My Taboo Harem!

Sienna kept her forehead against his for a long moment. Her hands still rested on Phei’s bare chest, fingers spread lightly over the warmth of him, feeling the steady, living beat beneath his skin. She had said too much already. Done too much already. Kissed him. Touched him. Called him hers, even if only by accident.

Phei did not move first, giving her room and time.

Infuriating. Sienna lifted her head and looked at him.

Her face tried to return to its old coldness. The neutral line of her mouth. The calm violet eyes. The faintly bored air of a girl who had no use for trembling human nonsense. But she was sitting on his lap, her fingers still touching his bare body, her cheeks still flushed, and her lips still soft from the kiss.

The mask was doing heroic work. Sadly, heroism was not the same as success.

"I am not ready," she said.

Phei’s expression sharpened at once.

His hands loosened around her waist. "Then we can stop, Sienna."

She stared at him. For one second, she looked offended; then embarrassed and offended because embarrassment had been seen:

"That is not what I meant."

Phei blinked. "Sienna, you just said—"

"I am not ready," she repeated, each word precise now, as if she were explaining something to a very attractive idiot, which, in her opinion, she was, "and I am not patient enough right now for more..."

She stopped, her blush deepened.

Phei waited with corner of his mouth twitching.

Sienna’s eyes narrowed. "Do not smile."

"I am not."

"You are preparing to."

"That is different, okay you’re not ready for more what?"

She looked away, jaw tightening before forced the word out as if it had personally insulted her bloodline.

"Foreplay."

Phei’s expression became carefully blank.

"I hate that word," she said. "It sounds like a committee named it."

"That is probably true."

"I am serious."

His smile faded, Sienna looked back at him. For once, she did not hide from the heat in her own voice.

"I am aching for you, Phei."

The words struck him harder than any kiss had, Sienna looked like she had dragged them from some locked place inside her and resented the effort. But they were true.

"I want you," she said, lower now. "Badly. After everything tonight. After... everything."

Her fingers pressed once against his chest. "I want you to take my first time. First, because I want it to be you."

"And second, because we are running out of time."

Phei’s gaze searched hers. "Sienna—"

"I cannot explain all of it now."

"I know."

"No, you do not."

"Then tell me what I need to know."

Her lips parted. For a moment, she seemed to wrestle with something large, old, and buried far beneath the cold surface of her gaze.

Then she looked at his mouth.

"Can we—"

Phei claimed her mouth in a deep, hungry kiss and tongue slid against hers in slow rhythm it made her whole body soften and then tense again in his arms.

The kiss was wet and consuming, his lips moving over hers with barely restrained need.

He could feel her slender frame trembling against him, her breath catching sharply before she melted into it, her arms winding tighter around his neck. Her soft, inexperienced tongue met his with shy hunger, and the small, involuntary moan that vibrated from her throat into his mouth went straight through him like lightning.

His mouth caught hers with a lust and tenderness that made her breath vanish into him. Sienna stiffened for half a heartbeat, startled by the speed of it, then clung to him, arms returning around his neck with more urgency than before.

Her own lips opened beneath his, still unpracticed and uncertain, but this time she did not pull back from the depth of the kiss. She followed him, clumsy and hungry, letting him lead because she had asked without saying the rest.

At the same moment, space opened around them and a black-white wound unfolded silently across the library air, the library dissolved behind them, amber lamps and shelves and city glass slipping away as if the world had been politely dismissed.

Sienna’s fingers tightened around his neck, Phei did not break the kiss even as portal swallowed them.

The next breath carried silk sheets, dim starlight, and the quiet luxury of his bedroom.

Phei stepped onto the bed with one knee, Sienna held in his arms, her gown spilling around them in a glittering wave of blue-white fabric that caught the faint starlight like captured frost. He lowered her carefully, but not slowly enough to pretend he was calm.

Her back met the soft bedding, and he followed above her, one hand braced beside her head, the other at her waist.

Still kissing and answering the urgency she had finally allowed him to see.

He kissed her deeply as he laid her down, his body settling over hers with controlled weight.

The hard, thick length of his cock pressed firmly against her lower belly through their clothes, letting her feel exactly how much he wanted her. Her star-blue gown had ridden now bunching around her thighs and hips, exposed more of her smooth, pale legs.

The moment her back met the cool silk sheets, a soft, broken gasp escaped her into his mouth.

Sienna’s breath broke when the bed took her weight. Her arms tightened around his neck as if the sudden softness beneath her had made everything more real. Phei felt the tremor pass through her body and slowed by one fraction, enough to give her time to stop him.

Her mouth moved against his again, awkward, determined and sweet enough to ruin him.

Phei kissed her until the frantic edge of her breathing softened into something deeper.

Then his lips left her mouth, dragging down to the corner of her jaw.

Sienna’s eyes opened. "Phei..."

He kissed beneath her ear. Her voice failed.

His mouth was hot and insistent against the delicate skin just below her ear. He could feel her pulse hammering beneath his lips. A soft, shaky sigh escaped her as he kissed lower, and her slender body arched faintly beneath him, her thighs pressing together instinctively.

The glittering crystals of her gown caught the starlight, cold and regal against the growing heat of her skin.

His mouth moved to her neck, warm against the pale skin above the glittering edge of her gown. Sienna’s head tilted back before she seemed to realize she had done it, exposing more of that delicate line to him.

A soft sigh escaped her, and the sound went through him with such force that his hand tightened at the bedding instead of her.

Control. He needed control. A ridiculous requirement under the circumstances.

He kissed lower. Slowly. Along the side of her throat, to her collarbone, across the bare line the off-shoulder gown had revealed all night like a punishment tailored by enemies.

He took his time, pressing open-mouthed kisses along the elegant column of her throat, feeling the way her pulse jumped and fluttered under his tongue. Her skin was cool at first, then warmed rapidly beneath his mouth. Every soft sound she made — those small, breathy sighs and quiet whimpers — drove him closer to the edge of his restraint, his control was slipping away.

This was Sienna!

His free hand slid slowly up her side, thumb brushing just beneath the curve of her breast through the fabric, not yet touching, but close enough that she could feel the promise of it.

Phei’s mouth reached the upper edge of the dress and stopped. He hovered there. Breathing against her skin.

Sienna looked at him.

His lips were at the boundary between what the gown allowed and what it still protected. His hand rested at her waist, not moving further. His eyes were dark, heated, but there was hesitation beneath the hunger.

Not fear, reverence.

He looked almost afraid to take more from her than she had offered.

Almost afraid that if he rushed, the fragile trust in her eyes would close forever.

Sienna stared at him, chest rising and falling beneath the glittering bodice and her expression shifted and reached for his hand.

Phei looked at her.

Sienna took his wrist and guided his hand around behind her, to the hidden zipper at the back of her dress.

His breath changed and tremor went through him... Sienna was directing his hand on her body on her own accord.

Together, they found the clasp. For a moment, neither moved: her hand on his, his hand at the back of her gown, the zipper waiting beneath their fingers like the last gate before a world neither of them could pretend not to see.

Sienna’s cheeks burned, sill, she did not look away.

"Help me," she said.

Two words. Barely spoken. Enough.

Phei’s fingers closed gently over the zipper. With her hand still resting on his, they drew it down. Slowly.

The quiet, metallic rasp of the zipper sliding down her back was the only sound in the room.

As the dress parted, cool air kissed the newly exposed skin of her back. Sienna’s breath hitched sharply, her body trembling beneath him. Her fingers tightened over his on the zipper as if anchoring herself.

The gown loosened completely around her torso, the structured bodice no longer holding her breasts in its cold, glittering cage.

Sienna’s back arched as the gown loosened, her eyes fluttering shut for one dangerous second before she forced them open again. The glittering bodice relaxed around her, no longer holding its perfect shape with the same severe precision.

Phei sat back, bringing her with him carefully until she was seated before him on the bed.

The star-blue gown slipped the off-shoulder line slid lower, the bodice loosening from her chest as the fabric began to fall away from the body it had guarded all night. Pale skin caught the dim starlight, smooth and luminous against the retreating blue-white silk.

Phei’s gaze stayed on her face.

Then the dress slipped further; past the last delicate resistance of the bodice.

And before him—