Page 96 of Haunted Crowns
She did not kiss him like a woman proving a point; she kissed him like a queen claiming her kingdom, like a sinner pleading for absolution, as if salvation and sacrilege both lived in her mouth.
And gods, he let her.
Because in that moment, there was no Kareon, no prophecy, no war waiting behind the door.
There was only her, only this, only love. But the moment did not break. It deepened. She pressed into him, chest to chest, hips brushing in a rhythm just shy of surrender. Her breath caught on parted lips, and he drank it like air after drowning. Heat curled low in her belly, a pull that tightened with every second she didn’t touch more of him. She moaned into his mouth, a soft, wrecked sound that unraveled him.
The kiss turned savage. Lips and teeth and desperate breath. He kissed her like he’d been starved, and she took him like she’d been waiting a lifetime.
She was silk and fire beneath his hands. Her nightgown slid beneath his fingers, whispering off her shoulder like surrender. She looked up through her lashes, bold and burning, a queen who knew exactly what her touch could ruin.
“Look at you, wicked little thing,” he rasped, his voice rough with want. “You’re going to fucking break me.”
She smiled sinfully against his mouth, all heat and command. “Then break for me.”
He cursed under his breath, his grip tightening on the backs of her thighs as her chemise gathered up in frantic folds. “You’re playing with fire.”
She didn’t flinch. Instead, she rolled her hips, slow and devastating against the hard press of him. “I am fire.” She bit his lip, hard enough to make him curse, soft enough to make him beg.
A guttural groan tore from him, as he lifted her off the ground in one urgent motion. Her legs locked around his hips. He pinned her, hard, against the wall. Grinding. Desperate. As if friction alone could save him. She gasped, half-laugh, half-plea, caught between ruin and delight.
“You like that?” she whispered, lips brushing his ear.
His grip tightened, his voice a rasp. “Don’t tease me, Eris,” he growled. “Or I’ll fuck you so hard, your legs won’t remember how to hold you.”
The threat hit like a flame to dry silk; she gasped, hips twitching before she caught herself.
“Then do it,” she whispered, breath fractured. “Make me limp for days.”
That did it.
A sound tore from his throat, half snarl, half moan. She’d dared him, and now he was going to make her feel every second of it.
He carried her to the bed like a man possessed and pinned her down like she belonged beneath him. Then came mouth and hands—everywhere. Demanding. Devoted.
She arched into him, the nightgown twisted, half-forgotten. Her hands fumbled at his shirt, buttons scattering like the last of her control. The silk bunched at her waist. Higher. Higher. Until her thighs were bare, her body opened beneath him like prayer.
“Gods, you’re so fucking beautiful,” he whispered. His mouth moved lower, teeth grazing her inner thigh. She moaned, hips lifting without thought.
Her fingers tangled in his hair. “I want you, Stephan,” she whispered, breath fractured. “All of you.”
His body moved with hers, rolling his hips in slow, deliberate circles that frayed every nerve.
“You drive me fucking mad,” he growled. “Every godsdamned night, I dream of all the filthy, fucking ways I'll tear you apart and make you beg for it.”
"Then fucking take me,” she begged, legs spreading, desperate. “Now.”
His eyes flared, her words tearing through the last of his control. He growled—rough, animal—and dragged her hipshard against his, grinding with ruthless pressure. “Mine,” he breathed, voice shaking. “You’re fucking mine.”
She gasped. There was no mistaking how far gone he was—so big, so urgent, so fucking desperate. Anticipation curled hot between her legs. One more breath and she would have shattered.
Then came a knock, loud and merciless, like the universe itself mocking them.
Eris went still beneath him, her body still pulsing, her mind hazed with pleasure.
Stephan didn’t freeze. Didn’t stop. Didn’t care. His grip tightened. He couldn’t stop tasting her.
“Stephan—the ceremony!”
