"Need you tae... ride me."
After a hesitation, she gave a shaky nod. "Sh-show me?"
He clasped her hips to guide her, easing her body forward until her br**sts bobbed just above his hungry mouth. Then he worked her back down. Forward and back...
When she took over, he knew she was his. This will happen. At last, I'm claiming my mate. My Lousha.
Each time she rocked over him, one of her ni**les dragged across his waiting tongue. The fear in her disappeared - her eyes grew silvery and wicked as she rode him for her pleasure.
Lightning struck as her long hair lashed over her br**sts and face. Rain misted her skin as she panted.
So beautiful. Mine. And he needed more. "Harder," he bit out. Need to mark her neck... claim her forever. "Ride me harder!"
She arched backward, hands behind her on his thighs, her hair sweeping over his legs. Breasts jutting to the sky, she frantically ground on his cock.
"Lousha! Canna last." As she continued to whip her hips in his lap, he rose up to meet her gaze.
With her eyes half-lidded and her voice a sultry purr, she asked, "Are you going to mark me?"
"The ever livin' hell out o' you," he growled. "Right as you're about tae come on me." Seizing her arse with both hands, he shoved her down on his c**k just as he bucked upward.
"Ah, gods! MacRieve!" Her br**sts bounced against him. "You're making me..."
She was already there? Gritting his teeth to keep his seed, he thrust up again, harder. The stone beneath him began to fracture.
"I'm... I'm..."
Eyes fixed on her neck, he leaned in, licking her, lulling... As he shoved up into her slick heat, he bit her flesh in a frenzy.
Claiming her... marking her... His eyes rolled back in his head as she cried, "Coming!"
Desperate to feel it, he snarled into the bite, plunging her up and down. Harder... harder. As the stone cracked, she screamed with pleasure, her sheath contracting, milking him, demanding.
He followed her, ejaculating inside her with a broken yell against her skin, mindlessly pumping wave after searing wave.
She sagged against him, gasping, "It's so hot...."
After-shudders. Arms wrapped around each other. Hearts thundering.
He reluctantly released his bite, but he remained aching and stiff inside her, still needing to drive into her. So he dragged her to the ground with him.
Just before he took her on her hands and knees, she gazed back at the rock they'd broken with a fierce look.
Cupping her waist and gripping her long hair, he bucked into her, roaring with pleasure as she moaned his name.
Then they both gave themselves up to the beast within him.
40
What have I done?
When Lucia woke, her eyes opened wide - with realization. She was lying in MacRieve's arms, her back tucked into his chest, both of them naked.
Ah, gods, he was still... inside her.
He roused then and gave a self-satisfied exhalation. The sound was so utterly masculine, and grated on her like nails on slate.
Job well done, conquest is complete, I came, I saw, I conquered her.
His mark on her neck burned....
When he began hardening again, she stifled a cry and shrugged out of his grasp, disentangling her body from his. Can't handle this. Aching everywhere.
Without a word, she rose, unsteadily sifting through the clothes she'd worn last night. All ruined when he'd ripped them from her.
Once she found her pack, she dug for underwear, shorts, and a T-shirt. As she quickly dressed, she kept recalling that satisfied sound he'd made. The conquest. He'd gotten everything he'd wanted with her. From her.
I've gotten nothing I wanted. She couldn't be here, had to get away from him, away from the bow that had been a part of her for centuries.
She was no longer an Archer. Do I feel different? Dazed? Crazed?
I feel... wrong.
"Lousha?" MacRieve leapt up, snagging his jeans and stabbing his legs in them.
After shouldering her backpack, she staggered toward the levees. The statues along the cobble walk glared down.
MacRieve hurried after her, shoving the bow in front of her face. "You left this and your quiver, lass."
She wouldn't look at it. At him. She couldn't. He'd done this to her. Ruined her ability. Now with no means to finally destroy Cruach, Lucia would be expected to sacrifice herself, to appease that monster.
Going back in that foul lair? Without an arrow trained on his heart? At the idea, Lucia couldn't catch her breath. I can't do that! Even now that I have nothing else to offer...
Her neck burned, the pain seething, a constant reminder of her sins. Can't catch my breath...
"Uh, I'll hold the bow for now." He slung it over his shoulder. "Love, talk to me. Did I hurt you?" He scowled at himself. "O' course I hurt you. But how badly?"
She didn't answer.
"Where are you going?"
"H-home."
He jogged in front of her. "What about the dieumort?" he asked, turning to walk backward. "Saving the world and all that? We're so close."
They'd never been farther away! "Nïx sent me down here for an arrow. Because I'm... I was" - her breath hitched - "an archer. All that's different now." Lucia couldn't even stop Cruach from rising with one of Skathi's arrows. "I have another job to do." And I'll grow to hate you for it. "This is where we part ways, MacRieve. You go retrieve the dieumort." Hell, maybe that was why Nïx had sent him down here. Maybe he was the one on the quest.
"Lousha, it's no' over yet."
"You have no idea what the repercussions from last night will be. No idea what will be expected of me now!"
"Nay, because you will no' bluidy tell me!" He gripped her forearms in his fists. "Talk to me!"
She gave herself up to her outrage, to her need to blame, both preferable to this wretched fear. Imitating his accent and low voice, she said, "Lousha, o' course the cuff will work. That's why I got it from those bluidy witches. I would never hurt ye!" Flinging herself away from him, she screamed, "You shouldn't have come for me! You should've let me do what I needed to."
She can't even look at me.
Maybe this was one female who shouldn't have given up her career for her man. There was nothing in her eyes but... bitterness? It was as if a piece of her had died.
And he'd helped kill it.
She was no longer a Skathian. Thousand-year-old vows had been broken last night, and as she'd clearly told him, she hadn't been ready for it. She'd also warned him that she would hate him forever if he pressured her to go against her beliefs.