“You have to ask me nicely.” I took his wingtip back into my mouth. This time, I sucked on it.
“Ahhh…” The exclamation was more a gasp than a groan. But the Drakonian words, with their musical lilt, rolled from him. “You are the most divine woman I have ever known”—he trembled with anticipation, and his voice kept breaking when he panted on every second word—“and nothing would please me more than to be your mate.”
I released his wing. “That’s more like it.”
As I tightened myself around him, all the breath left him in a single, agonized exhalation. His hips moved, tiny little thrusts that were beyond his control. I squeezed again, and rode him, hard and fast. His head fell back, the muscles of his cheeks and jaw delineated with the effort of holding on.
My body tightened, the delicious friction undoing my own efforts to hold back. When we hovered on the very edge of oblivion, I ordered, “Give it to me, Rhodes.Now.”
With a roar he shattered, and I went with him. Wave after wave of ecstasy passed through us, until we shuddered slowly to a state of collapse with me lying in his arms.
And I felt the first pulse from him. I thought he was big before, but now he swelled as the lock began.
“Shaftz,” he husked. “That is—amazing.”
I should have been sated, but like with Zyair and Xandros, my body instantly wanted more. I began to move again, and in that instant, his shaft started to vibrate.
It took me to another plane of existence. My brain filled with white noise, I uttered sounds I couldn’t begin to interpret, and his groans took on an intensity that resonated through the air itself. More and more—until I didn’t think I could take it. I would explode…
And then, we did. Wave after wave of pure ecstasy, as we clung to each other and struggled to breathe.
Rhodes’s arms tightened around me, and he tucked his noseagainst my neck. I inhaled too—and was swept away by his unique aroma of leather and stormfire. I didn’t want this moment to end.
“Stupendous,” I whispered in English.
“I am not familiar with that term,” he rumbled as he nuzzled my throat.
“Ask Xandros,” I suggested.
He sighed, his breath gusting warm against my skin. “If I ask Xandros, he will not only not tell me, but flaunt his superior knowledge.”
“He does flaunt,” I agreed, tracing the tattoo on his arm with my fingers.
“Can you draw me a new one?” he asked.
I smiled. “I have been making somewhat of a study of Drakonian musculature.”
“I want one of you,” he stated.
I opened my mouth to reply, but they came out of nowhere—images of a metal room. A limp body hung from chains a short distance away—I barely recognized Senaik. He had marks all over him. Punctures.
Teeth marks
Rhodes’s breathing hitched, and his body stiffened. “Manticore fang marks,” he hissed.
I met eyes that were blazing garnet. “You saw what I saw?”
He nodded. “We see through Zyair’s eyes.” He took a deep breath and closed his own. “He is alive.”
My heart soared. Zyair wasalive. But Senaik?—
“What is she doing to him?” I whispered. “Senaik looked as though he’d been bitten…”
“Manticores are fluid feeders,” Rhodes said.
“Fluids? Like—blood? Are you saying they arevampires?”
His arched brows drew down. “Vampires?”
