I punched him right in the face.
I couldn’t have hurt a man like Cypress. He’d clearly been hit before and, I’d wager, by people who struck better than me. But it must have taken him by surprise, because he fell backward slightly when I did it. His eyes widened as he rubbed his cheek. I’d aimed for the one that wasn’t injured, so he could thank me for the small favor.
I gritted my teeth. “You know what? It would have been better if you’d left me in that cage.” I didn’t want to go back, not now that I was out, but if I’d never known about any of this, that would have been preferable. “Since I’ve gotten out, I’ve been constantly yelled at and berated by you, attacked by those assholes, made to endure constant torturous pain, and turned into a tree. And this last bit was entirely your fault because if you hadn’t decided that you wanted to get your dick sucked by that fairy, I wouldn’t have been in that fucking alley to begin with.”
Not to mention I’d lost a friend. I hadn’t had many in my life, and that burned as badly as the torture spell. I turned my back on him. Fuck him and the horse he didn’t ride in on. I wouldn’t let him see me cry. I covered my eyes like that would do the trick, even though I knew it was ridiculous. He was probably going to see the tears and use them against me the next second he could.
Because that was what this world out here was. Pain mixed with moments of beauty. Out here, there was the moon. There were majestic trees swaying in the wind. Sunsets. And fruit. There was more food than I’d ever imagined.
But there were also assassins with pain spells and endlessly feeling anxious. Living with not knowing who wanted to hurt me and not understanding anything at all. Not to mention sexy men who held you one night and then hated you the next.
“That’s all well and good, Princess,” he rasped before taking a step closer to me. I was heaving air in and out. “But how about you throw your little temper tantrum after you get some clothes on.”
I looked down, and sure enough, I was naked as the day I was born. My nipples were pebbled. My skin was red and caked with dirt. I was wild and feral. “Fuck you,” I growled.
Cypress looked exasperated. His eyes turned dark and angry. His muscles flexed. We were a breath apart, staring each other down with venom and anger, and then he was spinning me around and crushing me to his chest, my ass grinding against his hardening cock.
“I saved your life. I rescued you from a cage. You might have been alive, but you weren’t living. You had never seen the sky.”
He ran his right hand down my tight stomach, and I leaned back to rest my head in the crook of his neck as he whispered.
“While you were safe and sound, I was killing half a dozen men so you could live, all while thinking of ways I could punish you for getting kidnapped. I so badly want to spank this perky ass of yours.”
I went rigid. “It wasn’t my fault. She hit me over the head,” I complained, a bit of the anger now doused in lust as his hands continued to roam my skin. I was grinding against him.
“You went and got yourself captured. Do you want to go back to Nightmare, Princess?” Cypress asked while pressing me closer to him. “Do you want to live in that cage, letting Bhaltair feed from your power?”
To punctuate his words, Cypress ran his lips along my neck. “Or do you want to live, hmm? Really, really live.” I was choking on air. My skin buzzed with awareness. I was dirty and exhausted, but delirious all the same. I ached for his touch and craved to feel him against me.
“Yes,” I whispered. What was wrong with me?
“Then I suggest you never raise a fist to me again, Princess. There are far worse things than pain.”
Cypress pulled away, leaving me standing on shaky legs with my mouth dropped open in shock. What had just happened? “What are you doing?” I asked as he dropped his gear and shrugged out of his shirt. The sight of his defined abs and scarred, tan skin had my pulse throbbing for a relief I couldn’t quite place.
“Put this on,” he said while tossing the thin fabric to me.
I pulled it over my head, not taking my eyes off of him. Far worse things than pain? I was so sick of his presumptuous attitude. Like he knew everything, like he had a clue about everything while I knew nothing. He dished out information as though it were currency and I was a beggar on the street.
“I’m sick to death of you dismissing my life as though yours was so much worse. You killed a man when you were young? I’m sorry about that. I saw my first dead body when I was five years old. Frozen to death because they forgot to heat my cell block. I’d probably be dead too if I hadn’t been small enough to fit inside a crack in the wall that was pressed up to a vent.” I waved my hand. “I’m not someone for you to kick around anymore. I’m a princess, right? That’s what you call me. That’s what you’ve told me. Well, fine. If I’m a princess, then I order you to kiss me.”
He stared at me a long time, enough for me to wonder if he was either going to beat me or laugh at me for my order. By the moon, I’d never really had a mouth on me; I was sneaky, not ballsy. I didn’t spit out orders, punch people in the face, and yell. What the hell was
