Chapter 2: The Memory in Her Mouth
The phone had rung twelve times before falling silent. Anya had counted each ring against Dema’s chest, feeling his heartbeat shift from the heavy, satiated rhythm of after to the alert, watchful thud of now.
He didn’t move until the silence felt solid. Then, with a sigh that came from the depths of his bones, he gently lifted her, separating their bodies. The night air was cool on her damp skin. Wordlessly, he gathered her shift, then picked her up, cradling her against him as if she weighed nothing. He carried her through the palace’s silent, darkened corridors, not to their bedroom, but to the marble bathroom where warm, scented steam already curled from the sunken tub.
Prince Idris’s staff were ghosts who anticipated needs. Dema lowered her into the water. It was the perfect temperature, laced with sandalwood and something citrus-clean. He knelt on the mosaic tile, the muscles in his back and shoulders moving like tectonic plates as he reached for a sponge and a cake of soap.
“I can wash,” she murmured, but her hands felt like lead weights.
He ignored her, his touch beginning at her feet. He worked with a concentration that bordered on reverence, massaging the soap into her arches, between each toe. His hands, which could break a man’s neck with a single twist, were impossibly soft. He moved up her calves, her thighs, washing away the evidence of their joining, the sweat of the desert night. The water turned milky around her.
She watched his face. In the low, golden light of the fountain, he looked ancient, carved from the same stone as the tub. His brow was furrowed, his mouth a tight line.
“It was different,” she said softly. “On the terrace. It was just us.”
He knew what she meant. He always did. His hand stilled on her knee. A muscle in his jaw jumped.
The memory was a stain no soap could reach. The pit. The blinding, white-hot floodlights. The stench of cheap vodka, unwashed bodies, and blood. They had dragged her in, a prize for the champion. They had forced her to her knees in the sawdust, right where a man had died an hour before. The cold press of a knife to her throat. Show us how the beast fucks his princess. Dema, standing across the ring, his hands bound in chain-links, his eyes not on the leering crowd, but on her. Empty. Dead. They’d poured cheap salt vodka into her mouth until she choked. The taste of it, the bitterness, was the taste of violation.
He hadn’t fought. He’d walked forward, his movements mechanical. He had done what they asked. He had saved her life and shattered something in himself to do it. Afterwards, he had carried her away, trembling and retching, and for months he would not touch her, flinching from her own hands as if her skin burned him.
She reached for him now, her wet fingers grazing the scarred knuckles of the hand holding the sponge.
He caught her wrist, not roughly, but firmly. He shook his head. A silent, steadfast refusal. He would not let her service him, not like that. It was the one line he would not cross, the ghost he kept at bay.
“Let me,” she whispered, not pulling away. “Let me touch you. Please, Dema. For me. Not for them.”
His eyes closed. A tremor ran through him. He released her wrist.
She moved in the water, kneeling before him. The tub was wide, the water lapping at her chest. She took the sponge from his hand, dropped it. She reached for the tie of his loose trousers, the only garment he’d pulled on. He was already hard again, a thick, heavy weight in her hands as she freed him. The sight of him, ruddy and straining in the steamy air, sent a liquid pull low in her belly.
“Look at me,” she said, echoing her words from the terrace.
He opened his eyes. The pain and the love in them were indistinguishable.
She didn’t use her mouth. That memory was too sharp, too salt-bitter. Instead, she leaned forward, guiding him with her hand, and rubbed the head of his cock against her lips, her cheek, smearing the bead of moisture there. She painted herself with him, a claiming in reverse. A soft, filthy groan escaped him.
“You are mine,” she whispered against his skin, her breath hot. “This is mine.” She tightened her fist around the base, feeling the pulse of him. “Not theirs. Ours.”
She began to stroke him, slowly at first, learning the rhythm that made his breath catch. Her other hand cupped him underneath, feeling the tight, heavy weight of his balls. He braced his arms on the edge of the tub, his head hanging forward, watching her work him. His breaths came in ragged gusts.
“Fuck, Anya,” he gritted out, his voice strained.
She sped up, her wrist twisting on the upstroke, her thumb smearing over the slick tip. Precum slicked her movements, the sound wet and obscene in the steamy room. She watched him unravel, this giant of a man brought to trembling ruin by her thin, fragile hands.
“I want you to come,” she breathed, her own arousal a throbbing echo between her legs. “I want to see it. I want to taste it.”
That undid him. With a choked-off roar, his hips jerked forward. Thick, hot streaks jetted across her collarbone, her shoulder, a few drops landing on her chin. She kept milking him through it, until he was spent, shuddering, his body slumping against the marble.
For a moment, there was only the sound of the fountain and their breathing.
Then, with a gentleness that belied his animal release, he reached for a clean cloth, wet it, and began to clean her skin. He washed his spend from her, his touch meticulous. When he was done, he leaned forward and kissed her shoulder, right where a drop had landed.
“Spasibo,” he murmured into her skin. Thank you.
He stripped off his trousers and slid into the tub behind her, pulling her back against his chest. The water rose, warm and embracing. He nuzzled her wet hair, his arms a fortress around her.
She felt his lips curve against her temple. A smile. Rare and precious.
“Good?” she asked softly.
“Good,” he confirmed, the word a deep vibration in his chest.
But the peace was brittle. As they sat in the water, the distant sound of a helicopter thumped in the air, growing louder, then fading. Not Idris’s usual transport. Something heavier. Dema’s arms tightened around her. He didn’t speak. He didn’t need to.
The phone had stopped ringing. The world outside was moving again. Their borrowed calm was already leaking away, like the steam from the water, vanishing into the dark.