Savage Lessons (Temple of Luna #3) Read online

  Every one of those thrusts hit her G-spot, and she tried not to collapse under him. Nothing had ever felt so good, but she didn't want it to end. "More, Dejan."

  "Come." A snarled command, steely and firm, and she couldn't resist.

  Pleasure churned deep inside her, tightening into a knot of heat that made her shake. He thrust one more time and the knot exploded, sending the heat rippling through her, head to toe. Lexa clutched the chains and screamed.

  She faintly felt the sting of his teeth, digging into her shoulder as he snarled. Warm, rough fingers centered on her clit, rubbed slow, deliberate circles that twisted pleasure higher.

  She rode the inconceivable swell of pleasure for what seemed like forever, orgasm after orgasm, and Dejan through it all, whispering and growling and taking her...

  Something inside her snapped, the final tiny piece of herself that she'd kept hidden. She accepted him, wolf and woman, and a burst of inviting magic rose between them.

  "Yes." He slammed into her, then dragged her up to his chest with a snarl of triumph. His arms locked around her, and he buried his face against her neck. His teeth bit into her skin, and she shuddered as he jerked inside her and groaned her name, his release evidencing itself in a hot, satisfied rush of dominant magic.

  Warmth spread through her, and her muscles wouldn't hold her anymore. She went lax in Dejan's arms, the chains binding her wrists clinking. "Oh."

  "Mmm." He eased her back to the bed, and she felt the brush of his fingers as he freed her from her bindings. His hand stroked over her arm, down her back and along her side. "Rest."

  "Rest." Lexa tucked her cheek against one of the plush pillows and sighed. Her brain had gone fuzzy, and she could barely move. "That's a good idea."

  He moved off the bed, but she didn't stir. Surely he'd come back, and she could curl up in his arms and sleep.

  Chapter Two

  He didn't even have the courage to report to Celine in person.

  Dejan sent a message -- text instead of video -- and fled to the wing of the Temple devoted to the trainers' living space. Forty minutes under the pounding spray of the shower and another twenty spent pacing the confines of the trainers' garden gave Celine plenty of time to send a message if she chose.

  She didn't, which could mean Lexa was in worse shape than he'd feared -- terrified or injured or --

  "Thought you'd be tied up all night." Hektor, one of the other trainers, sat down on a bench nearby. "Kweku said you'd been tapped to take over with Lexa."

  Dejan considered snarling, but Hektor wouldn't be intimidated. "Are you gossiping like a novice now?"

  Hektor raised both eyebrows and stared at him. "Just making conversation. What's eating you?"

  "She's a novice. Celine has lost her mind, sending me a novice."

  The older man shrugged. "She's not just any novice. She's going straight to the silver robes. Everyone knows it."

  No one went straight to silver robes, not even Celine. "That's absurd. She's too young for that."

  "Don't think age figures into it. Not this time."

  If Celine shoved Lexa into silver robes, it would be a disaster. His loss of control was his own responsibility, but Lexa had wormed her way under his skin, prodded him with the perfect mix of challenge and submission.

  Wouldn't that make Hektor's words true? a tiny, reasonable voice asked. She'd wrenched away his control with singular skill. If anyone deserved a silver robe, it was Lexa.

  Assuming he hadn't hurt her when he'd taken her.

  Dejan closed his eyes and sank to the ground. "I let her push more than she should have."

  Hektor said nothing for a moment. "Good Goddess, Dej, what happened?"

  He'd lost his head. Lost control. Taken her like a man crazed for touch instead of a teacher testing a student. "I don't know. Celine is with her now."

  "I don't understand."

  Of course he wouldn't. Dejan scrubbed a hand across his face and wondered how many showers he'd have to take before the scent of her skin faded completely. "I don't know."

  "Shit." Hektor rose, his boots thumping on the walk. "Do -- Do you want me to go check?"

  "No. Celine will summon me when she's good and ready." And probably make him wait in misery as punishment.

  His colleague looked skeptical. "Can I do anything?"

  "No."

  Hektor backed away at his surly response. "Then I'll be on my way."

  It meant brooding on his own, but Dejan preferred that. He didn't bother to apologize as Hektor took his leave, too intent on the tablet he'd dumped on the grass next to him. It would chime soon, indicating a message from Celine. It would.

  It had to, because he wouldn't survive if his carelessness had damaged the brilliant power in Lexa's body.

  When Lexa woke, the room was dark. She could barely make out the outline of someone sitting in a chair by the bed, but her senses told her it was Celine, not Dejan.

  She sat up, clutching the sheets to her chest. "What are you doing here?"

  Celine glanced up from the tablet in her hands, her expression guarded. "How do you feel?"

  Her muscles were a little sore, but she mostly felt tired. "I'm fine, Celine. Is this part of my test?" There had to be a reason Dejan had left without a word.

  The high priestess's tension eased, but only marginally. "No. I'm not sure if I should commend you or turn you over my knee right now. Do you understand what you did?"

  Lexa trembled as she swung her legs off the edge of the bed. "Something wrong, I take it?"

  "Something inadvisable for a novice." Celine tapped her tablet and held it out. "I'd like you to read the message I received from Dejan."

  The message was terse and heartbreaking. Snapped. Lexa seems physically unharmed but there could be damage. You were out of your mind to trust me with a novice, and I'm never going to forgive either of us for it.

  Lexa bit her lip. Her pride had pushed her to push him, and what she'd given him was a far cry from the comfort a priestess was supposed to provide.

  Something inside her protested the harsh judgment, whispered that what she'd offered hadn't felt wrong or calculated. It had felt like freedom.

  But his words were unmistakable. She felt lighter than she had in years, but Dejan was in torment, damning himself for what he'd taken at her request. It was unforgivably selfish, to take pleasure and deliver pain in return.

  She handed the tablet back to Celine. "I have no excuse."

  Celine's smile was gentle. "You need no excuse. You did the job of a priestess, even though you're yet a novice. Dejan's suffering is the result of a colossal ego and the delusion that no woman can ever be his equal, much less best him."

  That wasn't quite true, but Lexa only nodded. "What do we do now?"

  "Leave Dejan to me. You're going to be busy packing your things."

  Packing. She panicked until she realized what Celine must mean. She'd be moving to other quarters, out of the wing housing the novices and initiates. "No more tests or training?"

  "You set a test I never would have given you." Celine rose and tucked the tablet into her belt. "And you passed beyond any expectation. You should be proud."

  Yes, she should have been. But the expected surge of triumph didn't come. Instead, she felt oddly empty. "The announcement will be made at dinner?"

  "Mmm. Unless you're not feeling up to it...?"

  "No, that's fine." She had to accept her ceremonial goblet in front of the Temple, before she could receive her robes. "I look forward to it."

  Celine started toward the door, but paused after a few steps and turned. "You are all right, aren't you?"

  Lexa forced a smile. "I'm fine. This is a big achievement, that's all."

  "Of course. I'll let Dejan know that you're fine. And I promise you he'll be fine, too."

  She sounded confident, and Lexa only wished she shared the feeling.

  By the time Celine motioned for Lexa to approach the head table, the place of honor reserved for the most
elite priestesses of the Temple, people had already begun to talk.

  Dejan's gaze followed her, intense enough to feel like a hot caress. He sat with the other trainers at their table in the corner, a lone circle of masculinity in the sea of women.

  Most everyone had kept their comments and speculation out of earshot, but Lexa knew they could only be saying one thing. Dejan's stare was too blatant, too obvious to allow for too much interpretation.

  She held her head high as she walked to the front table and knelt before it. "Thank you for the invitation, Celine."

  "Lexa." The high priestess gestured with one graceful hand. "A silver robed priestess kneels only before her King and her Goddess. Come and sit with us."

  The hush in the dining hall was deafening, and Lexa fought the blush that rose as she took an empty seat at the end of the table.

  It left her with a clear line of sight to Dejan, who hesitated for an endless moment as silence turned to whispers, whispers to scattered applause. Someone shouted a congratulations, someone else laughed in delight. Dejan inclined his head, a slow, graceful nod that gave respect even as lust burned in his eyes.

  A shudder took her. She still wanted him and, this time, it had nothing to do with her ambition. It had everything to do with the way he'd touched her, and the way he watched her now.

  Sudden, savage anger rocked her. She'd finished her training now, and dalliances between priestesses and trainers were forbidden. She could never have him again, and he'd deprived her of the few slow, lazy minutes she could have spent with him still inside her, his skin against hers.

  He'd cheated her.

  Lexa lifted her chin and glared at him.

  His jaw clenched. The strong, dangerous hands he'd stroked over her body fisted on the table, but he met her challenge and returned it, the cocky tilt of one eyebrow comment enough.

  If she knew what was good for her, she'd ignore him. Forget he even existed. Instead, she lifted her new silver goblet and licked the rim before taking a delicate sip of wine.

  The look he gave her could have singed the clothes off her back.

  The woman to her left cleared her throat, and the sound jolted Lexa into looking away. She'd have to watch herself, or everyone at the Temple would think there was something going on between her and Dejan.

  And there wasn't. There couldn't be.

  There wouldn't be.

  By the time the evening meal ended, Dejan didn't know if he wanted to kill himself or Celine. All he knew for certain was that Lexa gazed on him like a woman torn between rage and lust, and his body ached with the possibilities.

  She was furious, and he didn't blame her. He'd earned her ire a hundred times over, but when she gazed at him in pure, feminine challenge, the beast inside refused to back down. He'd snapped. He'd claimed.

  Now he needed. And could not have.

  Or should not have. The rules of the Temple were important, but rules were nothing when weighed against the feral hunger inside him. Not just the need to possess, but to comfort. To reassure himself that he hadn't hurt her, body or mind.

  He might not be sure if he wanted to kill Celine, but Celine would almost certainly murder him if she discovered him lurking in an alcove, waiting for the newest priestess of Luna.

  He smelled her before he saw her -- the clean, floral scent of her perfume, the soft musk of her skin. And, underneath it all, the traces of him. Proof she'd accepted his claim, at least a little, because outright rejection would have purged the lingering feel of his magic twined with hers.

  She stopped short and took a half step back. "Dejan," she murmured, her voice husky and low.

  It was so easy to reach out and tug her into the alcove. The hallway was private, but not private enough to eliminate the risk. She was a priestess, now. Off limits to a trainer.

  When she lifted her face and met his eyes, all traces of her anger had vanished. She looked wary instead. Cautious.

  He lifted a hand and traced the curve of her cheek, reveling in the soft skin under his fingertips. "I'm sorry."

  The firm line of her mouth softened. "You have nothing to apologize for."

  "No?" He let his hand fall away. "I would disagree."

  Lexa turned her head, averting her gaze and leaving him staring at the bare, tempting line of her throat. "You did your job."

  "No. I did not." He caught her chin and urged her to look at him. "If I'd done my job, I would have spent a week learning you. Maybe more. I wouldn't have lost my grip on sanity and forced you to do the job of a priestess while you were yet a novice."

  Her breath caught. "It doesn't matter. The end result is the same."

  Not for them. His craving for her continued unabated. So many things he'd never done, so many ways he hadn't gotten a chance to touch her. He slid his thumb over her full lower lip and inhaled the heady scent of her. "No. It's not."

  The anger she was taking such obvious pains to hide broke through. "Then perhaps you shouldn't have run from the training room as soon as you were done with me."

  He deserved it, but he hadn't expected her pain to tear at him quite so much. "It wasn't like that, but I'm apologizing for that too."

  "Celine showed me your message."

  Celine was a meddlesome bitch. "It wasn't my finest moment. I was worried."

  "You wouldn't have had to be if you'd stayed."

  "You could have been hurt. Or scared. Celine would have thrown me from the Temple if I took chances with your welfare."

  Lexa stepped away, into the hallway. "So you left? That seems like a bizarre way to make sure someone's all right."

  He winced, because it sounded callous. "There are protocols in place that I hope you never understand."

  She seemed to consider that. "Fair enough." She took another step. "I accept your apology."

  "And you run."

  She didn't bother to argue. "I run."

  "From a half-feral wolf." Surely she knew what instincts she'd rouse, what torture it would be to keep himself from giving chase.

  Her eyes flashed anger again, though she quickly lowered her lashes to disguise it. "I have no choice."

  Footsteps echoed down the hallway, and he dragged her deeper into the alcove, tucking them both tight into the shadows. She gripped his shoulders, her nails sharp through his clothing, and finally opened her eyes when the intruding footsteps faded.

  She was breathing fast and shallow, her full breasts outlined under thin white robes, and a shudder ran through her. "This is impossible."

  "Impossible," he agreed, pressing her back into the wall, pressing his body to hers. "This is impossible."

  Lexa trembled. Then she moaned, buried her face against his neck and bit him. Hard.

  Pleasure swelled, intense and exhilarating , and strong enough to overcome reason. He fisted his hand in the thick strands of her hair and snarled as he wondered how long her mark would linger.

  When she released him, it was only to drag him down for a fierce kiss. She tilted her head to fit her mouth to his, her body softening, eager for touch.

  Too eager for an unprotected hallway. Not nearly eager enough for the need that throbbed inside him. He needed to reclaim sanity, reclaim his hard-won control, but the beast rode hard and close to the surface, hungry for the woman he'd only been allowed to taste.

  "Not here." Her hands opened and closed on the back of his shirt, kneading like a cat. "They gave me a -- a new room. Do you know where?"

  If he was caught going in or out of it she'd suffer, lose what status she'd fought so hard to gain. "Not your room. The gardens. Meet me tonight."

  She licked her lips. "What time?"

  "The third chime." Late enough that no one would be about but servants bringing meals and wine to priestesses and the warriors they entertained.

  "Yes." Lexa kissed him one last time and jerked away to hurry down the hall.

  Celine was going to murder him, and the beast was too pleased to care.

  Lexa held her breath as she ducked around a
corner to avoid two gossiping servants. The path to the trainers' gardens had been anything but clear, and every near miss ratcheted up the tension inside her.

  Now I know why people always find illicit things so delicious. Her body throbbed with anticipation already, and she refused to believe that all of that unbearable arousal was due to the fact that Dejan waited for her.

  He couldn't affect her that much, because she couldn't afford to lose herself in him.

  Of course not. That's why you're jeopardizing everything you've worked for just to touch him again.

  Lexa cursed and hurried through the door to the gardens.

  A hand caught hers at once, but when she turned Dejan held a finger to his lips, his face barely visible in the shimmering light from the moon. He tugged her deeper into the gardens, past a burbling fountain and a bench surrounded by gently swaying wind chimes that filled the night with soft music.

  "Here," he said finally, dragging her between two tall, twisting trees. Their branches met overhead, but just beyond them lay a lush circle of grass bathed in silvered light. The tall stone wall that ringed the trainers' garden sat beyond it, softened by ivy climbing subtle wooden trellises.

  Her heart pounded. She gripped his hand tighter. "Are you certain, Dejan? That you want this?"

  "That I want you?" A sharp tug brought her body tight against his, his chest to her back, and she felt the hot, unyielding press of his erection.

  Desire left her weak, her tongue thick, but she forced out the words anyway. "No, that you want me like this. It's dangerous."

  "And yet you're here."

  "Did you really think I could stay away?" She caught his hand and pulled it down, closer to where wet heat gathered between her thighs.

  His hoarse chuckle rasped out of his throat, stirring the hair at her temple. "You ask my question, and yet you don't know the answer."

  There was only one answer, only one thing that mattered, and it was easy to confess in the dark solitude of the garden. "I need you, Dejan."