Total pages in book: 81
Estimated words: 76370 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 382(@200wpm)___ 305(@250wpm)___ 255(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 76370 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 382(@200wpm)___ 305(@250wpm)___ 255(@300wpm)
“Yes.” Suddenly, I’m tired of talking. What does it matter if I’m feared by nearly everyone I encounter? What does it matter if my mother didn’t rule the same way? Oh, our people respected the threat she could bring to them if they crossed her, but they loved her in way that couldn’t be feigned. The times I’ve been home since leaving Sabine Valley, I’ve found my sister inspires that same kind of feeling. An intrinsic difference between us, yet another reason I would have been ill-suited to be heir. I don’t have the gift of setting people at ease while still commanding their loyalty.
I am only the way I am.
I lean back and give Aurora a long look. “Put your mouth to good use, Aurora.”
She doesn’t hesitate. She simply lowers her mouth and presses delicate, soft kisses to my hips, my thighs, before finally working her way to my pussy. I like the look of her mouth on me. I like the look on her face even more. She’s as blissed out by giving this as I am at receiving it. For fuck’s sake, she moans at the first taste of me.
How am I supposed to remain unaffected after witnessing that?
I fist her hair in my hands and spread my thighs wider. It’s tempting to ride her face, to hold her in place as I chase my own pleasure, but I want to see what she’ll do given a little freedom.
She doesn’t disappoint. Aurora parts my pussy with her thumbs and traces her tongue over every inch of me. Like she’ll never get another chance and she wants to memorize every second of this. She spears me with her tongue and then moves up to focus on my clit. Again with those teasing little licks, pushing my desire until I’m shaking in an effort to hold still. That’s when she pushes two fingers into me and twists her wrist to find my G-spot. She strokes it lightly as she picks up her pace on my clit, quickly finding the rhythm that has my thighs shaking.
She winds me higher and higher, until my control snaps. “I need—” I tighten my grip on her hair and roll my hips, fucking her mouth. She makes a happy sound, and I belatedly realize this was her goal all along. To push me until I took what I wanted.
Gods, this woman is a gift.
I drag Aurora up my body and kiss her. It’s tempting to keep going, to lose myself in her until we’re both wrung out, but we have to get out of the sauna. I carefully nudge her back. “Let’s go.”
We grab robes from the locker room and head back up to my penthouse. We take our time in the shower and appreciate this moment of peace after everything that’s happened. It’s not enough to truly put my concerns out of my head, not with my ever-present worry about Sabine Valley, not when I’m all too aware of the clock ticking down on the assignation with Aurora.
I take the time to call Sara and check in, but as expected, they’ve handled the situation. The supplier magically found the missing ten percent within five minutes of Sara showing up. I don’t ask what kind of example they made. They’ve been my right hand for long enough that I trust they did what was necessary without crossing over into being too much. A delicate balance, but one at which Sara exceeds.
And there’s nothing else on my plate.
Aurora’s watching me, her expression contemplative. I raise my brows. “Yes?”
“I don’t understand you.”
“Do you need to?” I find myself holding my breath while I wait for her answer. I don’t know what the right one is; I don’t know which one I crave.
Finally, she looks away. “I’d like to.”
“Why do you sound so put out by that?”
“Because it’s irritating as hell.” She makes a face. “It was easier to hate you.”
“Hate takes as much effort as any other emotion; more than some.” It’s much preferable to apathy, honestly, but I’m not about to say as much. If Aurora no longer hates me—No, no use following that rabbit hole into a spiraling game of what-if. “If it makes you feel better, there are large swathes of you that I don’t understand, either.”
“Me?”
I give her the look that faux innocence deserves. “The bratty submissive. The fierce friend. The princess of the Underworld. You’re all that, but it’s only the tip of the iceberg. You must have a life outside of Hades.”
She tucks her hair behind her ear. “Is there a question in there?”
“Surely you’re not content to be the pampered princess forever? There’s a fire in you that needs to be fed. You can only rise so far in Hades’s territory.” Hades will be ruling for some time yet, and he’s got both Megaera and Hercules beneath him. Should he decide to retire, surely those two will take over running operations. And Hercules is several years younger than Aurora. She’ll never run the Underworld, no matter how many years she works there.