The Darkest Seduction (Lords of the Underworld #9)(82)
Author: Gena Showalter

He ached for her. As he’d never ached for anything, he ached for her, and he didn’t take the decision to slay her dragons lightly. He’d do what needed doing. “Go on, baby. Tell me the rest.”

A shudder moved through her. She inhaled forcefully. “Cronus told me that Skye was Galen’s prisoner, then he told me that he didn’t actually know where she was, then he showed me her lifeless, bloody body.”

Paris had known the bastard was low, but this…he had no words. His reckoning with Cronus needed to happen soon—with knives. No wonder Sienna had been so upset when she’d returned to the castle. “I’m so sorry, baby. If I could take away your pain, I would.” Finally he told her what he’d wanted to tell her. “This isn’t your fault. It was never your fault. You aren’t responsible for the things other people do. Never have been, never will be. This is their shame, not yours. But I know it hurts, I do, and however you want to handle it, I will help you.”

“He showed me because he expects me to spy on Galen and to…to be with him.”

Spots of black flashed over his eyes. “When you say be with Galen, do you mean be with him sexually?”

A shameful nod, and maybe even a bit resolved, as if she deserved nothing better.

“That you’d even consider it tells me that you want to punish yourself,” he said, comprehension a slap in the face. “For what you did to me, and what you think you allowed to happen to your sister.”

Her chin jutted stubbornly. “Maybe.”

“So, what else is it you did exactly, that some part of you thinks you need to be punished? Fought for a cause you believed in? Check. Slept with a man you were attracted to, despite everything else? Check. Saved him when you could have left him to a slow, torturous death? Check.”

Her hand balled into a (proper) fist. “I told you that I hated you as I lay dying.”

“Every couple says things they don’t mean when they’re fighting.”

“Well, I meant it at the time! And before that, I drugged you.”

“Yeah, and I planned to screw you and leave you like I’d done to a thousand others.” She flinched at his crudeness, but he kept going. “And guess what? At the time I was blithe about it. I loved women, and I protected them, but I still used them. In my mind, it was my right. I needed a wake-up call, and you gave it to me.”

“No, you—”

“Don’t make excuses for me. You’ve seen my past, and you know I’ve spoken true.”

She snapped her teeth at him. “So you’re saying you bear me no ill will? None at all?” A snort lacking any hint of amusement.

He fisted her hair a lot harder than he’d intended, but he didn’t loosen his grip. “Baby, I’m saying I adore you.”

Once again, she floundered for a response. The anger drained from her, and utter longing peered down at him. “Adore?” she squeaked.

“Your ears are working just fine.”

The harshness of his reply had her sighing dreamily, something that puzzled and aroused him. “I was wrong earlier. This is the sweetest thing anyone has ever said to me.”

And so I’ll be stepping up my game now. If that made her happy, his A-Game was gonna make her blissful. “Nothing to say in return?”

“Well, yeah. Cronus says that my being with Galen is the only way to keep you and your friends safe.”

Hell, no. When they’d lived in the heavens, Galen had been one of Paris’s go-to guys. They’d hung together, fought together. Paris had admired the guy’s emotional distance, his ability to do whatever was necessary to finish a job successfully. And okay, fine, they’d shared women, sometimes even at the same time.

He hadn’t cared then. He cared now. Not just because Galen was Enemy One, but because Sienna was his and his alone. She was staying with him.

“You’re not going back to Galen.” No way, not ever. Actually, Paris would die first. “And just a quick FYI. Apparently my friends plugged the keeper of Hope full of bullets earlier today. He’s no good to anyone right now.”

“But he’ll recover, I know he will, and then…then…” The rest of the story flooded from her. The Chamber of Futures, the portraits, the three possible outcomes for the world. For Cronus. For him.

Too much to digest at once, but still, nothing changed his mind about Sienna staying put.

“We have time,” he said. “We have time to figure this out, and we will. But you’re not going to him. You’re mine. Only mine. And I’m yours. I will never sleep with anyone else. Do you understand what I’m saying? Never. When I said you were it for me, I meant it. No one else, whether you’re with me or not. And Sienna, you will be with me.”

As he spoke, her mouth fell open, snapped closed. “Do not say things like that.”

“Baby, I will do more than say it. I will blood oath it.” He reached for the daggers under the pillow, but she threw herself over his body and batted the weapon to the floor. Then, clearly suspecting he’d just reach for another weapon, she swiped her arm over the nightstand and sent the gun flying.

Now, there was the shocker of a lifetime. He wasn’t offended by her resistance, though. She wanted him safe, alive, thriving. Was even willing to sacrifice her happiness for his.

“Did you just challenge me?” he asked. They were flesh to flesh, male to female. Her wings spread, blocking out the rest of the room. She was all that he saw, all that he felt. Her br**sts pressed into his chest, her ni**les already beaded for him. Her core rubbed against his swollen length, and her legs splayed over his. “I think you just challenged me.”

“No. I did not.”

“You did. Quick fact—you mess with a man’s weapons, and you might as well knee him in the balls. You’ll get the same results. So I accept.” Moving so quickly she couldn’t possibly resist, he flipped her over, onto her back, spread her legs and shoved inside.

No preliminaries. Just straight-up, hard-core sex in the most basic fashion. She was wet, so very wet, so they had no problems.

“Paris!”

“Yeah, baby, that’s it. Take me all the way in.”

“Is this how you reward all challengers?” she asked between panting breaths.

“Only you.”

Her moan of pleasure filled the room, blending with his hiss of inexorable bliss. By the time he finished with her, she would know the man she belonged with—because there would be no part of her that he left untouched.