I realize why when he crawls on top of me with a look that tells me he isn’t even remotely finished with me, and that he needs full range of movement to accomplish what he has in mind. My breath catches in my throat.
“I can’t come again,” I pant. “Not yet.”
“You can, sweetheart. You will.”
He starts kissing the hell out of me. Arching my back, I lean like a cat into the hard planes of his muscles. He wraps a hand around my bowed back, then without warning, flips me over until I’m on my stomach.
“Basten! What are you—” My words die as he shoves the torn skirt out of the way, exposing my bare ass to the room’s cool air. He grabs my hips and lifts them high so that I’m on my knees with my elbows on the bed.
His hands knead my ass cheeks, holding my hips prisoner with an iron grip. I realize he wants to fuck me like this, rutting from behind like an animal.
“This pussy belongs to me,” he growls. “Do you understand? No other man touches it. Not Rian. No one.”
A flare of anger makes a part of me struggle against his grip while, at the same time, another part of me wants to move closer to claim his cock. “My body is my own, you bastard. I’ll do whatever I like with it.”
“Not this. It’s mine.”
He rubs my entrance with the tip of his cock, and by the gods, this angle elicits a whole new wave of sensations. My traitorous body is gushing again for him.
He teases me with the tip of his cock pressed a little deeper into my swollen heat. “Tell me you want me, Sabine.”
“I want you to fuck me,” I bite off angrily, twisting my head so I can glare at him. “That’s all it will ever be.”
He pushes in another inch, so shallow it’s torture. He knows exactly what he’s doing. There’s a dark, hungry depth to his voice as he says, “Tell me that you love me.”
My heart thrashes like angry hooves against a stall door. How dare he, with his cock in me, say such a cruel thing?
I gag on my shock, spitting out, “I never said that!”
He rests a hand on my lower back, holding himself back from thrusting into me as he clearly wants. “You don’t think I know what love looks like? Come on, little violet. I can read you like a book. You love me. You have for a while. Admit it, and I’ll have you seeing stars.”
His gruff voice is softer, coaxing. That same damn tone he used when he promised he’d run away with me. And I hate Basten for this more than anything else. For these fleeting glimpses of vulnerability that he offers so stingily. Moments when I can see the real him, the one he hides from everyone but me.
“Say it, Sabine. Say you love me. That’s all you have to do.”
His voice is so tender yet so commanding. His tone makes me want to trust that I can believe him, but I’ve fallen for this before. He’ll show me snatches of this side of him, tempting me with the authentic person I know is buried there, but then the moment I lower my walls, he’ll throw his own back up.
“I hate you,” I breathe, eyes squeezed as tightly closed as my jaw is clamped. “I hate you so much it hurts. What I hate most is . . . I’m in love with you.”
A ragged exhalation shakes out of him. His body shifts behind me, his hands firming over my curves. His cock strains at my entrance.
“Good girl,” he breathes.
He gives me his whole cock, thrusting all the way in. I gasp, leaning forward on my elbows as my vision blurs. He drags my hips back and sinks into me again. And again. His strokes are fast and worshipping now—a reward for giving him what he wanted. As much as I’m choking on anger, the feeling between my legs wins out. I push my hips back against his thrusts so that his cock hits the tingling place inside my channel. He reaches around to caress my breasts, fondling the nipples.
“That’s it,” he urges. “Take what you want. Take your need.”
He knows how to work my body as expertly as he does a bow and arrow. Touching the right places, feeling for the sensitive areas, when to go easy and when to go hard. It isn’t long before my pussy is quaking again, close to another release. With each of his thrusts, the buzzing intensifies. I rub against his cock wildly, not caring about anything but getting the release I crave.
He rolls my nipple between his fingers, and that breaks the pressure. It shatters over me like cracking ice, decimating me. Drowning me. Reducing me to nothing more than a quivering mass of liquid pleasure.
My thighs threaten to give out, so Basten grips my hips to hold me up as he pumps faster.
“Yes. Fuck. You’re mine, little violet. Mine.”
He comes in me with a final deep thrust, fully buried in my scabbard. I can feel his cock pulsing against my slick inner walls, pumping hot sprays of semen that fill me up. It feels so good. His hot come. His throbbing cock. And it’s so wrong, absolutely filthy, a sin I’ll never forgive myself for—but as necessary as breathing.
I slump onto the bed, still in the tattered masquerade gown, while Basten goes to my wash basin and fetches a cloth. He comes back and cleans me up with a tenderness that makes my heartstrings tighten. I feel the terrible sting of coming tears.
Of all the cruel things he’s done, making me admit I loved him was the worst. I didn’t want to say it even to myself. I thought I loved Adan, when all I really loved was the idea of getting out of the convent and starting a new life. With Basten, I told myself that it was the same. My feelings for him were confused. It couldn’t be love, because I didn’t know what love was.
I should have known he could read the secret buried in my heart. The shame I never wanted anyone to know about. I gave him my heart, fully and without reservation, and even after his betrayal, I’m still so damn in love with him that I can’t think straight.
I brush away a tear, not wanting him to see. I meant what I said: I love him, but I hate him, too. We just can’t stay away from each other. Maybe it’s this place. Duren. Sorsha Hall. With its sinful nature, this place is more dangerous than anywhere I’ve ever been. Even with Basten’s loyalty to his master, and my fury over his betrayal, we keep getting pulled back to each other like circling planets. It’s a collision course for destruction, I know, but I’m just as helpless to stop it.
Basten’s weight sinks onto the bed beside me. He wipes away the tear that rolls down my cheek, chased by two more.
“I’ll take care of you,” he whispers in a tone that twists me up inside.
He tries to kiss me, but I shove him away, bitterly wiping away my tears. “You can’t take care of me.”
“Sabine. I can. I will.”
“You can’t!” I shove him harder, almost knocking him off the edge of the bed. Pushing to my feet in the tattered gown, I kick his armor toward his feet. “Get out!”
“Please.” His jaw tightens. His throat bobs in a swallow as his walls slip a little further. “I couldn’t stand it if you—”
“Get out, Basten,” I hiss. “Take your gods damned armor and go!”
Chapter 32
Wolf
I fasten the armor that marks me as a Valvere soldier and leave Sabine’s room, resting my head against her door as I mull over how completely fucked up I am.
Yeah, I lied to Sabine to protect her. It was justified. I didn’t have a choice. But a good man would have stayed away from her after breaking her heart. He wouldn’t have fucked her against a wall in her engagement party gown until she cried.