House of Sky and Breath (Crescent City #2) by Sarah J. Maas

“Yeah?”

“Yeah,” she said, and he punished her for the sass in her voice by licking her again, drawing another gasp. “Ruhn.”

Fuck, he loved his name on her lips. He slipped a finger into her, finding her mind-meltingly tight. She was going to drive him wild.

She tugged on his shoulders, hauling him up. “Please,” she said, and he hissed as her fingers wrapped around his cock and guided him to her entrance.

He halted there, poised on the brink. “Tell me what you like,” he said, kissing her neck. “Tell me how you want it.”

“I like it true,” she said, hands running down his face. “I want it real.”

So Ruhn slid home, crying out at the sheer perfection of her. She groaned, arching, and Ruhn stilled. “Did I hurt you?”

“No,” she whispered, hands framing his face as he hovered above her. “No. Not at all.”

The pressure of her around his cock was too much, too gloriously intense—“I can go slow.” He couldn’t. He really fucking couldn’t, but for her, he’d try.

She laughed softly. “Please don’t.”

He withdrew nearly to the tip and pushed back in with a smooth, steady thrust. He nearly leapt out of his skin at the rippling pleasure.

Her hands dug into his shoulders, and Day said, “You feel better than I even dreamed.”

Ruhn smiled into her neck. “You dreamed about this?”

He thrust again, sinking to the hilt, and she gasped. “Yes,” she said, as if his cock had wrung the word from her. “Every night. Every time I had to …” She trailed off. But Ruhn claimed her mouth, kissing her as deeply as he fucked her. He didn’t need her to say the rest, the part that would smash something in his chest.

Ruhn angled her hips so he could drive deeper still, and she reached up above her to clutch at the rolled arm of the chaise. “Ruhn,” she moaned again, a warning that she was close—and echoed it with a flex of her delicate inner muscles.

The squeeze had him grabbing her hands in his and slamming home. Her hips undulated in perfect rhythm with his, and nothing had ever felt so good, so real as their souls twining here—

“Come for me,” he breathed against her mouth, as he reached between them to rub the bud of her clit in a taunting circle.

Day cried out, and those inner muscles fluttered and clenched around his cock, milking him—

Release barreled through him, and Ruhn didn’t hold back as he pounded into her, wringing the pleasure from both of them. They kept moving, one orgasm rolling into the next, and he had no fucking idea how it was even possible, but he was still hard, still going, and he needed more and more and more of her—

He erupted again, hauling her with him.

Their breaths echoed against each other like crashing waves, and she was shaking as she held him. He lowered himself so his head rested upon her chest. Her heartbeat thundered into his ear, and even the melody of that was beautiful.

Her fingers tangled in his hair. “I …”

“I know,” Ruhn said. It had never been like that with anyone. Sex had been good, yeah, but this … He was fairly certain his soul lay in splinters around them. He kissed the skin above her breast. “I should have asked you if you had anything to report first.”

“Why?”

“Because my mind’s too fried to remember anything after this point.”

Another one of those soft laughs. “All is quiet. No word on Pippa Spetsos after she eluded capture at Urd’s Temple.”

“Good. Though I guess we could use a distraction to keep attention elsewhere.”

“From what?”

Ruhn toyed with the strands of her long hair, trying to make out the texture, the color. All was pure flame. “I’m coming your way.”

She stilled. “What do you mean?”

“We need to get into the Asteri Archives.”

“Why?”

“The vital intel Sofie Renast possessed is likely in one of the rooms there.”

She pushed up onto her elbows. “What?”

He pulled out of her and said, “Any intel on the layout of the crystal palace or the archives, since you’re so familiar with them … we’d appreciate it.”

“You’re going to break into the crystal palace. Into the archives.”

“Yes.”

“Ruhn.” She grabbed his face in her hands. “Ruhn, do not go there. They will kill you. All of you.”

“Hence the need for attention to be elsewhere while we break in.”

Her fingers dug into his cheeks, and her heart pounded so wildly he could hear it. “It’s got to be a trap.”

“No one knows except people I trust. And now you.”

She shot to her feet, again wholly veiled in flame. “If you’re caught, I cannot help you. I won’t be able to risk saving you. Or your sister. You’re on your own.”

His temper began simmering. “So you won’t tell me anything useful about the layout.”

“Ruhn, I—”

Again, that awful hiss of surprise and pain. That glance behind her.

To him. The male.

Ruhn grabbed her hand, like she could stay with him. But she began panting, wild and frantic. Terrified. “Ruhn, they know. I—” Her voice cut out for a moment. “The dungeons—”