CHAPTER 64: FINALLY HERS

No.

Lorraine screamed in her heart.

She wouldn’t let it end here.

Not when he was this close. Not when his body betrayed everything his pride tried to deny. She felt the throb of him against her thigh. The heat in his hands. The way his breath hitched when she clung tighter. The way his gaze darkened when her gown slipped.

So she whispered his name, not husband, not prince, not the son of the mighty house that bore the Bear sigil, but...

"Leroy..." Softly. Like a secret. Like a spell.

And then she smiled, slow and dangerous, the way she’d once seen a courtesan do when she danced for nobles. Not out of affection, but dominion. There was a craft in seduction, not just of the body, but of will. And Lorraine had learned from the best.

Her lips brushed his jaw, then his ear.

"I know what you want," she whispered, voice low and laced with smoke. Her fingers, light as air, traced the collar of his tunic, then slid beneath, gliding over the hard plane of his chest, the heat of his skin. "You think you want control. But look at us... Look at you. You’re burning."

He didn’t move.

So she leaned in further, pressing her mouth to his throat. She could feel the pulse pounding there, faster now. Her teeth grazed his skin.

"You want to lean on someone," she murmured. "Let me be that someone."

Without knowing, even when she was lost in her lust, she circled back to that girl under that vyrnshade shrub, offering to be his "someone".

And then she sank lower, trailing her lips down his neck, down his chest as she slid from his grip. Her knees touched the cold floor.

His eyes followed her.

A growl escaped him, a low, rough, dangerous growl.

But she wasn’t afraid.

She met his gaze from below, eyes bright with challenge, her voice a whisper of velvet.

"Kneel," she said again, softer now. "Not to me. But over me. Like you want to. Like you’ve always wanted to."

He stared.

In the dim light, she faintly saw something cracked in his eyes—some brittle wall of restraint, too long held, too long starved. His chest rose once, sharp. And then...

He shrugged off his coat. The sound of it hitting the floor echoed like thunder between them.

And then he was on her.

His hands gripped her shoulders as he pushed her back onto the velvet of his coat. His body followed, covering her, heat and weight and need. His mouth found hers, hungry now, and she gasped into him as he kissed her like a man starved. Her fingers tangled in his hair. His hand dragged down her side, urgent, and then wrapped around her thigh, pulling her closer.

He knelt.

Over her.

As she had asked.

And somewhere between the aching kiss and the rustle of silk, she smiled into his mouth...

Checkmate.

He kissed her like a man starved, his mouth fierce and possessive, worshipping every inch of her as though she were the only thing anchoring him to sanity. Lorraine gave back just as much. Her hands wandered with the boldness of a woman who had waited too long for this, whose desires had simmered beneath veils and silence. His scent, the heat of him, the rasp of his voice... everything about him unraveled her.

And he didn’t even know.

Didn’t know that the woman beneath him, the one he was kissing senseless, was his wife.

It made her drunk with power.

She moaned into his mouth, letting him take control, letting him believe this was just lust, just madness.

But for her, it was more than that. It was reckoning. It was possession. It was homecoming.

When he pushed her dress aside, baring the softness of her skin to the cool air, she shivered, but not from cold. His hands, calloused and warm, ran over her curves with an urgency that thrilled her. His thumb brushed over the swell of her breast, and she gasped. He buried his face against her neck, murmuring something incoherent, teeth grazing her skin like he couldn’t help himself.

She arched under him, pulling him closer. Her hips shifted, inviting him in. Let him have her. Let him lose himself inside her. If this were sin, she would drink it down like wine.

She blinked up at him, this prince who didn’t even know who lay beneath him, whose mouth he’d kissed, whose legs he now parted.

Would he still want her if he knew?

Would he pull back if he realized he was holding his useless wife like this?

But he didn’t stop. Didn’t hesitate.

He hovered over her now, his chest rising and falling in uneven waves. His eyes searched her face, still shadowed under the dim light. His mask... forgotten. And then he pressed against her, hips nudging, entering her just slightly.

Lorraine stilled.

A sharp sting lanced through her, and she gasped. Not in pain, but in disbelief. She had prepared herself. She had fantasized, plotted, teased this moment a hundred times. But now that it was happening—this act she had reserved for him alone—her body betrayed her composure.

He felt it. The way she tensed. The involuntary breath she sucked in. His hand cradled the back of her head, fingers threading through her hair, anchoring her. His other hand gently stroked her side, coaxing her to relax.

And then, without a word, he pressed his lips to her brow.

Tender. Uncharacteristically soft. As if he, too, understood on some primal, inexplicable level that this was something sacred.

He eased into her slowly, letting her body adjust, letting her nerves melt into want. Her legs curled around his waist, drawing him deeper, her fingers clutching the back of his tunic as if she’d fall apart without him.

She was shaking now. From the pleasure. From the overwhelming fullness. From the knowledge that this man—this warrior, this prince, this man she’d loved and hated—was finally hers.

In the most absolute way.