setting, and perhaps she found the modified warmth comforting—her small hand felt cool and clammy, no doubt a result of nerves.
It was a short walk to the room. Thorn pushed the door open and gestured for Adara to precede him. She stopped just inside as the lights came up to a gentle glow, and he knew she’d seen the huge bed set against the wall opposite the door. Well, she had to know this was expected of her. Surely any woman whose males were allowed to use them as betting currency anticipated this very situation. All the same, it infuriated him on some level. What if it hadn’t been him who had won Adara? She could have been lost to men who wouldn’t appreciate her or to those who would abuse her.
Instantly he focused his thoughts. The game with her brother had happened for a reason, and she was never meant for another. She was theirs, and her red hair completed the prophecy. She need never fear that a male would barter her body again.
“Do you require sustenance, Adara? The use of the facilities?”
Her glance skittered over his face before she dropped her eyes for a second time. Excellent. It wasn’t a studied move but one that acknowledged his status. And hers. “No. I’m fine.”
“Remove your clothing, little one.”
The partial silence and total lack of movement greeting his pronouncement became oppressive. He could hear his own heart beat in his temples and feel the rush of blood through his veins. The faint pulse of the air exchanger didn’t offset the short pants of breath Adara took.
“I am not in the habit of repeating myself, Adara.” He kept his tone neutral, yet firm.
Trembling fingers plucked at the hem of her colorful top and hitched the fabric up in tiny increments, her smooth, rounded belly uncovered by her effort. Thorn didn’t think he’d seen anything so erotic, and both he and his brothers watched the females in the center’s clubs strip whenever they came to the city, before Ronnie. It gave them fodder for self pleasure. The porn on the profilers was repetitive and the action often jerky and shadowed with the interference from the sun spots. Adara clearly had no skill in seductively removing her clothing, but he was seduced nonetheless.
She succeeded in pulling the shirt over her head, revealing a bit of lace that veiled her round breasts, the creamy tops rising in a gentle slope above the pale blue bra. Thorn rethought his edict about no underwear. She really wouldn’t require any, but she looked incredibly sexy with her nipples covered so fetchingly.
“Place it on the table there.” He pointed to where he wanted her to put her shirt, hearing the rasp of lust in his voice. Adara heard it too, and she flinched. Shit. He didn’t want her afraid of him, but the recognized need to begin her training immediately pushed him hard. They had but a small window of time before leaving here. And a little fear might be a good thing, what with her temperament.
Once she had laid the article of clothing where he commanded, she slipped out of her shoes and then pushed her trousers down, revealing beautifully formed legs. She wasn’t tall by Virile standards at all, perhaps a voluptuous five foot five in her bare feet, but he was over a foot taller and more than a hundred pounds heavier. His brothers were nearly as big. They would surround her and fill her completely. She awkwardly folded the trousers on top of the shirt, nerves evident in every movement.
A matching piece of lace covered her sex, and he made no attempt to cover his arousal, noting how Adara’s eyes drifted to the front of his pants. “The rest. Now.”
Reaching behind to unfasten the bra served to push her breasts out, and he noted how her nipples had tightened. He hoped it was at least partly the result of arousal and not because of the coolness in the room. The luscious mounds fell free of the gentle restraint, and he ached to touch them, weigh their tender weight in his hands and tweak the coral buds decorating