Ashes of Chaos (Legacy of the Nine Realms Book 2) Page 6

  “Drop your spell and call me that again, Aria. I fucking dare you.”

  “I’m horny, Knox, not suicidal.”

  His smile was all teeth, promising blood with his bite. A shiver of unease snaked down my spine, and the temperature dropped as he silently watched me. He didn’t move, didn’t speak. His eyes told me what he’d do the moment he caught me, and damn if I didn’t accidentally want to drop the crystal’s protecting me and bend to that iron will he held over my body.

  I craved to be beneath him, bending to his superior strength as he wrecked my sensibilities, forcing that animalistic need on me until I was nothing more than flesh and bones that knew no resistance and wouldn’t care that he feasted upon them. I trembled, shaking my head to dispel the imagery he was feeding me with his eyes.

  “Who’s the fucking pussy now, Aria?”

  Chapter Six

  I stood just out of Knox’s reach inside the room. Silently scowling at him, and fighting the need rushing through me from the image he painted in my mind, vividly perverted, right down to the noises I would make if I let him have me. Stepping back, I turned to scan the space that Knox said held information. He was aware I was searching for something, but he had no idea what it was. If he had any knowledge of what I was after, he’d probably laugh at me and tell me I was insane.

  Hell, even I thought I was insane for what I wanted to do, or planned to attempt since the chances of my success were a little over zilch.

  I scrunched my nose as Knox smiled, folding his arms over his chest while the others patted him on the back as if he’d caught me. He hadn’t captured me, nor would he. I turned my back to him, dismissing them all as my eyes slid around the room.

  On the far wall of the antechamber was the large, colorful feather plume. I ran my fingers over the glowing feather, watching in wonder as it sparkled brighter as if sensing my magic. Looking to my left, I noticed an entrance to another enormous room and paused. On the table, in the middle of the room, sat a massive bird-like skull with shark-like teeth. Beside it sat a lot of big feathers of varying colors.

  I lifted a feather, holding it to my nose, then set it down when I saw what appeared to be a giant nest in a darkened corner of the room. My eyes narrowed, and I tilted my head, studying the materials used to make it. Feathers, blankets, and other miscellaneous items intricately woven together, and upon close inspection, I could see the nest had been well-used.

  “What sort of creature is this?” I asked, knowing that Knox was listening to me.

  “You tell me, Aria. What is it?” he countered, closer than he’d been moments before. I spun, staring into ocean eyes that were inches from mine. I could feel his breath fanning my lips, and everything within me begged to step past the barrier holding him away from me.

  I peered down at the spelled quartz encircling my feet, pressing my lips together before lifting my attention back to him. I drank in the sight of Knox, thirsty for more. His lips curved into a knowing grin as he watched me. He inhaled, and his smile faltered, replaced by a scowl as his expression turned cold.

  “You want to explain to me why I can smell mutt on you?” he inquired, lifting a brow as he gave me a pointed look.

  “I may have let one kiss me,” I confessed, withholding the disappointment of that kiss to myself.

  Knox grinned with heat smoldering in his eyes. I didn’t need to tell him I’d been disappointed. The smug look in his eyes and the tilt of his lips told me he already knew. I wanted to lie, to say Dimitri bent me over and wrote his name on my uterus, but this was Knox, and he just knew shit. He could smell that I’d simply touched Dimitri’s lips, so lying about fucking him, well, it would be pointless since he could scent the lie in my lack of arousal, and something as mundane as my mood.

  His expression told me he wasn’t worried about Dimitri in the slightest, and mine told him to get bent. Knox tilted his head, and his smirk turned conceited. Fiery eyes told me he was silently considering how he would bend my ass over and show me how he intended to get bent inside me. I swallowed, and his eyes sparkled with the challenge, daring me to lie.

  “It could have happened that way!” I snapped, and his head shook slowly.

  “Nah, Little Monster. It wouldn’t have. You and I both know that I’ll be the one satisfying your hunger when you reach your limit.” His voice was laden with gravel, scraping over every nerve ending in my body, causing a chill to shiver up my spine.

  I loved the sound of his deep, sexy voice when he lowered it to that come, ride me woman octave. I swallowed, turning my head to stare into the room behind me. I whispered the spell for light, and candles lit within the room.

  I felt Knox stiffen without needing to see him do so. His heated breath fanned my bare shoulder, and I shuddered involuntarily, sending a carnal wave of lust rushing through me to pulse against my apex. My shoulder throbbed where his mark adorned my flesh, and I felt the whisper of his lips against it, causing my core to clench, as all the blood in my body lowered to my nether region.

  Knox’s scent was an aphrodisiac that drugged me, more potent than any potion or spell. He projected it on purpose, watching me fight the need to shed my inhibition and abandon my course to do what every instinct within me wanted.

  It was an endless fight against doing what my body required, and what my mind knew we should leave alone. Neither could agree, and with every moment I was this close to the man my body desired, I wasn’t sure which would win the war.

  “I bet Dimitri’s lips brushed against yours, and you saw me instead of him. I’m going to guess your creature didn’t even stir in his presence because she found him so fucking lacking that she couldn’t be bothered to notice him. Your body didn’t respond to Dimitri because you need and want the intensity that comes when we’re together, and everyone else just falls short and is found wanting in comparison. You and I both know that anything less would be pale and lacking, other than you and me stripped bare, fucking like the savages we really are.”

  I moved away from him, unwilling to acknowledge he was right. Knox didn’t need verbal confirmation. He was cocky enough without me adding to it. We both knew I wouldn’t give in to another, and that my creature demanded the biggest, most primal beast would mount us, and that was this asshole prowling around me like a creature that smelled an easy kill.

  As I moved, the quartz crystals moved with me, spelled to protect me from anyone, and anything. Quartz alone would serve as heavy protection, but spelled with an enchantment, they became magical stones that guarded me against anyone I didn’t want touching me. This meant I’d manually had to add Knox to that list since I wanted those powerful hands on me anytime they were near, even though I shouldn’t.

  “I’ll take your silence as confirmation.” He followed me into the room, and I leaned against a table, staring at the formula marked on the paper. “I can help you find what you’re looking for,” he offered.

  I turned to tell him off, frowning as his scent hit me with the force of being struck by a bus I hadn’t seen coming. My head dropped back as a moan slipped from my lips. I fought to regain control, dropping my head forward as my attention locked on the wickedly dark smile burning in his eyes.

  Knox was releasing pheromones mixed with testosterone to lure me out of the quartz. I smirked, freeing my scent that made the cocky grin on his lips falter. His eyes widened with the realization that I wasn’t just horny; I was in season and had concealed it from him. His tongue escaped his mouth, licking his full bottom lip as he silently prowled closer.

  Knox’s hands landed on the table behind me as he leaned forward, breathing me in as his deep, soothing rattle escaped his throat, echoing through every part of my body. My lips quivered while he watched me, his knowing gaze smoldering with the promise of flames as his nostrils flared. Knox shouldn’t have been able to get close to me, yet he caged me against the table regardless of the spelled quartz.

  My pulse thundered with need, dropping to his hungry mouth that I desired to devour. If I t
ouched him, the spell in the quartz would end, which wasn’t something that I couldn’t let happen. Not yet, anyway.

  He stood and reached down, hooked his fingers beneath the shirt he wore, lifting it to reveal his body’s smooth, sculpted muscles. My eyes lowered to the ripple of muscle clenched in his abdomen, revealing his hard body to my hungry gaze. I loved Knox’s body; the subtle curves, the sharp edges. The way it rippled with power as it drove into mine, taking me to heights only he could achieve. He tossed the shirt aside, absently rubbing his large hand across the back of his neck, searching for something.

  Slowly turning away, he revealed the hard, tapered muscles of his back that adorned ravens up his spine and shoulders. His broad shoulders dipped into the narrowed waist that vanished into the pants he wore. Those pants offended my senses, hindering the feast my hungry eyes wanted. It took effort to tear my gaze from his hard body, forcing my attention away from the male dripping his sinful scent to fuck with my head and hormones.

  A scrapping noise across the floor gained my attention, and I frowned, watching as Knox returned with a large chair. He nodded toward the wide bench seat, his lips curling into a dark smirk as he kicked off his boots and sat, removing his socks.

  Knox leaned back, studying me through his dark lashes as my chest rose and fell with hunger, growing labored with the need to climb him and cave to my baser needs. Swallowing audibly, I frowned, noting that he was telling me with his eyes to sit down, instead of asking.

  I worried my lip between my teeth, letting my eyes linger on the way his stomach creased in the position he was sitting. His smile revealed white teeth as he noticed how my eyes couldn’t tear away from his utter perfection, lifting his arms wide, resting them on the back of the chair. Ignoring the warning burning in his eyes, I paced.

  “Sit the fuck down, woman. You’re exhausting me,” he announced in a clipped tone, his eyes slowly sliding down my body, noting the splattering of blood that marred the wispy white skirt I wore. “I take it the witches in the woods were your kills?” My attention lifted from his muscles, locking with his eyes. “You surprise me. Come, ride my cock. You know you want it, and I’m right here. Use me to soothe that ache.”

  “Hard pass,” I whispered breathlessly, lifting my arm to rub the tension in my neck.

  “That isn’t the answer I wanted out of you, woman.”

  “Sucks to be you then, doesn’t it?” Knox lunged, and I yelped, swallowing as his lips curled into a predatory smirk.

  Chapter Seven

  Knox snorted before sitting forward, clasping his hands in front of him. He offered me a wicked smile that promised dark desires as a deep rattle slithered over me. “Well, something is hard.” He leaned back, and my eyes lowered to see his cock testing the boundary of his pants, bouncing against the fabric twice. This caused me to laugh in surprise, which made his eyes light up with mirth. “Do you even know what this place is?” he asked, leaning forward again.

  I slid to the floor, giving my legs a break from standing. Knox swallowed hard, noting I’d sat on my knees before him. Amusement danced in his gaze at the subtle act of stubbornness, since there was a soft place to rest my ass beside him. I’d decided my knees were a better option. Although it usually displayed submission, Knox knew I wasn’t offering that to him. Irony. It was amusing when it played out as it was now.

  “I’ll give it to you, Aria. You look good from behind as I am chasing you. But you look much better on your knees before me. You know what would make you look even better?” I smiled, licking my lips while his attention moved to my mouth. “You’re playing with fire, and you’re not even afraid of the flames.”

  “Do I look good on my knees, Knox?” I asked, moving my feet out from beneath me. “I think I’d look much better on your face, riding it.” I closed my eyes, rubbing my fingers over my strained shoulder.

  “You’re leaving quite the pile of bodies behind as you move through this realm. I’m impressed with the sheer number of kills, but you’re sloppy at best. Eventually, you’re going to end up hurt unless you join me, where you belong anyway. You and I both know where this leads, and we know who will win.”

  I pushed down the pang of regret that came from the fact that I was leaving hundreds of witches dead in each town I visited. They weren’t savable, of that I knew, yet it mattered little to my mind that they were vile beings leaving ruins in their wake. I had to stop them, but that came with a toll I carried. It was heavy and smothering. My throat bobbed, tightening, and caused a lump to grow as heat burned my eyes. I pried my gaze from him, looking down at his sexy feet. Who the hell had sexy feet? Knox did, but then I liked every inch of him, right down to his cocky smirk.

  Knox had a way of knowing what bothered me, nailing it on the head with a verbal hammer. I slid onto my side, resting my head in the palm of my hand as my elbow touched the cold, marbled floor. A sardonic smile played on Knox’s mouth. I watched him stand, moving onto his knees before he spread out on the floor beside me, his body mirroring mine as he faced me.

  I swallowed hard as he held my hungry stare. Our eyes remaining locked on one another, knowing each other through a primitive, carnal-lust, on the deepest level a man could know a woman. Sex between us was dirty, primitive, and filled with violence. We unleashed with a mutual need to rid ourselves of the aggression we felt. I worried my lip, remembering the feel of him stretching me full. His body had barely fit within mine, his immensely enormous cock stretching me painfully full, taking up every inch within me. Knox grinned wickedly, like he knew exactly what I had thought of while staring at him.

  It wasn’t just animalistic.

  It was as if our creatures drove the sex to be darker, more aggressive, and I fucking loved it, craving it more than my need to escape him.

  Our creatures were primal, matching our need to go at each other hard and without mercy, but then mercy wasn’t something either of us would ever ask of the other.

  “All the death I leave behind,” I swallowed hard, “does it make me a monster you want to kill?” I whispered carefully, studying his face at my words that slipped free. His jaw clenched, and those knowing eyes slid up to meet mine with regret burning deep within. “I didn’t think it would be hard to murder bad people. I wasn’t wrong, not entirely. It’s surprisingly easy to punish those who trespass against the innocent. But I find I’ve become numb to their cries, which honestly scares me. No one should ever become numb to death, or from taking a life. There’s this place within me warning that I may enjoy it too much, which terrifies me the most.”

  “You either become the hunter or the prey in this world,” he swallowed, watching me. “Unless the thing hunting you is much stronger as in our case,” he added, drawing his finger into a pattern on the floor. “How many innocent lives have you taken, Aria?”

  “None, and I don’t intend to either,” I whispered through the emotion clogging my words into my throat. “You?”

  “Thousands.” He watched the narrowing of my eyes as I judged him harshly for admitting something so horrendous out loud. “It is easy to judge what you don’t understand. You see a man where there is only a monster. You look at me as if I should care what you think about what I have done during my life. Someday, when you’re forced to make the choices I have, I hope you remember that no man craves war. Monsters crave war, Aria. Man craves hearth, home, and a woman to carry his babes in her womb. He wants to watch as she feeds his babe from her breast, growing stronger from their mother’s milk. I wasn’t born a monster. I was born a man who housed a beast, but once awoken, our monsters do not simply go silent into the night. They’re built to wage wars and fight them. I am what your bloodline created, and yet I still crave to see my wife with my son, yet everything within me knows that it won’t ever be so. I know war, and I know how to fight it. Have I ended innocent lives? Yes, because in war, there are always those who die needlessly, and those deaths are on us. Losing innocent lives is the price of war and inevitable, no matter how much you try to preven
t it.”

  “Plan for what is difficult while it is easy, do what is great while it is small,” I whispered on an exhale, watching his lips tug into a knowing smile.

  “The Art of War. You’ve read it?”

  “Several times,” I admitted, enjoying the sparkle igniting in his eyes as if he’d found me a worthy advisory simply because I’d read the book. “That’s how I judge your moves. You must have read that worn copy a thousand times, with its broken spine and creased pages. The book looked loved and well-read.”

  Knox licked his lips, inhaling as the muscles of his abdomen rippled with power, drawing my gaze to the tattoos on his chest and stomach.

  “Which of Sun Tzu’s tactics am I using against you?” he asked in a raspy tone, his eyes studying me as my mind turned over what game he may be playing. “I promise you; there are many in play.”

  “Thus, the expert in battle moves the enemy and is not moved by him,” I smirked, and he returned it with a wolfish smile that promised blood. “If his forces are united, separate them. You have done that. I am alone in this unforgiving land.”

  “You’re not alone. I am here with you. I’m in the shadows, looking over your shoulder, hunting my pretty, ethereal prey as she slumbers, unaware that the biggest monster in all the realms serves as her protector and enemy. You’re never alone as long as I hunt you, Aria. I am never far behind you.”

  I closed my eyes, lowering my arm, frowning as he mirrored me. “If you’d never married, or been in love, and I wasn’t your enemy, could you want me?”

  His mouth tightened into a hard line, and my brow creased at the pain that flashed across Knox’s face. I closed my eyes and felt sleep trying to pull me into a much-needed respite. My chest rose and fell as I sensed his nearness, inhaling the smell of his body.