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Hiding none of my aversion toward the tome, my entire demeanor shifted into one far more guarded.
“Which book?” His pleasure to hear me speak to him was apparent, rampant, his every expression coaxing me to keep going.
The dreadful book bound in blue vorec leather. “Your Manual on Young Mates.”
Fingertips landing between my bare breasts, a featherlight stroke ran down my flat stomach. “What about the book displeases you?”
“It was written to guide hybrid men in techniques to trick an inexperienced girl into submission.” Horrible and effective. Cyderial had proven the book's lessons produced results as promised. “How can you trade knowledge that reduces a female to a concept—one that could be fed, watered, and fucked? You made a study of the author’s suggestions, followed his advice… and I reacted exactly how the manual claimed I would.”
It made me feel like more of a prized collectible than a person. “You want another secret? I’m mortified females can be so easily manipulated. I’m ashamed you wield such an unfair advantage. And I’m depressed to realize that the first time I awoke in your house, it was that very book you studied.” I felt my lip quiver as even the parts of me so thoroughly seduced in the shower retreated. “You did it all as the author instructed—delicious food, soothing drink, physical touch, banter, sexual pleasure. How dare males share such knowledge that is hidden from us females.”
He cocked a brow. “If I do not study, how can I ensure I do not make the same mistakes as those who came before me?”
Catching his exploratory touch before male fingertips might dare touch where they were not welcome, I warned, “You say you love me?—”
“I do!” Quickly spoken and with grave intensity, he cupped my jaw, assuring he had my full attention as he repeated it. “I do love you, Lorieyn.”
“That’s not love. That is war. You have waged war on me from the day we met.”
All gentleness and ease, he pulled me closer for a cuddle. “What do you know of war, you beautiful, fragile thing?”
I knew being fucked by a well-studied mate had been indescribably pleasurable. Which gave me good reason to fear the addiction might grow beyond my physical need for his fluids to soothe my heat. I might even begin to confuse his attention with intimacy, when I had no one else to talk to.
It might change me.
Allowing myself to indulge in the comfort he offered, knowing it was wrong, I heard a tremor in my voice. “I’m going to miss my sisters, and it hurts to think of it. They love me, Cyderial, in a way you never could. You took me away from them.”
“I do not doubt they will miss you in the barracks.” A deep breath stretched his ribs, exhaled on a sigh as his arms became all the tighter around me. “But need I remind you that you were going to abandon your sisters for the fog?”
Shame ran in a shiver under my skin, a fair reminder I had chosen myself over the collective. “I envy males. You hear a song and know. Females are left ignorant, not only by nature but by the men who say they love us. Why do we not have such books? How am I to learn to handle you? All we are is shut away, locked in a vault to slowly go crazy until dreams of escape tempt us to wander the academy halls at night, lonely, knowing something is very wrong but having no clue what it might be.”
Solemn in his reply, he stroked wet hair from my face. “You will not be lonely anymore. You will not go hungry. You will be denied nothing I can give you for your benefit.”
And that was the issue I needed answering. “Who decides what benefits me?”
A fair question.
“I do.”
There it was. Verbal confirmation of how tenuous my position was. A powerful man with a wealth of knowledge, a disgust for humans, and an eagerness for physical pleasure would decide what he believed was best for me.
With the inquisitive gaze of a student eager to challenge her teacher, I prepared my mind with a real consideration of the hours I had spent in his presence since being mated. I navigated each remembered interaction. Cyderial had provided everything I’d asked for and a great many things I had not.
Promises of a comfortable lifetime as his stolen mate.
“Let me show you all will be well.” With that, his mouth fell to mine to feast upon my troubled words until I was breathless and shamelessly making sounds that betrayed how much his touch could undo me.
Less than forty-eight hours had passed since I awoke in his house, and still, my breath caught on a moan when he palmed my breast and blatantly employed another trick he must have known I read in his filthy book.
And it worked.
My insides were fluttering, my pelvis tilting, and a very small part of me prayed he’d force me down upon his cock.
Even if he scared me senseless.
Indeed, I was doomed.
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