My Spartan Hellion (6 page)

His heart battered the wall of his chest until it threatened to burst, a furious rush of blood surging into his pulsing cock. He was almost tempted to wade through the water and do just that, but he came to his senses before he could make a fool of himself. Just like the sirens who’d ensnared Odysseus, Lamia sat there spinning her web, trying to trap him, but he wouldn’t be so easily fooled. He knew she was up to something.

“Get out of the water.”

He realised his mistake too late when she shrugged and stood. His next breath lodged somewhere between his lungs and inside his throat when she spun around and sauntered towards him, her movements sensual, erotic. His gaze followed every single droplet of water that clung to her nude figure, tracing the trail that a lone dewdrop made as it slithered between her breasts and across her middle, before disappearing into the thatch of dark curls that hid her womanhood.

Buried deep within his foggy brain, somehow he managed to recall that his men stood on the ridge behind him. Snatching up her garment, he stalked over to her and wrapped it around her wet body.

“What in
Hades
are you doing?”

“You keep asking me that and—”

“I do not know what game you are playing, but it shall not work.”

She shrugged away from him, slowly donning her
peplos
,
and he struggled not to follow her every move with his eyes, but it was just that—a struggle.

“You are overly suspicious, Thanos,” she said when she was finally fully clothed. “Come, drink some wine with me, and let me help you relax.”

He knew her docility was a trick. Even as he followed behind her, his gaze fixed on the gentle sway of her hips, he knew. And when he sat beside the fire and relaxed against her, drinking from his cup of wine, while she soothed the aches in his shoulders with her delicate hands, he knew. In his arrogance he determined that, because he recognised her ploy, he would not be fooled by it—but later he would realise his mistake in underestimating her.

Chapter Five

Lamia snapped her eyelids open, and she tried to stretch, but a solid wall of muscle hampered her movements.

Thanos’ nude body lay pressed against her back, while his arm was draped around her waist. She glanced down the length of her body—his leg was entwined with hers and his hand gently cupped her breast. Thanos always slept nude, and until last eve he had politely stayed on his side of the mat, but, likely owing to all the wine, he’d drifted beside her until their bodies lay intertwined.

She swallowed down a needy moan, her nipples tightening as molten heat furled in her belly at the coarse hair of his rough legs brushing across the smooth skin of her thighs. Everything about Thanos screamed of untamed, masculine virility, and, while she was loath to admit it, his large, powerful body—with its rough planes and hard edges—called to her as a woman, making her feel delicate and feminine, something she’d never felt with any other man before.

He shifted again and his thumb brushed her now stiff nipple. She bit back the sigh that hovered on her lips as lightning shocks of pleasure sizzled down her spine. Everywhere he touched her skin tingled, causing dewy warmth to pool at the juncture between her thighs. She wrestled with the feverish heat that now claimed her body, hating the desperate need this stranger had awakened inside her from the moment their lips had touched and they’d shared their first kiss.

She shook herself—to gather her wits. And then she shook him.

“Thanos,” she whispered.

She rolled her eyes when he mumbled a series of muffled words but did not budge.

She nudged her back harder into his chest. “Thanos,” she hissed. “I need to relieve myself. Wake up.”

Somewhere in the back of his sleepy mind he must have understood her because he loosened his embrace and rolled away from her.

Thank the gods
. Her ploy had worked. He’d been suspicious at first, but, between the wine and her gentle hands, he’d eventually relaxed before succumbing to the arms of sleep. Her only hope was that the wine would keep him asleep long enough for her to escape.

She wasted no time in scrambling off the mat. With measured steps she tiptoed into the sparse forest that surrounded the camp. After relieving herself, she waited. Several moments passed without a sound.

Thanos was still asleep.

She carefully made her way towards where the horses were tied up for the eve. With stealthy movements, she untied Thanos’ white stallion and slowly guided him away from where the Spartan soldiers were camped. She walked beside Zeus until she was sure the sound of her galloping away would not be heard by the sleeping soldiers.

* * * *

Lamia’s hair whipped violently about her face as she urged Zeus to go faster.

“Come on. Come on,” she yelled, trying to coax the stallion to pick up the pace.

Leaning forward, she grasped his mane tightly and dug her heels into his flanks.

“Faster, Zeus. Please,” she begged, her lungs burning with every frantic gulp of air she struggled to take in.

She didn’t need to turn around to know who was chasing her. She could feel his angry gaze burning the skin off her back. Still, she desperately wanted to turn her head, if only to gauge his distance. But she couldn’t afford to take her focus away from pressing the horse to go faster.

As the blistering sun blazed down upon her, she knew that it would only be a matter of time before he caught up to her. She’d been confident in the success of her escape…too confident.

In one moment she was sitting astride the galloping stallion and in the next she was wrenched off Zeus, only to remain suspended in the air, her body dangling above the ground. A startled scream rushed out of her and she winced in pain when her body collided with what felt like a crushing boulder, although she knew it was just the flank of Thanos’ horse. She barely had time to brace herself against Thanos’ mount before he abruptly released his hold on her, sending her flailing wildly to the ground with a loud thud.

“Ouch,” she cried as she crashed down, before rolling over to sit up. She had broken her fall with her hands and knees, scraping them in the process. Rubbing her palms across her chafed skin, she dusted away the dirt, trying to soothe the dull throb of pain from her scratches.

At the sound of footsteps, she lifted her head, her gaze colliding with stormy blue eyes swirling with fury.

“You promised. You gave me your word that you would not try to run.”

She thought of Darius, her need to avenge his death, and the fact that this Spartan still stood in her way. “I lied,” she spat out. “I lied, Spartan. I have no intention of going to Sparta with you.”

His entire expression hardened as he closed the distance between them, while she tried to widen it again, scooting backwards.

She had barely put a yard between them when his hand shot out to grasp her ankle, and he dropped down to his knees, jerking her roughly across the rocky and uneven ground, tugging her closer.

“Ouch, Spartan. Stop,” she protested as her barely covered backside scraped against the hard, arid earth beneath her.

Struggling wildly, she kicked her arms and legs out, slashing at anything in their path as she desperately fought to get away. She knew Thanos had taken several hard blows when her knuckles began to throb from what she could only guess were punches to his jaw.

But instead of relaxing his hold, his grip only tightened until he managed to drag her beneath him and cover her body with his own. He clasped her wrists in his hands, pinning her to the ground as he clamped her legs between his bulging thighs.

She struggled beneath him, twisting in every direction, but her resistance was futile, and eventually she yielded, relaxing into the solid earth, limp with exhaustion.

Frustrated tears burned the backs of her eyes, but he was not swayed as his expression darkened. “You will have much to cry about soon,
agapetos
,” he said harshly.

In one fluid motion he rolled off her, to rest on the ground in a seated position. Before she had gathered his purpose, he’d pulled her across his lap, her backside facing the sky.

He wouldn’t
.

The steely glint in his eyes said otherwise

“No, Thanos. Please, do not do this,” she pleaded, using his given name this time, hoping it would endear her to him, but, just in case it didn’t, she resumed her desperate struggling.

He remained silent.

Grasping the fabric of her
peplos
in one hand, he wrenched it upwards, balling it at her waist, her ass now completely exposed.

She continued to kick and protest, but her efforts were wasted. Fury boiled inside her until her veins pumped with churning, hot lava. In all her twenty-eight
annos,
no one had
ever
spanked her. No one had ever dared. Not even Darius.

She swore worse than a
tavernas
whore when his first strike came, his hand slamming down against her buttocks. Her back arched instinctively, the sting of the blow jolting her entire body.

She cried out when another stinging blow came. But, as tears slipped from her eyes, she gave up yelling and simply tried to ignore the jagged needles of pain.

Thanos said nothing, although he continued to spank her…
hard
.

The sound of flesh meeting flesh echoed across the barren plain as sharp arrows shot from her lower back to the rest of her body with each slap.

She expelled a shaky breath when he finally stopped, grateful that it was now over.

With a tenderness he’d not displayed moments ago, he cupped her buttocks, gently squeezing the soft, full globes, and she shivered when a new throbbing ache settled in the lower regions of her body.

His hand continued to stroke her rounded flesh, back and forth—massaging first, then lightly squeezing before gently stroking again.

A soft hiss forced its way past her lips when his finger dipped below her cheeks to slide through the now moist folds of her core.

It came away coated with her juices, glistening beneath the sunlight. “You’re wet, Lamia,” Thanos said softly and the deep gravel of emotion in his voice was unmistakable.

She tried to turn over to look at him, but he placed a palm against her back, gently nudging her down.

“Did you enjoy being spanked?” he asked, his finger lazily encircling the tiny nub at the mouth of her sheath.

A sharp breath pulsed in her chest, while a steady, unrelenting throb began to build between her legs.

“Did you, Lamia?” he demanded, emphasising his words with the press of his finger inside her.

She shook her head, balling her hands into tight fists. She refused to answer him, refused to reveal to him the truth because she was shamed by it. But his skilful hands were driving her mad, making her want to do things she’d never dreamed of. Of its own volition, her ass lifted to meet the shallow thrust of his finger, and she let out a deep moan.

“No,” she protested, needing to say something to make him stop or else he would continue his assault upon her senses, her body making a liar out of her.

“I think you’re lying, Lamia. I think you enjoyed being spanked.” She could tell he was smiling by the amused tone of his voice. The bastard. She would not admit the truth and give him the satisfaction of knowing that she
had
enjoyed it.

“N-no,” she managed to croak out, her traitorous hips now rocking in a steady rhythm, eagerly meeting each probing thrust of his finger.

“Then why are you so wet?” he groaned as he roughly shoved two fingers inside her.

Her answer was a deep, soul-stirring moan and she gasped when his hand suddenly slapped her ass.

She began to squirm against his lap. She was so close to coming she could feel herself on the edge of release and she strained towards it, another moan escaping her lips.

His hand came down hard again as he shoved his fingers deep inside her. A primal sound rose up out of her, and her hips now bucked furiously against him. She was so close, so close to release as the tremors quaked harder within her…

Lamia’s mouth fell open then, as her eyelids clenched shut and violent shudders thundered through her body. The wave inside her began to crest, but, before it could break apart and carry her away to blissful fulfilment, his hands stilled.

A strangled sob escaped her. “No. Don’t stop,” she pleaded, her hips lifting instinctively, desperately seeking out his hands—his fingers.

He chuckled softly, his palm stroking her soft, reddened cheeks, but not that place where she ached for him to touch more than anything else.

“You do not get to come, Lamia. You disobeyed me. So that is your punishment.”

She stiffened, his words slowly piercing the fog that had settled in her lust-filled mind, her fury chasing away the last remnants of her arousal.

Whipping her head around, she speared him with her gaze. “Now I see why you are not yet wed, you twisted deviant. Who would ever wish to wed a man such as you?”

Out of frustration, she’d lashed out at him, but the tiny ember of pain she glimpsed in his eyes instantly had her regretting her harsh, rash words.

“Thanos, I did not mea—”

The rest of her apology caught in her throat as she was unceremoniously rolled from his lap and dumped on the hard ground.

Wariness settled in her gut when she glimpsed the tiny muscle in his jaw twitching uncontrollably. He shot to his feet and began to march towards the horses.

He’s going to leave me.
Panic gripped her and her stomach tightened into knots at the thought that he would leave her out here alone with nothing. Without food or water or a horse, she would surely die—that was if the thieves that trolled the coast didn’t get to her first.

But, when he headed back over to her with a twine of rope in his hand, she decided she would rather he’d deserted her.

He is going to hang me.

She jumped to her feet and turned to run, but only managed two steps before his hand shot out, grabbing her around the waist. She struggled against him but he easily overpowered her, just as he’d done before. He spun her around to face him and, with his free hand, he clenched her wrists in his grasp.