“She didn’t deserve that,” Flev muttered.

Soleis shrugged nonchalantly. “Better to hurt her now than later.”

Flev stopped packing the few items in the hut and pinned him with a confused scowl. “What is going on with you? I know you were raised better than this.”

Soleis wanted to wither away, but he forced a laugh. “Drop the big brother act. You know I wasn’t raised. Everything I learned, I picked up on the road, and one thing I can tell you, women come around like buses. Miss one, catch another later.”

Flev smacked him hard with a large pot, and Soleis yowled loud enough to send birds flying away outside. It took a second for his mentor to realize he had actually hurt him. Soleis flexed his jaw to make sure it wasn’t broken.

“Let me see,” Flev sighed, inspecting his face. “You’ll live. Where’s the Heart, Soleis? What happened at the castle complex? You’ve never had a cold, much less a scrape. Now, you come back bleeding and bruised and flinching at a tap on the wrist.”

Soleis expelled a breath and dropped his head. Flev plopped down next to him, and the two men avoided looking at each other. The silence stretched an eternity.

“He already has the stone,” Flev surmised. “Now, you’re trying to get her to forget about you and go back to her world.”

Soleis buried his face in his hands. “Gods, I wish it was that simple,” he breathed.

He had to make her hate him. He had to make her believe he had changed because, otherwise, she would never leave him. He wanted Lola to return to the Sky Realm. He would devote the rest of his existence to keeping Belzaan away from her and the ring.

But, there would be no winners. The sickness in this world would spread. Eventually, she would die in hers. Maybe of natural causes. Maybe surrounded by a gaggle of grandkids and a doting, grey-haired human husband. Belzaan would get the ring, and the Fire Realm would face the retribution.

Everyone would suffer, like the Sylph had promised. Soleis could see it no other way. He couldn’t sacrifice Lola.

“I’m leaving, Flev. Soon as the rebels pull out tonight. I can’t leap to another realm without the stone, but I can stay away from her until she takes off the ring. If she’s anywhere near me, whatever links me to Belzaan will lead to him learning the truth. He still doesn’t know.”

“What is he doing with the Heart?”

“He thought it could transform him, but it doesn’t work. He needs the missing piece in Lola’s ring. That’s why we have to get her back to her world. Thol can go along for protection. He’ll die before he lets anything happen to her. As for you, I won’t hold you hostage here. You’re welcome to join them in the Blue Sky Realm. It would make me feel better knowing she has you on her team.”

“This is unbelievable,” Flev said in disbelief. “Are you trying to tell me you’re giving up?”

Soleis met his gaze. “Can you blame me?”

Before Flev could answer, someone knocked on the door. They both looked up as Lola entered the hut with arms crossed, her face devoid of emotion. “I need to speak with you,” she said without feeling. Flev wordlessly exited. Soleis braced himself.

“Shouldn’t you be with the rebel?” he asked.

“I thought I might remind you why I’m here,” she said, closing the door. She untied the silk saran and let it fall, and he arched a brow. “It damn sure isn’t because of the rebel.”

“You should cover up.”

Lola gathered her voluptuous breasts in both hands. She exposed the pink nipples through her splayed fingers. Her flat stomach quivered as she inhaled deeply. Her narrow waist flared to shapely hips, and there was a gap between her slender thighs. She slid her hands down her body and covered her blond thatch, eyeing him for a reaction.

Soleis wasn’t sure what she was after, but this wasn’t the response he had expected his behavior to elicit.

He leaned back on the bed to take pressure off his growing erection. When she sauntered toward him, every muscle within his body tightened expectantly. He followed the suggestive sway of her hips until he thought he might explode from simply watching her. He closed his eyes and sucked in a breath at the touch of her hand on his chest.

Lola straddled him, cupping his face. “Look at me,” she whispered.

“You’re embarrassing yourself,” he said in a strained voice.

“Look. At me.”

“What am I supposed to see?” he asked gruffly. “A woman throwing herself at a man who doesn’t want her anymore?”

She bit her lip, and her eyes clouded. But, she responded to his ugly taunt by locking her wrists behind his neck and rising slightly on the balls of her feet. She rolled her hot, damp V ever so seductively over his throbbing hardness. Back and forth in a tantalizing swirl that simulated sex. Soleis gripped her hips to stop her.

“You don’t want me?” she asked. He shook his head as her mouth met his. She boldly licked his lips apart and dove her tongue into the recess.

“Mmph,” he groaned deep in his throat.

As she tilted her head and nibbled at his mouth, he pushed against her. He could feel her through his clothes. This couldn’t be happening. He needed her to believe he…His arms involuntarily went around her waist, and his pelvis thrust forward more forcefully. Lola threw her head back with an airy moan. The erotic sound made him ache.

Soleis snatched his hands from her body like she was ablaze. He tried to hide the fact he trembled with need as he studied her from half-closed eyes. His chest rose and fell a little faster than normal. “You must be a glutton for punishment,” he breathed.

Laughing, she stood away from him. “Is that what you think? What if I told you this is all I ever wanted from you?” She clenched a fistful of his hair and jerked his mouth to her breasts.

Soleis gasped around her nipple. Was it possible to crave her more for the rough-handling? He clutched the sheets tighter to keep from touching her, but just a taste. Just a taste wouldn’t hurt. His tongue flicked, and she nodded encouragingly.

She eased a hand between her legs and caressed herself. Sibilant whispers of excitement spilled from her lips as she rocked against her fingers and let him have her breasts. He had never seen her do anything so disinhibited. In their limited sexual history, she had been shy and demur. The naughty behavior made him wish he had a lifetime to figure her out, but he didn’t.

“Lola, I—”

“Ooh, don’t stop,” she crooned. “Did you think I wanted more than this? Did you honestly think you had to cause that scene because I loved you?”

Her words lanced his soul. So, she didn’t love him. So, he had no reason to break her heart. This had all been about satisfying the animal instinct to mate. He could deal with that. It meant there was no need to resist the call of the wild.

Soleis angrily snatched her to the bed, and her face registered amusement as he ripped off his clothes. “Glad to see we’re on the same page. Let me give you what you need,” he growled. His stiff manhood speared the air between them. He reached for her, but she evaded his grasp.

“Which one of us needs it most?” she scoffed.

Soleis hesitated uncertainly. He stood naked at the foot of the bed with his hands on his hips as she leaned back on the pillows and sexily crossed her legs. While he seethed with desire, she looked unfazed. It annoyed him.

“Open for me,” he demanded.

She shook her head. “You don’t call the shots this round. Get in the bed.”

Another zip of excitement shot through him. He obliged to see what she would do or say next. This side of her piqued his interest, even if it broke his heart. She was acting like a common harlot, and it turned him on. She would never know how much he loved her. He would play the role of jaded lover until the last drop of passion was spent.

Then, he could send her away and be alone with his regrets.

Soleis wrapped his tumescence in hand, slowly stroking as she navigated to the space between his legs. She rose on her knees and clutched his shoulders. He bit his bottom lip and looked down at himself. “Are you ready to handle this?” he asked, giving her an under-eyed stare. Everything about the look oozed seduction. And challenge.

Lola shamelessly took over touching him. She stunned him by bowing her head. He had a split second to process what she was planning. Suddenly, her plush lips nudged the blunt tip of his member, and he grunted. “Lola!” She pushed her mouth over him, engulfing him in wet heat. With a strangled swear, Soleis half-rose from the bed and clutched her neck to stop her.

He brought her up to his lips for a brutal kiss. Their ragged breaths warred as they violently clashed. She slapped him. He smarted. A determined smile crossed her face, and she shoved him to the mattress. He bolted upright again, but too late. Her tongue swept the length of his manhood. Astonished moans flew from his open mouth as his jaw dropped, and he fell backward to his elbows.

Lola emitted tiny little gasps. She hummed as she swallowed his pounding erection, and he squeezed his eyes shut. He couldn’t watch. He would shower her if he studied the way her head bobbed graceful revolutions at his pelvis—up, around and down—milking him with her expertise.

She lifted her eyes to see his reaction. She used sex like a weapon. Her lips, teeth and tongue. Her hands, her breasts. Silver webs of wetness clung to her fingers and chin, but she didn’t care. Her hollowed cheeks worked miracles. What in the four realms was she doing to him? Soleis cupped the back of her head and thrust into her greedy orifice. Excruciating pleasure knifed through him. The way she whined around his manhood. He wouldn’t make it. He was no match.

“Lola…Lola…”

“Mm-hmm?”

“I’m there,” he groaned.

“Hold out for me.”

“I can’t! Oh, fuck!”

She released him with a soft pop. Growling, Soleis squeezed himself to quell his eruption. The blood rushed from his head to his loins. Somehow, he arrested his climax.

But, he was dizzy with need. But, this wasn’t about him. This was about her getting her kicks. He realized that now. The look on her face said she knew her power. He struggled to recover as she casually licked her lips, a cat finishing her cream.

“Fuck!” he shouted.

She giggled seductively. “Thank you for teaching me how to satisfy a man.”

“My pleasure,” he muttered through clenched teeth.

The idea of her taking her prowess to another man’s bed gutted him, but he couldn’t say a thing. He had no right. However, Lola arched a brow, as if she expected protests, and something pinged him. She was purposefully trying to bait him. She was on a mission to hurt him the way he had hurt her. The knowledge didn’t make him feel better. For her to go to these lengths, he had cut her deeply.

Was her heart involved, like his, or simply her ego?

Soleis went on guard as she climbed on top of him. Her back was to his chest. He knew she could feel his tremors. She could hear his labored breathing. Where their skin touched, she could sense the flash and disappearance of blue scales.

She was the only woman who could make him feel so out of control. He wondered if she knew he was on the verge of losing it completely. Though he had given her a glimpse of shifter sex before, there were boundaries no mortal woman had ever crossed with him.

He feathered light kisses over her shoulder and whispered, “Are you sure you want to do this?”

“No romance. No foreplay. You’re not allowed to kiss me like that.”

“Tell me what you really want.”

“I want…the truth,” she whispered. “About Belzaan.”

She directed his pulsing member into her body, and he couldn’t answer. He growled as he thrust upward, filling her to the brim. Another thrust, she cried out with excitement.

Her derriere fit snugly against him. She didn’t have to move. Subtle inner muscles massaged his manhood, and her arousal made her sheath a constricting deluge. As she slowly danced in his lap, riding him in reverse, her silky liqueur dribbled down his shaft. His nails dug into her hips and drew pinpricks of blood.

“I’m sorry,” he ground out as he sheathed his claws.

“You don’t have to be. You can tell me what I need to know.”

“No, Lola, there’s too much at stake—Uhn! I don’t want to lose you,” he mindlessly confessed.

She paused. “Does that mean you want me to stay?” she asked over her shoulder.

Unable to speak, he guided her rough and slow—the stop and start of a man trying to hold himself in check. But, then, he let go, and she tightened her knees and arched her back. She grinded and sheared against him. Her X-rated sounds of enjoyment ignited his inferno. Literally. He opened his mouth and released fire. Yet, Lola still didn’t stop.

“Do you want me to stay, Soleis?”

Yes, his body answered. An infinite number of times yes.

He couldn’t say that. He quickly extinguished the flames that raced across the dry thatched roof. Clouds of steam billowed in the wake of the blast of water he expelled. Embers and rain fell around them like magic.

As she rose and fell on his pounding manhood, she laid her head on his shoulder and stared at the corner of the blue sky that was unveiled. He almost sobbed because it felt like regret sex, the kind to make a man remember what he was giving up. He kneaded her breasts and buried his face in the side of her neck. Their tempo accelerated, intensified.

The merest suggestion he loved her would keep her bound to him, and she would die. His teeth sank into her skin as a coil of tension wrapped around him and tightened in his core. It promised everything but only until this was all over.

“I want you to let this go,” he sobbed.

She nodded and kissed his heated temple with a tenderness she had forbidden. His wings sprouted when she reached her zenith. They grunted at the same time, shook with the same force. He thrust into her, pinning her to his body with a hand on her stomach, as her orgasm broke over them like anointed oil.

“Soleis! Ah! Yes! YES!”

“After this…we have to say goodbye,” he whispered.

She gave no indication she heard what he was saying. She frantically rode him through the finish line. Boisterous cries of passion punctuated the percussion of their bodies colliding. He yanked her hard upon the solid ridge of his erection in the throes of climax, emptying himself. He gave everything. All of what he shouldn’t.

There was nothing left but silence and descent. His manhood pounded within her and matched the rapid tattoo of his heartbeat. He folded his wings, and the blue light around his irises faded, and he gingerly eased out of her sensual grip.

“Why?” she asked in a small voice.

“Because we have no future together.”

He thought he heard her bite back a quiet sob. She said nothing. Remaining astride him, she leaned her flexible body forward and rested her face on the bed. He followed her and pressed his forehead to the center of her back. He closed his eyes, breathed her in. Her light, powdery floral smell. Her heat that was degrees cooler than his. Her residual humidity that blanketed them in the musk of sex.

“I have to believe there’s a destiny in which you survive,” Soleis said. “But, it doesn’t exist, if you’re with me. Belzaan is after the missing piece of the Heart of the Dragon. You have it. As long as we’re together, he’ll find you.”

“We could destroy it.”

“You’d be stuck here forever without the ring.”

Another beat of silence as she stretched in bed beside him. Her emerald eyes snagged his and wouldn’t let go. She traced his lips, whispering, “I would follow you to the ends of all the worlds, Soleis.”

“No, you wouldn’t,” he chuckled softly. “I would never allow it. You’re going back to the Blue Sky Realm where you’ll be safe. I’m sending Thol and Flev with you for protection.”

“I don’t recall asking your permission to stay.”

He cupped her face. “Lola, for once, don’t crave the adventure.”

“Requesting that of me is like asking you not to save the world.”

“I’d gladly watch them all burn to give you a chance at a full life,” he admitted.

“If you send me away, I’ll only find my way back to you.” When he moved to protest, she covered his lips with her fingers. “Enough. I’m staying, Soleis.”

“Even if it kills you?” he asked.