He found the shimmery bath crystals he’d purchased from Hannah Drake Harrington’s Floating Hat shop. The crystals turned the water a deep purple and shimmered with a bluish undertone. He caught at the hem of her top. “Arms up, baby.” Seychelle complied, and he pulled the little top over her head. Her bra followed. He turned her around so he could examine her nipples. “You sore at all?”
She shook her head. He lifted an eyebrow and tenderly ran his finger over those tight buds. Little goose bumps rose over her skin and she shivered in reaction. He couldn’t help himself; he leaned forward and licked first one and then the other before drawing each breast into his mouth and sucking gently, giving each one equal attention. She cradled his head in her arms, her breathing changing to a ragged pant.
Giving herself. She did that for him without reservation. He lifted his head and found her mouth. Took it. Took everything. God. Her kisses. They were sheer magma, flowing through his veins in a slow burn straight to his belly, spreading through his body and reaching his groin. His woman. Nothing like her. He lifted his head, licked at her soft lips.
“You’re so fuckin’ beautiful, angel.”
Savage sat on the edge of the tub to test the water. He wanted it hot for her. Steam was rising, but he didn’t want it so hot it was uncomfortable. “The point I’m making about Czar is this: we needed him. Sorbacov wanted him dead. Not just dead, baby, but before he died, he wanted him suffering as much as possible. I was so little the first time I realized we would never make it without him and he was in such pain. It radiated off of him. Not just physical, but mental. He took everyone on. Not just us, but the other kids too. The ones he knew he couldn’t save. He knew so much, still does. He’s scary with what he knows. Anyway, it started back then. I was about four or five when I started trying to take it away from him. Just a little bit. Just enough to help him out. I didn’t know what else I could do. Then little by little when the others were at their worst. I would practice all the time.”
He reached up and unzipped her jeans. “Hands on my shoulders, Seychelle. I don’t want you falling.” She was trembling again. She knew. She’d given herself to him. Committed to him. He’d told her everything, and she hadn’t run screaming from their home, so that meant their life was really going to start. Tonight. He was free. She gave him that, and she knew it. She was nervous, but she wasn’t running. His woman. Courageous.
“And you’ve been doing it ever since.”
He nodded. “After so many years, like you with your gift of healing, I can’t seem to stop. It’s a compulsion. Fortunately, I had trained myself to just drain away a small amount. It’s more difficult when we’re all together and everyone is upset, like at a meeting. Then I’m getting bombarded. Won’t lie, babe, on my own, that rage can build up and take me there. Don’t want you to blame anyone but me when I’m fallin’ over that edge and it ends up on you.”
Her hand cupped the side of his face. She waited until he lifted his gaze to hers. “We do it together, Savage. We give that gift to them together. They’re your family. You take their pain on for them because you love them. You’re mine. I take it from you because I love you. That’s only ours, no one else’s.”
His heart nearly shattered in his chest. She meant it. That was the thing. Seychelle would give herself to him. Sacrifice herself for him. Give him her body and her tears. She would give him the freedom to be unashamed of who he was. He needed to be a better man for her. To live up to her. He needed to give her the world because she fucking deserved it.
He pulled her jeans and lacy panties down slowly over her hips, unwrapping his gift. He leaned in and inhaled the scent of her and then licked, liking the way her body jerked in reaction. “Step out of your jeans, baby,” he said softly, holding her steady by her hips. “When you take your bath, take your time, think of me. Of us.”
Deliberately, he slid his hand between her legs to find her clit, brushing his finger and thumb back and forth gently. Circling. Flicking. “Do whatever you want, Seychelle, bring yourself as close as you want, but you can’t get yourself off. Promise me, baby. No cheating. I give every orgasm. I want you shaved clean and I’ll bring you a robe and a bottle of water. You have to be hydrated.” He pressed a kiss to her already-bare pussy lips and then stood up to help her into the deep bathwater. “Tonight, I’m going to show you something very, very special.”
He watched her nipples tighten and the goose bumps rise all over her skin. Yeah, she liked the idea almost as much as he did.
Savage found himself smiling as he lit several candles, preparing the room for Seychelle’s first time with the flogger. She was in the grotto, surrounded by the jets, those voracious bubbles teasing her sensitive body. He’d deliberately told her she could touch herself as much as she wanted, but not to bring herself off. Knowing Seychelle, she wouldn’t have ever considered touching herself until he put the idea in her head.
He loved introducing her to new pleasures, watching her eyes light up, that slow, almost shocked surprise creep into her expression. The dazed delight. Seychelle gave him permission to be himself. She hadn’t once asked him to be anyone else. He didn’t have to hide the fact that he loved the things he did to her.
He had high solid metal stands that looked like pyramids wrapped in copper, four of them. Two were by the bed, one on either side but several feet away from it. When he lit the tall, dark honeycombed candles, the flames cast shadows along the walls and over the bed. The other two copper stands were on either side of the couch he’d had his brothers make but then put in storage and never brought out until he found the house. The pyramids were on either side of the couch, so the tall, honeycombed candles he lit threw shadows across the railing and windows. The candles were specially made, looking exactly like a honeycomb but black. When they were lit, they dripped red molten wax, so that it ran in either tears or little rivulets through those octagon-shaped holes. Both the bed and the couch had four-by-four posts with metal rings attached to them. The posts were anchored solidly to the floor.
Savage wore only a pair of soft black pants that enabled his hard cock to stretch. He was aching already, and it was going to be a very long night for him, but well worth the wait. This was really the start of their life together. Their real commitment to each other.
Seychelle was open-minded. Willing to try. Willing to think whatever he proposed might be sexy. Sex and pleasure began in the mind. She let it begin there. Her first reaction wasn’t an automatic shutdown. She thought about it with the idea that whatever they did together would be sensual, that he would somehow make it that way for her.
There was no sound, but her scent drifted to him through the open doorway. Wild strawberries and honey. His blood grew hot, rushed to his cock, filling him, stretching those scars to a painful ache. Just knowing what he was going to do brought him to a sexual frenzy.
Seychelle entered the room, her hair in a messy knot on her head, dressed only in a short silken robe that scarcely covered her bare bottom, adding to his ache. She looked so beautiful she took his breath. The room was cool, and he could see her nipples pebbled beneath the thin material. Her breasts were generous, and as she approached him, they swayed invitingly, drawing his attention. She was aroused, the fragrance, that combination that haunted him, teased his senses. Her breathing was heightened. Her eyes bright. She looked a little nervous, and that was always intoxicating to him.