttering closed a few times, Alexander's lipstick-smudged lips parted to breathe out a soft, tortured groan. Fire danced through Jaylah's chest at the sound of it, near pleading. He was very ready for her. He had been ever since she first pulled him in to kiss him at his request, she could feel it.

In the span of his stubborn silence, she trailed a hand down her form to pull the chemise over her head. Alexander exhaled a shaky breath, looking like he might pass out.

Jaylah could no longer be cruel. She ran her fingers down the sharp angle of his cheekbone. "Look at me." He did, eyes liquid and black with hunger. "Tell me what I have to do to make you mine."

He looked down at her, all of her vulnerable, unguarded for him. Just this once. His eyes flicked up, his front teeth denting his lower lip hard enough to draw blood. "Nothing," he said at last, determined to remain perfectly still under her. "I already wasn't going to hurt you."

"Why should I believe that? All the grand proclamations you made ten minutes ago were lies."

"Three of them were." A smile twitched on the ends of his lips.

I haven't touched another woman since I've known you. I wake up with your name already on my tongue. I think of nothing but you every single day.

I would worship you if you let me.

Jaylah leaned back in realization, her heart skipping a beat with the sincerity shining through his eyes. A lock of his hair fell forward against his brow, catching against his dark eyelashes. In that moment, she knew she had something near her grasp that was more precious than anything else already in it.

She reached up to untie the sash from his hands—only to find it had already been slipped from his wrists long ago. He tossed it unapologetically over the edge of the bed. The slyest of foxes could escape any trap.

"I will let you," she said of his request, "if you let me."

Alexander only seemed to hear the first part. He appeared unable to decide where to touch her first now that he had free reign. Her skin sparked with delirious energy wherever he dragged his hands: over the curve of her hips and waist, the sides of her ribcage, the swells of her chest, and into her hair as his mouth once again found hers. He evidently enjoyed kissing her the most. Though her lips felt thoroughly bruised and their teeth clacked together a few times with the odd angle, she would never get enough either.

His throat bobbed as she moved back, laying her lips down the path of her fingertips. Down the white scars of his neck, the lines of his collarbone. Apparently it had not been empty flattery towards himself whenever he bragged about his physique. Unspent energy made him shudder when she reached the edge of his pants. "Jaylah," he murmured, half of it a strangled sound. "Jaylah."

Pulling her lips from his skin, she looked into his heavy-lidded eyes and knew what he wanted. He was just as hopelessly out of breath as her, so devoid of anything to say for once. He had suggested once that he was the only one who could handle her, though she now figured it was the other way around. Heeding the desire tying her stomach in knots, she let him shed the rest of her clothing and his before returning to their original position. His fingers dug into her sides. Twin gasps were dredged from both their chests. Jaylah's mind went blindingly white and blank, so it took her a moment to move, and when she did it was almost painstakingly slow. Alexander was only hers for one night; she would make it count.

Not that there was any outcome where it could be mediocre. Never in her life had she felt so strongly for anything, much less a person. She would kill anyone and everyone for him.

As he looked up at her his heart was in his eyes, and his name was on her tongue, and Jaylah was certain that out of the never-ending list of decisions that would lead to her downfall, this was the sweetest.