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Feyre’s father paced back and forth, ignoring the sound of heavy fists pounding against the front door. Her sisters hid in their bedroom, wanting to avoid what Feyre knew was coming. Her father had borrowed a lot of money from a local crime syndicate, with interest rates so exorbitant Feyre knew her father couldn’t have paid it back in his lifetime. She winced at the slamming on the wood, locked to keep those men out.

It had been like that for days. Her father merely waited them out, aware they’d tire themselves and wait again for the morning. Feyre couldn’t go on like this. It was so late. She ran her hands down her semi-sheer nightdress.

“Father,” she tried, well aware there was no point in being rational. Her father was going to enrage whoever their boss was. “What if we just let them take–”

“No.”

Feyre sat back down in her chair, relieved when the pounding stopped. It was a small reprieve. A moment later glass shattered against the elegant wood, eliciting a gasp of fear from their father. She heard the lock click and then the sound of heavy boots in the foyer.

“Archeron,” a smooth, masculine voice called. Her father paled even further at the sound and Feyre knew she’d been right about the angry boss. She stood, hands braced on the back of the leather chair. They were in her father’s study, just off the main hall. It was agony to wait, made worse when a long, wooden bat pushed open the study door.

The man who walked through could have been the devil himself. Dark, inky hair set against a chiseled, truly beautiful face. Golden brown skin held the bluest pair of eyes Feyre had ever seen in her life. He was young—for someone with his kind of empire, at any rate. Maybe early thirties, a good decade older than herself.

His eyes swept through the room, landing on her for only a moment. She dropped her gaze to the officers behind him. Two other men, brutally strong and just as beautiful, flanked her father on either side. The taller of the two had twin blades crisscrossed against his black armored back while the other had a long dagger pressed casually against his thigh. Both held heavy, iron tipped bats in their broad hands. 

Her father was going to die. Maybe she would, too. Her father seemed to have forgotten she was there as he stepped forward. Her father adjusted the fine cuffs of his jacket, eyeing the man.

“Rhys—” Rhys raised his bat and smashed it against her fathers face before he could get another word out. Feyre screamed softly, clapping her hand over her mouth when Rhys turned sharply to look at her. Her father crumpled to the ground, blood pouring from his mouth.

“I have been calling on you for two weeks,” Rhys said, eyes sliding from Feyre back to her father. “You have been avoiding me. I hoped we could work out an arrangement regarding your debts.”

“We still can,” her father gasped. Rhys only shook his head. Beside him, the man with the longer hair pressed his boot against her fathers knee until he groaned.

“Oh? What do you think you possess that I might still want? I could merely take everything in this estate and sell it before casting you out onto the streets.”

“Anything,” her father pleaded. “I’ll give you anything.”

Rhys’s eyes flickered back to Feyre’s face before sliding over her body in her thin nightgown. She couldn’t hide the way her legs trembled under his cold gaze. “What about your daughter?”

It was a bluff. Feyre forced herself to take a breath. Her father would never. She forced herself to look that terrifying man in the eye so he wouldn’t see her fear.

“I—”

“Feyre is only twenty one,” his father whispered, cowering as Rhys’s men crept closer. “Too young, she’s too young.”

“Are there others?” Rhys asked casually, jamming his hands into his pockets. “Are you offering me my pick of the eligible women in your home?”

Her father didn’t meet her gaze. “My eldest is twenty five—”

“No!” Feyre exclaimed. “Just let him take what he wants, don’t—”

“It’s no matter,” Rhys interrupted smoothly, lips curling with predatory intent. “I want your youngest. Would you trade her to me in exchange for all this?

Feyre trembled. He wouldn’t, he wouldn’t he wouldn’t—

“Deal,” her father whispered, still unable to look at her. Rhys turned to his associates. Feyre saw the microscopic incline of his head before the larger of the two took his bat and swung it viciously at her fathers knee. Feyre screamed, hands braced on the chair as the other, slighter man slammed his weapon against her father. Blood and bone ripped through the flesh, made worse when Rhys came forward and slammed his own foot against her father’s now ruined knee.

“What kind of man sells his own daughter?” Rhys snarled, kicking him in the ribs so hard her father, already sobbing, moaned from the pain.

“Please,” Feyre begged, coming around that chair. “Please, stop, I’ll do anything.”

She threw herself at Rhys’s feet, reaching for his heavy boot before he could lift it again. Rhys looked down at her, his furious face unreadable. She braced herself for him to kick her out of the way. The sight of her fathers splintered bone made Feyre’s stomach heave, her dinner rising in her throat. She vomited just beside his immaculate shoes, braced on her shaking arms.

Strong hands slid around her body, hauling her upwards. She thrashed for a moment but Rhys all but cradled her against his broad chest.

“The next time I call on you and you don’t answer, it’ll be Cassian who takes one of your daughters,” Rhys warned. Cassian, the man with shoulder length hair, grinned as he slid his bloodied bat over his shoulder.

“Feyre,” her father wept, for all the good it did. Rhys stepped over his broken, bleeding body as though he were little more than trash. And Feyre, terrified as she was, couldn’t pretend she wasn’t a little relieved to be carried out of that house.

From the top of the stairs, Nesta watched them leave. Her face pale, her arms wrapped around her body as though to keep her from falling to pieces.

“Don’t—” she began, her voice wavering. Rhys halted, inclining his head to look up at her sister. Cassian and the other, too, both peered up and Feyre knew if Cassian ever got to come back, he’d haul her sister out of their house without a second thought. He was grinning with open challenge at Nesta, for all she noticed.

“Don’t come back,” Nesta whispered, eyes only for Feyre. If she noticed Cassian at all, she gave no indication of it. “If you manage to free yourself. Don’t come back.”

Rhys’s hold on her tightened ever so slightly. Feyre couldn’t respond, was too numb, too shocked to do anything but keep her cheek pressed to Rhys’s chest. The steady thump of his heart was almost grounding. Rhys waited a beat before he turned for the ruined front door. No words were exchanged between them—his silence was enough. 

Rhys didn’t let her go—not when they reached his carriage and not when it jostled to life. He kept her pressed against his chest, her whole body trembling with fear. Feyre was too afraid to ask him what he was going to do with her. 

His associates sat across from them awkwardly, their bats still dripping with her fathers blood. Twice, Feyre thought Cassian meant to speak to her. He’d open his mouth, eyes sliding to Rhys…and then close it again. Whatever expression Rhys had to silence Cassian was one Feyre hoped to never see. 

By the time the carriage halted, Feyre was shaking so hard her teeth were visibly chattering. The prettier man winced at the sound, practically flinging himself out of the padded door, while Cassian shot her a sympathetic look. That didn’t bode well. Feyre tried to scramble out of his lap but Rhys caught her, holding her tight.

“Don’t do that,” he murmured, maneuvering them both to the ground. Feyre turned her head away from his chest, away from that masculine scent of salt and citrus, to the lovely, sprawling estate overlooking the glistening river. Of course he lived like a king, far removed from everyone else in the city. She hadn’t realized they’d traveled so far, though as Feyre looked out, she saw only the hilly, isolated outskirts of the place she’d once lived. 

And the well groomed man currently walking her into his home. How many trades had he made exactly like this? How many of those women still existed inside his palatial estate? Feyre couldn’t help the whimpering sob that escaped her lips. 

Rhys cleared his throat.

“I ah…I’ve seen you before,” he told her. Feyre didn’t know what to say to that. She took a breath, resisting the urge to burrow her face into his chest when he stepped over the threshold, still carrying her like a bride. 

His home was all marble and dark wood and lovely, cream colored walls. So at odds with the man who’d broken her fathers knee with his boot. Feyre gave in to impulse, squeezing her eyes shut and turning her face. She didn’t want to watch him descend into the dark, to wherever he’d chain her up for his perusal. 

“You ah…you were buying paint, I think,” Rhys continued, his steps measured and steady. “I was meeting your…” he swallowed. “Your father. You didn’t see me, but I saw you.”

“What are you going to do with me?” she dared to ask, her stomach flipping when she felt him set her against something soft.

“Don’t worry about what I need from you,” he murmured, pulling the dark blanket from the corner. “You should rest.”

“Rest.” Feyre repeated the word, certain she must be hallucinating. She was very obviously in his bed, crawling beneath his sheets. The masculine scent of the pillows were a dead giveaway, though only a man would have black on black bedding. Rhys, she supposed, was nothing if not consistent. He loomed over her, his violet eyes wide with some emotion Feyre couldn’t read.

“Are you going to kill me?” she whispered. She just needed to know what was going to happen to her. 

He scoffed. “I have no intention of harming you,” he agreed. “I–” He stopped himself, taking a step away from the bed. “Rest. We’ll discuss this… unusual bargain in the morning.”

“But you won’t hurt me?”

Rhys put a hand over his heart, as if that meant anything coming from a man like him. And still, Feyre figured if Rhys truly meant to harm her, she was in his home, in his room, in his bed. He possessed the strength to crush a knee, and if he couldn’t restrain her, well…she hadn’t seen where Cassian and the other man had run off to. 

“I swear.”

Feyre had the sense that Rhys lived and died by whatever code of honor he held himself to. Maybe that was why her father’s refusal to pay back his debts enraged him the way that it had. Still, she couldn’t make sense of his decision to take her, when she knew there were far more valuable things in her fathers home. Jewels and precious metals, art and spices. Even the house had monetary value. Rhys could have sold it.

Feyre blinked as a new, more terrible thought wormed its way through her mind. As Rhys walked towards the door, Feyre called, “Are you going to sell me?”

His whole body went stiff.

“Excuse me?” he whispered, his voice terrifying—lethal.

“To…to work off my fathers debt?”

His broad shoulders didn’t relax as he turned. “No Feyre. You’re safe.”

Safe. She stared at him, holding his gaze for a long minute. Rhys was the one who broke eye contact, shaking his head back and forth. What did safe even mean to a man like Rhys? He said nothing else, stepping from the room. Feyre immediately kicked off the blankets, thinking she might try and break out. It wouldn’t have been hard—there were no guards at the terrace door that overlooked the water just below. No locks on the windows, nothing that would have prevented her from running straight home.

Where Rhys would find her and drag her back. Feyre doubted he’d be so gentle the second time around. Or worse. Maybe he’d make good on his promise and let Cassian come back. And maybe Cassian would take steely Nesta…but he might change his mind and take soft hearted Elain instead.

Feyre retreated back into the large suite that comprised Rhys’s room. It was lovely, just like the rest of his home. A large bathing chamber with a tub big enough for four full grown men was enticing, though it was the art on his walls that kept Feyre from sinking into hot water. Her father had art, of course—art he chose, based on his own strange tastes. Rhys, it seemed, aligned more with what Feyre would have chosen. Nothing abstract but a capture of the world itself. Feyre lost herself in the swirling grays and purples of a churning ocean until her eyes ached and her body sagged beneath her own weight.

She felt as if she’d lived hundreds of lifetimes rather than just one. It was with a bone dead weariness that Feyre retucked herself back into Rhys’s bed. She closed her eyes, unsure if she’d be able to sleep…and woke to the mattress dipping just beside her. She didn’t move, waiting to see what might happen.

Rhys sighed softly in the dark, adjusting the blankets she’d twisted around her body carefully enough that had she not been on alert, Feyre might never have felt him at all. He’d broken her father’s knee and he…he was brushing tendrils of hair off her face. 

“I fucked this whole thing up,” he whispered, she supposed to himself. “I wonder if you’ll forgive me.”

She almost turned around and spat the word no into his face. How could she forgive him for accepting her as payment for her fathers debt? What kind of man asked that in the first place?

And what kind of man agreed? Her father could have said no, could have given everything up. Feyre had begged Rhys to stop and he had…but her father hadn’t tried to go back on his devil's bargain with Rhys.

She wondered how he explained it to her sisters. Would he frame it like Feyre had gone willingly, happily? Nesta would know better, but Elain? Her father was given a clean slate and no longer burdened by Feyre’s dowry. Even if Rhys never touched her, no other man would. 

Her anger shifted from the man sleeping in the bed beside her. Rhys could have declined the bargain, could have never asked. Her father could have said no. He owed her something—he was her dad. She’d thrown herself at Rhys’s feet and begged him not to kill her father.

And her father had merely let Rhys carry her out. 

Feyre’s anger didn’t keep her awake for long. She woke to cheerful sunlight streaming through the wall of windows that comprised the far end of his room. She was warmer than she’d ever been, snuggled beneath the blanket. Rhys had one arm thrown over her body, holding her against him. His cruel face was softened by sleep, those sensual lips parted casually. A lock of his inky hair flopped into his eyes, while thick, dark lashes fanned over his cheek.

He was beautiful, made all the worse by his casual violence. He had his free muscular arm thrown over his head, resting against it like a pillow. Feyre let her fingers lightly trace the swirling, dark tattoos inked over his bicep and shoulders, trailing towards his bare chest. She didn’t realize he was smiling until his voice, gravelly and thick with sleep, murmured, “I don’t suppose I could convince you to slip that pretty hand beneath the blankets?”

She jerked backwards. “Don’t be crude.”

One violet eye peeked open, followed by the other. “Is it crude? Or satisfying your curiosity about me?”

“I…” Feyre forced herself to swallow. “I have no curiosity about you.”

He pressed his lips together, his eyes bright with amusement. “No, of course not. Just an insatiable urge to touch me, then?”

She couldn’t deny that. Not when he still had one arm hooked around her. “How did you get these?”

“The usual way,” he replied, “some ink and a needle.”

“Why, though?”

“Why not?” He grinned, so heartbreakingly lovely. “I was young, it seemed like fun.”

“Is that your philosophy to life, then? Why not?”

He tapped the end of her nose with a longer finger. “Exactly, darling. Why not get a tattoo—”

“And why not take a woman as payment?”

He slid his arm off of her, his easy expression darkening. “I came to take his life.”

Feyre’s whole body went cold as Rhys slid from the bed, totally and utterly naked. She couldn’t enjoy the sight of his toned, golden body in the wake of that admission. Rhys certainly offered her a view every angle—from the broad, sculpted lines of his abs, tapering into a thick, soft penis. Muscular thighs gave way to a tight backside—every inch of Rhys was lovely to look at. Even his cold, furious face. 

She sat up while Rhys pulled out a rather nice pair of black trousers trimmed in silver from a drawer. 

“I don’t suppose he told you what I did for him?”

“No,” she whispered.

Rhys scoffed. “I imagine not. You don’t become a man with his wealth without accumulating enemies. Some of those enemies sank his ships. I fixed that problem for him, and repaid the money lost. All he had to do was pay me back—for the lives lost, my time, and my money.”

Feyre fisted the blankets while Rhys slipped a white shirt over his head.

“He repaid me by killing two of my low level associates—they’re not expendable to me, so wipe that look off your face—and thought to kill me, too. Assassins, poisons, arrows right through my window and worse. You’ll never know true fear, my darling, until a whore has a dagger against your cock.”

He chuckled, though Feyre didn’t find any of it funny.

“I made multiple attempts to be reasonable. At the end, your father chose to hand over his daughter to spare his life, unaware I only granted it for you. I doubt he’s grateful.”

“You…you didn’t kill him for me?” she asked, unable to believe him. 

Rhys began buttoning his fine jacket over his torso. “You begged, did you not?”

“I’m no one—”

He silenced her with another humorless laugh. “Untrue. In…” his eyes drifted towards a clock on his desk. “Four hours, you’ll be my wife. And who knows, maybe you’ll ask me to kill him as a wedding gift and I’ll get everything I wanted.”

Feyre’s mouth dropped. “Excuse me?”

He shrugged. “Maybe not. Maybe in a year. Who knows? I hear your father is looking to make matches with your older sisters. I’m sure whoever he chooses will enrage you—”

“What do you mean, married?”

His grin became feline. 

“What did you imagine you’d be doing here?”

Feyre’s eyes slid to her hands. “I ah…”

“Thought I’d tie you up to my bed? Sell you to work off your fathers debt?” he guessed. “How dull.”

“Why would you marry me?” she sneered. “Surely you are just dripping with prospects.”

He laughed softly. “Maybe. But you’ll be my wife all the same. No bed ties required...unless, of course, you wish it.”

“If you think I’m going to touch you—”

“Oh, you will,” he interrupted. “If you want my protection, you’ll consummate our marriage. I think you’ll find I can be quite generous when I want to be.”

Feyre clenched her fingers. Marriage had never been on the table for her. Nesta and Elain but she’d been deemed too wild by polite society well before her father agreed she didn’t need to participate in any season. She could remain as she wished, so long as she didn’t embarrass him.

 “If you’re expecting a virgin—”

“I’m not,” Rhys assured her quickly. “You mistake me for a member of the gentry. I am not, and have no interest as to your past. Only your future, Feyre darling.”

“And if I say no?”

“You won’t,” Rhys declared, ever smug. Handsome, too, in his fine clothes. “I think you’re far too practical for that.”

“Is that what this is, then? Practicality? You marry me so my father has to think twice before crossing you?”

Rhys walked to the door, his eyes sharp. “Your father will reconsider crossing me because I’ll kill him slowly if he does. Marriage to you is mere pleasure. You exist outside my business…unless, of course, you wish to join me?”

Join him. “How?”

Rhys grinned. “As my equal, of course. I’m sure Cassian would relish putting a weapon in your lovely hands. Think on it. And get ready. I’ll have a dress sent up.”

And that was that. Rhys left her alone in his bedroom, having decided that by the end of the day, she’d be his wife. 

His partner. Feyre didn’t know what to make of that at all. To keep herself from going insane, she didn’t think about any of it. Not the serving girls who came in and insisted they help her bathe, dress, and ready herself. She had a moment of hysterics when thin scraps of lace were practically painted over her most intimate parts before a pretty silver gown that might have been spun from undiluted moonlight was buttoned up her body. There would be no white, which was just as well. 

Feyre was ushered through his home as if she was the one keeping them, and not the fussy servants who’d woven delicate pearls and little white flowers into her thick, golden brown hair. Though, if it made Rhys wait before he dragged her back into bed, what did Feyre care? 

It occurred to her, as she stepped outside in the lovely sunlight, that she ought to have balked. Screamed. Tried to flee, and barring that, thrown herself from the cliffside into the rocky sea below. That's what a well-bred lady would have done. She certainly wouldn’t have stepped onto the stone lain path and made her way to a pretty gazebo draped in lilies of the valley. Rhys watched with open pleasure. He looked like a man who was getting exactly what he wanted. It was so absurd.

I’ve seen you before. 

She should have asked when. Instead, Feyre joined him in the middle of the wooden structure, where the servants, Cassian and the man she’d since learned was named Azriel, all watched as witnesses. No one from her family came, which she supposed was just as well. Feyre had no friends—the ladies had always shunned her. 

The whole thing was so ridiculous, so utterly absurd that Feyre just barely paid any attention to it. Her attention bounced between the sunlight that bounced against the high planes of his face, making him seem as if he was literally glowing with pleasure, and the surrounding nature. They were so alone here. No watching eyes of the others in town, no gossiping whispers. Just him and the sea, the crashing waves loud enough to drown out everything but Feyre’s own confused thoughts. 

She laughed when Rhys put the delicate band of twining gold and silver on her finger, admiring that sapphire nestled against her skin. And she laughed again when he offered her a rather plain black and silver band of his own that she put on his hand. What sort of crime lord married the daughter of a man he meant to kill? 

Feyre didn’t realize the whole thing was over until Rhys reached for her. Hand against the back of her neck, he pressed his mouth against her own while his friends laughed loudly. Reality crashed over her at that first, masculine taste of him. 

She’d forgotten his strength, that she’d seen him naked just that morning. Rhys kept her pinned by just his hand as his tongue pried open her teeth to sweep inside. Feyre tried to push him off her, for all the good it did.

Rhys got his taste and his kiss before he swept her back up like she was nothing at all to him. He laughed, the conquering hero and she his prize. Feyre didn’t fight him until he locked his bedroom door. The magnitude of what he meant to do settled in her gut just as she tumbled from his arms, falling back to his neatly made bed.

The sun was still shining. Surely he could wait until she was drunk? Utterly wrecked out of her mind? 

“Rhys,” she tried, noting the way his pants were tented. No waiting, then. “Rhys, lets…let's talk—”

“The only talking I want involves my name on your lips,” Rhys breathed, stalking towards her. “Begging me not to stop.”

He caught her thighs, yanking her forward. Feyre yelped, her foot catching him in the solid muscle of his shoulder. Rhys didn’t budge, though he did chuckle. 

“You want to ask me something, wife?” he whispered, pulling her heeled shoes off her feet carefully.

“You said you saw me,” she panted, closing her eyes when his fingers began tracing her calves. 

“Mmm,” he agreed. “Last year in the market. You were buying paint.”

“You didn’t say anything?”

“What does someone say to a work of art, Feyre? Hello? I was paralyzed.”

Paralyzed. It took Feyre a moment to realize he was kissing her inner thigh while she chewed on that detail. 

“Because of me?” she asked, unable to believe a man half as terrifying and lovely as Rhys would even look twice at her. 

He pushed the skirt of her wedding dress up over her hips, revealing the black lace she’d been forced into that morning. His eyes darkened with obvious pleasure. 

‘Yes,” he agreed. “I have thought of you everyday since. What it would be like to talk to you…to touch you…to taste you.”

He punctuated his words by kissing the fabric of her underwear. Feyre shuddered against the heat of his mouth. 

“Hard to get to know me if you can’t speak to me,” she tried to tease. Rhys licked her through the fabric, pulling her closer to his face.

“It’s hard to speak to you when I’m trying to beat the shit out of your father,” he replied. Feyre meant to respond—she swore some clever retort was just on the tip of her tongue, but Rhys pulled at her underthings with his teeth, lightly grazing the sensitive skin just beneath. Feyre’s hips bucked, hands fisting the sheets to keep herself steady. His violet eyes were a caress against her skin, watching as he pulled the scrap of lace entirely off her. Feyre watched awestruck, unwilling to admit that Rhys removing her undergarments might have been the most erotic thing that had ever happened to her.

And he knew it.

“Do you like the sight of me on my knees for you?” he asked, kissing up the inner part of her thigh. “Do you like seeing me worship my wife?”

“I…” This man is dangerous. He’s your enemy. You can’t trust him. 

His breath fanned over her cunt. “I think you’ll repay the favor when I’m through with you.”

“And then what?” she asked.

“And then you’ll be my wife legitimately and no one can take you from me.”

Feyre began to ask if there was some danger to that, but Rhys’s tongue slid up the center of her and Feyre merely forgot how to form coherent words. She had limited experience, despite what she’d implied to Rhys. A few quick tumbles between her and a serving womans son had been the extent of Feyre’s sexual prowress.

And never once had he put his mouth against her cunt and taken a taste. Rhys could have stopped with that first swirl, could have flipped her onto her stomach and fucked her until she was breathless. That was certainly his right, given he’d married her. It might have made things easier—she could hate him if he only fucked her.

But this was something else entirely. His eyes never left her face, hidden by her body and an inky flop of his otherwise immaculate hair. Feyre understood he was gauging her reaction to see what she liked so he could selfishly pull it out of her.

Make her crave him. He couldn’t have everything. Even if he was being honest and had wanted her for a year, had orchestrated her fathers demise to get her—he couldn’t have everything. Feyre was determined to deny him her pleasure, if only because she knew how badly he wanted it. 

While Rhys devoured her, Feyre forced herself to stare him down as she thought of the unsexiest things she could imagine. Him breaking her fathers knee ranked fairly high. Rhys continued licking, his eyebrows pulling when Feyre laid there utterly still. It wasn’t that his mouth didn’t feel good—his tongue was soft and warm and some part of her was excruciatingly aroused at the sight of him buried between her thighs. 

She couldn’t let him win. Not when he’d forced her to marry him less than a day after kidnaping her.

“Feyre,” he whispered, pulling his mouth off of her. The loss made her whole body buzz with want, though she kept herself still and impassive. “Are you going to be good for me and come all over my tongue, or am I going to have to fuck you into submission?”

“You can’t have everything, Rhys,” she whispered, hating how her voice was practically a whimper. 

Rhys wrenched open her thighs, teasing her clit with his thumb. “Maybe not, Feyre. But I will have you. I’ll have your body, and then I’ll have your spirit and when I’m done, I’ll have your love, too.”

Feyre hissed as his lips sucked without any of the gentleness from before. She bowed off the bed, shoved back to the mattress by his firm hand. Before, he’d been gentle in his hunger but now Rhys was ravenous and angry. She couldn’t breathe at the sight of his burning eyes, his insistence that she would come on his face. She couldn’t think of anything but the man on his knees before her, licking and sucking until a moan escaped Feyre’s throat. That was enough to drive him, to convince Rhys to push one of his long fingers into her body. Feyre clenched tight around him, desperate to be filled by something—anything.

He groaned when he felt her tighten around her, his tongue lapping at her clit with brutal efficiency. Feyre was going to lose her mind, unraveling when she’d sworn she wouldn’t. That finger became two, became three, pumping into her while he licked and sucked. Feyre was driven upwards despite her best intentions, unwilling to admit this was the first time she’d ever come from someone elses touch. Rhys groaned, the sound vibrating over her clit and Feyre was done for. She couldn’t hide her scream—not from the cheerful daylight and not from the gloating man between her legs. He devoured her orgasm, fucking her with his fingers until she could hear the wet slide of his digits in and out of her body.

He reached for her as she came down, fisting her hair roughly in his hand. “Get up,” he rasped. “On your knees, darling.”

She was pliant, her legs still shaking from her orgasm. Feyre let Rhys put her before him before she understood what he’d meant. Her gown pooled around her body like starlight while he hovered over her as though he were the night sky. His fingers practically trembled as he worked to free himself from his trousers while Feyre could do nothing but watch, hapless under his spell.

His cock was enormous. There was no other word for it—what she’d seen that morning, thick and long, had not been the full picture of what not bobbed mere inches from her lips. 

“Open,” he whispered, though it might have been a plea. “Open your mouth, darling.”

She looked up through diamond dusted lashes. Rhys reached between them, pumping his cock until moisture beaded at the tip. She kept her lips pressed together until he jerked his hips forward, smearing the fluid over them anyway.

She didn’t want to find out what disobedience would earn her. Feyre opened wide and Rhys exhaled a shaking breath. He slid himself against her tongue, head thrown back as if this was the most pleasurable thing that had ever happened to him. Feyre did have some experience with sucking, though the cock before had been small enough to be taken wholly into her mouth. 

Rhys couldn’t fit half. She gagged when he pushed into her throat, held by his vice-like grip.

“That’s it, sweetheart,” he praised, his chest rising and falling rapidly. “Gods, Feyre, you suck me so well.”

She pressed her knees together. It was stupid, but  no one had ever told her she did something well. And Rhys said it, perhaps, because he wanted to continue his slow thrusting in and out of her mouth, but Feyre didn’t care. She wanted to please him if he was going to offer her compliments. 

The grip in her hair loosened enough that she could have pulled away entirely if she wanted. And while Feyre couldn’t pretend the stretch of his cock didn’t make her jaw ache, she continued to let him bob her over him. It gave her a chance to study him without that mask he always wore—Rhys was all cool, burning fire here instead of bright, irreverent amusement. She could believe the panting man above her had wanted her for some time.

“Use your hand,” he breathed, “be my good girl and wrap it around me— fuck, Feyre, your mouth will be the end of me.”

Musky salt burst against her tongue and for a moment she thought he’d come. She looked up at him, gripping him tight in her hand as she worked him in tandem. She was disappointed he’d chosen to come that way, down her throat instead of in her body.

He hadn’t. She reached for her, hauling her upwards against his body again. Rhys brushed the mangled curls of her once immaculate up-do off her face. “Look at my pretty, perfect wife,” he whispered, his mouth ghosting over her own. “You please me so well.”

She slid her hand against the back of his neck just as he’d done at the end of their wedding. For a moment neither of them moved, half dressed and wholly ruined. An inch of space existed between them and Feyre found it to be intolerable. 

“Kiss me,” she demanded, her voice barely more than a whisper.

“As my wife commands,” he agreed, his eyes fluttering shut. Here was the man who’d slept beside her. As his lips slotted between her own, Feyre watched the peace that stole over his features.

He didn’t seem capable of the violence she’d witnessed. He seemed too soft, too gentle. How did she reconcile the two halves of him?

Did she need to at all?

Feyre wasn’t so sure. Not when her whole body responded outside of her awareness. His mouth between her legs had been exquisite but his lips against her lips was pure bliss. Her fingers curled against the nape of his neck, tugging softly at the dark strands. He tasted like her, musky and sweet and when she deepened the kiss, parting her lips so he could sweep inside, he moaned at what he found. 

She didn’t realize he was unbuttoning the back of her dress until calloused hands pushed the long, lacy sleeves off her arms. He didn’t stop his kissing—not when the dress pooled around her feet or he had to unlace the rest of her undergarments. 

Feyre was more tentative. Wanting him was strange and foreign. Wrong and right, all at once. Here, with his loving hands, she felt safe enough to bare herself to him and ask for that same vulnerability. 

He didn’t stop her from unlooping that first button. Rhys merely began exploring her freckled expanse of skin. Feyre forced herself to focus, but his stroking tongue in her mouth had reignited that same wild lust from before when he’d been kissing between her legs.

He’s been smooth, removing her clothes but Feyre was frantic.

“Off,” she panted when she couldn't get his jacket over his shoulders. He was too tall, too broad.

He didn’t tease or taunt. Rhys merely tossed his jacket to the floor and stepped fully out of his unbuttoned pants. He was…he was beautiful, she decided. Undeniably so.

Impulsively, Feyre asked, “Can I paint you?”

“You can do whatever you want to me,” he agreed, laying her against the bed. “I am your obedient servant.”

“That’s just your cock talking,” Feyre replied, earning a bright smile. He shook his head until more of his dark hair flopped into his violet eyes.

“You’ll see,” he said, kissing the corner of her mouth. “This city may obey me, but I only obey my wife.”

“Rhys—” He pressed his cock against her still slick opening and pushed, robbing her of whatever protest she’d meant to offer. 

“That’s it,” he agreed, toying with a nipple as he slid in and in and in. Feyre could barely breathe, couldn’t think as he invaded, filling her until there was no space for ever the smallest breath of air. Rhys gave her no time to catch up, rolling his hips against her. She clawed at his shoulders, gouging red scratches against the golden brown of his skin.

“Look at my pretty wife,” he groaned, his words punctuated by his rough thrusting. “This is what she wants—what she needs.”

She arched her neck, pleased when he pressed a sucking kiss against her skin. His tongue laved over the small hurt until Feyre was writhing against him, desperate for more. He knew she wanted him—that they wanted each other. 

She didn’t care what he was anymore. She was lost in the burning, choking pleasure of his every touch. All she could hear was the frantic wet slap of their skin and their fevered, hungry kissing. She was careening towards that ledge again with each new drag of his cock against her sensitive flesh. He was too, if his ragged breathing and rough thrusts were any indication. Feyre ran her fingers through his hair, eliciting the softest whimper of pleasure from Rhys. 

She shattered, tightening around him until he could only just pull himself back out. She didn’t realize he’d come, too, until she felt it sliding down her body to the bed below. All Feyre knew were the violet stars behind her eyes and the wash of incandescent pleasure that might have stretched into eternity. 

Rhys collapsed on top of her, holding her tight against his slick body. “Feyre,” he whispered into her hair. Over and over, he said nothing but her name. 

“Was it worth it?” she asked him, lips pressed to his cheek. “All this effort just to sleep with me?”

“To marry you,” he corrected gently. “And yes. I would do it over again if it meant you were my wife.”

Feyre swallowed. She’d thought, once he finished having sex with her, that he’d be over her—over this. 

“I’m not trying to punish your father,” he added. “I want you. Only you, Feyre.”

Their eyes met. Stroking his jaw with the tips of her fingers, she murmured. “Just me?”

“Just you.”

And for someone who had never once been chosen first—who had been wanted so badly by a person they would commit untold atrocities in order to have her—Feyre smiled. She kissed his cheek.

“Who knew my husband was so soft.”

Rhys smiled in return, his relief palpable. 

“Just you, sweet wife. Just you.”