Even though he was deep in conversation with the Second Chancellor, Jareth watched Keliana as she crossed the ballroom trying to reach him. The place was packed, everyone and his bloody grandmother at court because of Seth’s recent marriage and the crowning of a new princess, but it wasn’t difficult to spot the beautiful courtesan. The vivid color of her gown against the pastels and metallics of the other women set her apart, but it was the way she moved that drew the most attention.

Her delicate little hands wrapped around a large flagon, her face was a study in concentration as she made her way through the crowds seemingly oblivious to the reaction she was causing. Jealousy flared across the faces of some of the ladies around her, outrage on others, before they turned away pointedly and snapped their fans open. Men, particularly those without feminine company, stared openly while others made do with lustful glances that made Jareth want to punch them in the face. Repeatedly.

She was his. Now he’d had some time to think about it, the reality had finally sunk in. His body however, had gotten aboard with the reality a lot quicker, running at a low state of arousal, his cock semihard in his pants. All. Damn. Day. And no matter how you cut it, sporting a hard-on at a council meeting gained some strange looks from the other council members. He’d spent most of the afternoon with his legs crossed to hide the state of his body.

“Do you really think that deploying the T-seventeen prototypes along the Gavarian expanse would have much effect?” The chancellor, completely oblivious to Jareth’s shift in attention, carried on. “It’s a large area of space with a small scattered population, such a weapon would be better suited to the defense of a more densely populated area, give the pirate clans something to really think about if they want to engage in those areas.”

Struggling to find a way through the masses, Keliana gave up and turned. A smile ghosted over Jareth’s lips as he watched her working out another way to achieve her goal. Determination lit her small features as she headed toward the door to the terrace. Attagirl, if you can’t go through, go around.

“Well…” He returned his attention to Lord Caen. “Ideally yes, the T-seventeen would be an excellent deterrent, particularly for the busier space-lanes and colony routes but the problem is it’s not been tested fully.”

He sighed and leaned a shoulder back against the wall behind him, his interest in the conversation overriding any care about court protocol. He was a soldier, not a poet. He didn’t have the time to finny-fanny about learning three different bows and which of the ridiculously small forks was for seafood.

“Sure, it’s been lab tested, but you know what the science geeks are like…everything is precise, perfect conditions. I want to see how they hold up to space travel and being knocked about under shields that are nowhere near lab perfect. Those cores can be volatile so if one’s going to go up, I’d rather not take out a whole colony to find out. Would you?” he directed at the Chancellor with an arched brow.

“No, thank you…I’m good.” He motioned away a serving lad who silently offered to refill his goblet. No need to do Keliana out of a job. A frown creased his brow. Where was she? It wasn’t far from the door she’d walked out of and the one behind him so it shouldn’t have taken her this long to reach him.

Just as he started to straighten up, concern drawing tense lines through his limbs, a tall man stopped on his way back in from the terrace to catch his eye. Tall, and well-built despite the expensive tunic that proclaimed him as a lord with little to do with his time, Jareth vaguely recognized him as one of Sethan’s cousins, but the name escaped him for the moment.

“Seems your little woman is having a few problems out there with a couple of youngsters. Might want to head out there and smack some noses.”

Someone was hassling his Keliana. Anger boiled up within him as the words registered. From cool to white-hot within seconds, it surged through his body, galvanizing his muscles as he fought the urge to lash out.

“Thank you, much appreciated,” he bit out as the man walked away and managed a nod to Lord Caen. “Excuse me, my lord.”

“No, don’t worry about it.” Caen waved him off with an amiable smile. “Would that I was still young enough to go chasing skirts. Pretty little thing, that Keliana. Intelligent to boot, if you can get her to forget all this nonsense about just being there for her master’s pleasure and actually talk.”

“Obliged.” Jareth nodded, not really listened. Everything within him urged him to get out the door now and find her.

Without waiting for Caen’s reply, he turned and plunged through the doorway and into the darkness outside. It took a few seconds for his eyesight to adjust, but his hearing zeroed in on a little altercation taking place at the far end of the terrace. Three men, lanky streaks of noble piss, had Keliana cornered against a statue.

Her face was pale, her gown in disarray, and the expression on her face blank. After years of watching, he knew her. She was terrified, every line of her slender body taut as she used the flagon she carried as a weak defense. Anger turned to fury as they taunted her.

“Come now…We’re all friends here. I’m sure your master won’t mind us borrowing his pretty little toy for a while.”

Swift footsteps took him across the paved terrace to directly behind the little group and the growl that escaped his lips surprised even him. He’d been in countless battles, against pirates and other enemies of the prince, killed more men than he could remember, but it had always been just a job. His duty. He’d dispatched them with clean, professional shots or, for closer work, almost surgical knife work.

He didn’t use anger to hype himself up, get him riled for the kill. He’d seen too many soldiers go that way, and in his opinion, it didn’t make for a healthy mental state when the ability to kill was linked to an emotion that could be invoked by normal, day-to-day living. So the desire, no, the need, to tear into the trio and rip them limb from limb for daring to touch her took him completely by surprise.

“No.” His voice was low and dangerous in the darkness as he dropped a hand on the speaker’s shoulder and hauled him around. “I think you’ll find I mind very much.”

He didn’t waste time on more words. Instead he wound his arm back and let fly. His fist slammed into the smaller man’s jaw, meaty smack of knuckles against flesh loud in the darkness. His opponent reeled, stumbling backward, but Jareth was on him like a maddened Trakanas attack dog.

Grabbing the front of his tunic, he hauled the younger man upright until they were nose to nose, despite his struggles. Still a youth, with the soft appearance of the wealthy and indolent, he had nothing on Jareth’s years in service and the solid muscle that came from making a living in combat.

“If any of you touch her, hell you even look at her again, I will personally hunt you down and take you apart, piece by bloody piece.”

He shook the guy like a rag doll to punctuate each word, all the while fighting down the urge to rip his head clean from his neck. He could bench press more than this lot put together so it might just be physically possible. The demon riding him itched to find out.

“Do I make myself clear?”

Eyes wide, the guy nodded so violently Jareth thought his head was going to drop off. His lip quivered with fear as the acrid, hot smell of urine filled the air. Jareth’s lip curled as flicked a glance down. He hadn’t… He had. The spreading wet patch over the front of his breeches was visible even in the semidarkness.

A hard shove sent the younger man sprawling.

He doubted any of them were older than twenty, all puffed up with their own importance and for the first time in their lives facing the fact that not everything in their reality was theirs for the taking. Fucking jumped up, spoiled rich kids. Just the sort he’d loved to torment if any wandered on the streets where he’d lived as a child, more dragged than brought up.

“You disgust me. The lot of you.” His lip curled in a sneer as they scrambled to hold their friend upright, their expressions terrified. When he took a step forward they squeaked, backpedaling en masse until the one at the rear of the group teetered on the edge of the steps down into the garden. One small push and they’d go down like toy soldiers.

“Now, fuck off. Before I stop playing nice and take a few souvenirs in payment.”

He shook with the force of his anger, but a glance at Keliana’s pale face and trembling frame told him he had more important things to deal with than bandying words with three wayward brats who didn’t know not to touch what wasn’t theirs.

“Like a few fingers for touching my property.”

He jerked his head toward the ballroom, the warning bitten out in the lowest, most menacing voice he could muster. After years of dealing with recruits, it was pretty impressive, even by his standards. They certainly seemed to think so. Almost before he’d finished speaking, they made a break for it, fighting and scrambling over each other in their haste to get away from him. He hid a smirk as they raced across the terrace, pausing at the last minute to organize themselves in a line to get through the door. He wondered at what point the last one would remember the front of his pants were stained with piss.

Turning around, his smile faded. Keliana stood by the statue, the now empty flagon clasped between her hands. Her wary look and the glimmer of tears in her eyes hit him right in the gut. In less than two steps he was in front of her, the need to protect her surging through his veins.

His hand felt big and brutish against the delicate bones of her neck as he slid his hand under her hair and pulled her against his chest. She didn’t fight, dropping the flagon and resting against him trustingly as he wrapped his arms around her slender frame to hold her tight. She was his, and just the thought of any other man touching her drove him nuts, the anger threatening to consume him.

With determination, he fought it down and eased up on his grip. He had to have hurt her, but she hadn’t complained. Instead, her fingers were wrapped around the piped edge of his uniform jacket like a vise, knuckles white as she held on for grim death. Tiny tremors ran through her body as she rested her forehead against his chest.

“Shh, it’s OK. They’re gone.” He leaned back and slid a finger under her chin to make her look up. When she did, her eyes were too bright, wetness clumping at the corner of her lashes. “Just us here now, look?”

She clutched at his upper arms, the small gesture feeding the male animal inside, and peeked around him to the empty terrace. The confident, even sassy woman he’d seen before had disappeared, replaced by the quiet woman in his arms.

“They won’t come back. You promise?” She met his eyes, the soft whisper betraying just how much the incident had rocked her.

“I promise.”

She’d just been attacked and Lady knew what would have happened had he not turned up, but all Jareth could think was how soft and inviting her lips looked. The soft sweep of her lashes were dark against her pale cheeks, the creamy skin of her shoulders revealed by the wide neckline of her gown. Their gazes connected, awareness arching between them. Slowly Jareth lowered his head, watching her all the way.

“I’m going to kiss you,” he murmured, keeping his voice soft so as not to startle her. “Stop me now if you don’t want this because I don’t think I can.”

With a few short words, he ceded control of the situation. She was his courtesan, his slave, but this between them…this spark…was something else. She came to him because she wanted him, not because he owned her and he wanted her to know that.

Her eyes widened, but she didn’t move away. Instead her fingers curled deeper into his jacket as if to hold him in place. Her eyes fluttered closed as he claimed her lips.

He wanted to back her up against the wall behind her, pry her lips open and plunder the sweet recesses of her lips. He didn’t. Instead, his kiss was gentle, schooled not to scare her with the passion that ran rampant through his body.

He wanted to tumble her to the cool stones at their feet, rip the scarlet silk from her body, and fuck her until she screamed his name. Instead he slid his hand into her hair and pulled back until his lips whispered over hers.

“Let me in, sweetheart.”

She couldn’t resist him. Tremors raked her body, both from the attack such as it was and now, from the sweet seduction Jareth wove around her. His kisses were light, teasing, and so tempting she couldn’t help but follow them with her lips, hoping to get more. Kisses from a man who’d all but killed three men for daring to touch her, and threatened worse if they even looked at her again.

After years of indifference from a master who couldn’t have cared if she lived or died other than to complain about the inconvenience of having to replace her, to have a man prepared to fight for her was seductive. Longing mixed with need as he pulled her closer.

A soft moan broke from her throat as he kissed her again. This time she didn’t hold out, but parted her lips as soon as his tongue brushed over them. With a male groan that sent a thrill of awareness through her, he tilted his head and deepened the kiss.

The world fell away, everything else ceased to matter as his tongue moved along hers. Gentle strokes and brushes as he teased, tempting her into a response. To tangle her tongue along his and follow, until she was the aggressor.

His large hand spread over the center of her back, fingertips just brushing her skin where her gown cut away. Sparks of awareness skittered across her exposed skin, stealing her breath and a little more of her ability to breathe.

The dark stubble just showing on his jaw was rough against her soft skin, but she didn’t care, reveling in the differences between them. He was hard where she was soft, strong where she was weak, aggressive where she was submissive.

His soft warning to stop him had the opposite effect, as though it were permission to take her time and enjoy the moment instead of rushing on to make sure he achieved satisfaction as quickly as possible, her own needs and pleasure be damned. A permission she took to heart, rising on her tiptoes to flick her tongue along his lips, exploring him as he’d explored her.

Their kiss became a game as she grew bolder, teasing him with her tongue, darting forward then retreating before he could catch her. She chuckled as he growled a mock warning when she evaded him again, and nipped his lower lip lightly in retaliation.

His reaction was instant, the tiger merely pretending to sleep. The gentle mask slipped and revealed the man beneath as, with a real growl, he backed her up. She gasped as her hips met the unyielding surface of the cool stone behind her, the sound cut off as he used the opportunity to surge forward. His tongue pried her lips open and drove within.

The kiss was hot, openmouthed and sinful, whispering at dark pleasures and a passion she couldn’t wait to experience. Matching him, her tongue dueling with his, she lifted up and wrapped her arms around his shoulders, hands in his hair to hold his lips to hers and body pressed to his from breast to thigh.

He was hard, fully aroused, the thick length of his cock trapped between their bodies. Desire arrowed through her, weakening her knees as her pussy clenched hard. She wanted this, wanted him…had for years but never, not in her wildest dreams had she thought she’d be able to have him.

In a heartbeat none of it mattered, the fact she was a courtesan and he her master, nor that she’d been taught never to get emotionally involved. The fact she’d wanted to be free to love him seemed irrelevant. She was free. He’d granted her the freedom to say no.

Then he kissed her again, sucking and nibbling on her tongue in a sensuous move that had her eyes rolling in the back of her head and her thoughts scattering from her mind like autumn leaves in the wind to leave sheer, unadulterated need.

He lifted his head, breathing ragged and gaze decadent as he looked down at her. Without a word he bent and scooped her up into his arms, the expression in his eyes warning her not to argue. That any argument would end up with her skirts around her waist and his thick cock buried where they both wanted it to be, deep inside her.