Healer to the Ash King: (Standalone) (Dark Rulers Book 5) by Rebecca F. Kenney

Author:Rebecca F. Kenney [Kenney, Rebecca F.]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2022-05-31T16:00:00+00:00

Back in my room, I keep picturing the magnificent flex of the King’s body as he threw an entire adult man in armor off the third-floor balcony. It was horrible. Horrible. Not strangely, darkly attractive. I am not tantalized by the thought that he could pick me up bodily in one hand. Nor am I reveling in the fact that he said no to sex with Axley.

I suspect the King will come to me again tonight, once he has finished with the other women. I’m not sure what I want or what I hope for—just his confusing, tantalizing presence, I suppose. Nothing more. Maybe I’ll confront him about what I saw—rage at him a little.

I indulge in a bath, expecting to wait a couple of hours for him, but a few seconds after I step out of the tub, I hear the door between our rooms opening. Frantic, I snatch a towel and wrap it around myself just before he appears in the open doorway of the bathing room.

He props a forearm against the frame and takes in the sight of me. “Healer.”

“Your Majesty,” I breathe.

The front of his pants is stretched tight, a pronounced shape obvious beneath the fabric, and he keeps shifting, moving constantly, as if he can’t bear to stand still. I’m barefoot instead of in heels, so he looks taller than ever—truly majestic. There’s a restless, heated lust rolling off him, a raw male dominance so intense I can almost taste it. He wants sex. He said no to Axley, and now he has come to me.

My thighs and belly tighten at the thought, and my heartbeat kicks up.

“Take it off.” He gestures sharply at the towel.

“No, thank you.” I retreat out of reach.

He cocks an eyebrow. “So shy, after what you did to me the other night?”

“I told you that was a one-time mercy because you couldn’t sleep. There’s nothing more between us, and can never be anything more.”

A long sigh emanates from him. “This again, Healer? I am not looking for more between us, merely for a mutual release of the urge we both feel. There is no shame in taking pleasure together. I know you despise me, and you know I can’t love you or marry you. Yet our bodies react to each other, as is natural for two beautiful, powerful people. Why should we not indulge that craving?”

“Because then they’ll be right,” I murmur. “I will be the cheap mistress in the Rose Room, the one the girls fear will take your heart, even if they win the throne.”

“I promise you won’t win my heart or my throne. I will abide by the tradition of royalty marrying nobility. And I would not give my heart to someone who disapproves of me as thoroughly as you do. So there’s no issue.”

“But what we know to be true and what everyone else thinks are two different things,” I protest. “Even if you repeated that declaration to the Favored, they might not believe you. There’s

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