Forbidden Craving: The Nymph King / The Beautiful Ashes. Gena Showalter

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      Eyes full of innocence, she said, “Nymph... Ohs.”

      Frustrating female.

      “So, what are we going to do about Joachim?” she asked. “Don’t tell me we’ll deal with him when he wakes up. Give me an answer this time. I hate not knowing our plan.”

      We and our, she’d said. Not I. Not your. But we and our.

      He liked that she considered him a partner in this. “Worry not. We will do whatever is necessary to remain together.”

      “Whatever is necessary.... Are you talking about—” she gulped “—committing cold-blooded murder?”

      “Yes.” He kicked a pile of clothing out of the way and turned a corner. “But I would swing the blade, and you would merely watch.”

      “Yeah, because that’s the problem I had with the plan.” She sighed. “Is cold-blooded murder not a crime here?”

      “The strong govern the weak. If the weak refuse to obey, they must be pruned from the vine. In what way would it be crime?”

      “And you wonder why I want to go home,” she muttered.

      He wished he could wipe her memory of the surface world! “You will never be harmed here.”

      “Because you plan to protect me. Yeah, yeah. But I’m sure I’m considered a weakling to the rest of your world. At least physically. So what’s to stop the strong from attempting to govern me when you aren’t around?”

      “You are my queen. You govern others. They do not govern you.”

      A fresh, warm scent wafted to him just before the dining hall came into view, the table piled with food. The male centaurs and Minotaurs he’d hired from the Outer City had prepared a feast to welcome the new additions to the household.

      Shaye’s stomach growled, and he experienced a flicker of guilt. He hadn’t fed her dinner.

      He would have to take better care of her in the future. His woman should never go hungry.

      “Usually at this time of day, my warriors surround the table,” he said. Now he and Shaye were alone. Even the servants were gone. “You’ll have to wait to test your power.”

      “One, I’m not your queen yet. Two, I don’t want to order anyone around.”

      His pulse leaped. She’d said yet! “You order me around all the time.”

      “Supposed queen, remember?” she said and fluffed her hair. “If you don’t like my rule, you can cut me loose.”

      He snorted.

      She eased into the chair at the head of the table and eyed him. Expecting him to balk, he was sure. When he didn’t, she shrugged and filled a plate with food.

      As she swallowed a bite of coconut cream, her eyes closed in sweet surrender. “Oh, wow. Who prepared this? Surely not your army. They may look like beefcake, but I seriously doubt they know how to cook it.”

      “As if I would allow my men to cook,” he said, filling a plate of his own before taking the chair beside hers. “They would inadvertently poison us.”

      She popped a grape into her mouth. “So...you’re a chauvinist. Your men belong on the battlefield but never in the kitchen.”

      “Not even close. Food can mean the difference between life and death.” He leaned back and bit into a strawberry. How he would have loved to trace the fruit over her lips and lick the juice away. “The kitchen is a battlefield in its own right. My men simply have no real talent for it.”

      “Perhaps they’re too much like you. Arrogant, bossy, pigheaded, stubborn, half-witted, spoiled, demanding, self-absorbed and morally corrupt.”

      When she paused for breath, he grumbled, “Is that all?”

      “No. Horny. Overbearing. Mean.” She paused, tapped a finger against her lips before nodding. “That’s all.”

      “‘Mean’?” He frowned. “I’ve been the epitome of nice, catering to your every whim.”

      “Did you not steal me from my home? Have you not refused over and over again to return me?”

      He tossed his arms up. “This again.”

      “This always.”

      “Perhaps I can give you something better to think about.” He leaned forward and placed his hand on her thigh; she sucked in a breath.

      What she didn’t do? Rebuke him.

      Slowly, languidly, he slid his fingers higher. He stopped only a few inches away from the center of both their worlds.

      “Shall we bargain, sweet Shaye?”

      The pink tip of her tongue swiped over her lips and almost proved his undoing. “I’m listening.”

      “Give me time.” Would she find ten years objectionable? Five? Probably. He sighed. “A year. A mere blip in a lifetime. If I fail to win your affections, I’ll return you to the surface.”

      “You’re kidding, right?” She bit into a strawberry of her own. “By the end of that year, I would be considered dead. My business would fail. My home would be sold. My bank accounts would be emptied.”

      He tensed with incomparable need, once again overcome by the desire to lick juice off her lips and chin...to dribble the sweet but tart droplets into her navel...between her legs. She would writhe as his tongue followed every path taken by the liquid. She would tunnel her hands through his hair while her knees squeezed his temples.

      “Valerian?” She snapped her fingers in front of his face.

      He blinked. Their gazes met...heated.

      She had to suspect the direction his mind had gone—and she had to like it. Her pupils were blown, those velvety-brown irises utterly consumed.

      “How long do you propose?” he asked, his voice more of a growl than anything.

      She shifted in her seat, uncomfortable. “A week.”

      Risk losing her forever for a mere seven days of her company? No! “Six months.”

      “You ask for far too much.”

      “I ask for far too little when I long to demand an eternity.”

      A moment passed in heavy silence. Then she grated, “If I’m going to consider this bargain thing, I need to know a few things first.”

      “Anything.”

      She arched a brow. “Be honest. Do you want to wear my skin?”

      “Pardon?”

      “Yes or no? I have to know how deep this stalker slash creeper thing goes.”

      “No?”

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