로그인EMBER’S POVThe stretch burns so good. He’s so thick I feel every ridge, every inch forcing me open, and he doesn’t give me time to adjust.He just starts fucking me—hard, fast, the same way he fights.Every thrust slams me back into the mat, the wet sound of my cunt taking him loud and filthy between us.I’m soaked, dripping around him, and the way he fills me has my toes curling inside my shoes.His hand grips my thigh and shoves it wider. The other plants beside my head, caging me in.His face hovers right above mine, jaw tight, eyes locked on every flutter of my lashes, every broken sound I make while he pounds into me.He watches me like he’s memorising exactly how I look when he’s ruining me.“Take it,” he growls, voice rough. “Fucking take every inch. My beautiful clever girl.”I claw at his back, nails sinking in. He fucks me harder.The slap of skin, the way his cock drags over that spot inside me again and again, the heavy press of his body pinning me down—it’s overwhelming.
EMBER’S POVWe drill it.The throat, the knee, the eyes, over and over, his hands correcting, his voice merciless, and slowly — I feel it happen — something in my body starts to understand.The motions stop being separate things I’m remembering and start being one thing I’m doing.My hits land cleaner. My feet stop betraying me. He stops saying “dead” quite so often, which, from Knox, is basically a standing ovation.And that’s when I get the idea.Because he’s still faster than me, still stronger, still winning every exchange, and I am never going to out-muscle this man, not today, not in a year, not ever.But this morning has been one long lesson in exactly one thing, hasn’t it? You don’t fight fair. You find the thing that breaks.And I spent this whole morning cataloguing the one weakness the Lycan King has that no amount of muscle can armour.Me.So the next time he steps in to correct my stance, the next time he says “drop your shoulder, you’re carrying tension in your—” I let m
EMBER’S POV“…Sapphire?”“You channelled her before. On that bird. You reached in, and you pulled, and it nearly took your head off because you did it in a panic with no control.” He circles me slowly. “So we do it here. On purpose. Under control. You reach for her the way you reach for anything — deliberately — and you let just enough of her into your hands. Not a flood. A thread. You’re going to learn the difference between calling her and drowning in her, and you’re going to learn it in a room where the only thing you can hurt is me.”“I don’t — I don’t know how to do it on purpose, it just—”“Then find out.” There is no sympathy. None. “Close your eyes. Stop thinking about your hands. Go looking for the cold.”I close my eyes.And I go looking.Down, into the place where she lives, past the noise and the ache in my shoulders, into the dark — and she’s there, she’s always there, that vast proud silver presence.And I feel her turn toward me, feel her attention sharpen like a blade
EMBER’S POVWhere we’re going turns out to be a room in the sub level I didn’t know existed, all matted floor and low light and the specific smell of a place where people hurt each other on purpose.It’s cold. I’m still half-asleep. I hate everything.“So how does this—” I start, and he’s already moving.“Stance.” He circles behind me. “Feet apart. Wider. Weight back on your heels, not your toes, or the first person who touches you puts you on the floor.” His hands land on my hips.And my entire brain shorts out.Because his hands are large, and they are warm even through the fabric.They close over the curve of my hips and adjust me, tilting, squaring, and his chest comes up flush against my back, solid and unhurried, and his mouth drops to my ear.“Centre of gravity here,” he says, low, clinical, one hand pressing flat and warm against my lower belly. “You fight from here, not from your shoulders. Feel it?”What I feel is that I have forgotten how lungs work. What I feel is the enti
EMBER’S POV“Up.”The word arrives from somewhere in the dark, attached to a hand that closes around my ankle and pulls.And I go from a warm and blameless sleep to halfway down the bed in the space of a heartbeat, clawing at sheets, making a sound I would describe as dignified and Knox would describe as a goose being stepped on.“Wha—” I flail upright, hair in my face, heart slamming. “What. What’s wrong? Who’s dying? Is it Rafael? Is it—”“Nothing’s wrong.” The lamp clicks on, and there he is, standing at the foot of the bed, fully dressed, arms crossed, looking like a man who has been awake for hours and has opinions about people who aren’t. “Get up. Get dressed. Something you can move in.”I stare at him. I stare at the window, where it is black. Fully, unapologetically black. Not a hint of grey. The kind of black that has never heard of morning.“It’s night,” I inform him.“It’s five am”“That’s night, Knox, that’s the middle of the—” I scrub a hand down my face. “Why are you dre
EMBER’S POV“I need to make calls. If he’s reaching into a public street in daylight, if he’s got people carrying his messages three feet from you, then the perimeter is already compromised. We need to check the street surveillance. Where exactly were you at the time? I want the intersection, the timestamp, everything. Where was your detail? If they were standing more than a foot away from you, I will personally strip them of their rank and throw them in the cells. If he can get a messenger that close, he could have gotten a blade that close. We need to lock down the estate. No one gets in or out. I don’t care if the entire Council is waiting at the gates, I need to—”“Knox.”“—get a team watching the stranger too. I need to run his background check and ensure he is truly clean. Fcuk—” He stops and drags a hand hard through his hair. And when he turns back to me, the King cracks for a second, and the man underneath shows through, raw, all the fear he keeps locked under the crown bleed
KNOX’S POVHe blinks, the picture of innocence. “I’m not sure I understand. I explained the purpose quite clearly at the beginning of the evening. Conflict resolution. Closure. An opportunity for all parties to—”“Bullshit.”The word is deadpan, and I see Logan’s head snap up, see Gale’s sobbing st
EMBER’S POVI slump back into my seat unconsciously, not realizing how rigidly I’d been holding myself until the tension drains away.Knox lifts our entwined hands to his lips and presses a kiss to my knuckles, his eyes on me.It slows the tightening in my chest. Loosens the knot that Harrison’s qu
EMBER’S POVI stare down at Knox on his knees, my pulse slamming so hard I can feel it between my legs. He's grinning up at me like a wolf who's already tasted blood, gold eyes glowing, fangs just barely peeking past his lip.I fold my arms, pretending my thighs aren't already trembling."What do I
EMBER’S POVWhen I step outside the girls’ cabin with Rayana and Queenie flanking me, Rayana is mid-monologue about the caribou she’s planning to devour at dinner — something about sinking her teeth into tender, perfectly seared meat that borders on orgasmic — and I’m half-listening, half-scanning







