[To Become a River of Stars] Dong Xiange - Chapter 75
“Stick your tongue out.”
He figured he ought to collect some interest and leave his mark.
After all, this was prey that belonged to him alone.
Shiliu was still crying, her eyes swollen like walnuts, refusing to look at him.
He simply grabbed the nape of her neck, forcing her to lift her head. As she moved, a perfectly round tear rolled down, hanging at the corner of her eye, poised to fall but not quite.
His hot, damp tongue directly touched Shiliu’s flushed outer eye. With a light flick, he sucked the tear away.
The tear was warm, his tongue was warm too. Where it touched her smooth skin, a tingling itch spread.
Shiliu desperately wanted to claw at the spot he had licked, hard enough to draw blood even, if only to override that slightly astringent, numb sensation.
But her wrists were pinned tightly. Li Xuanci gave her no chance to evade. The tip of his tongue slid across her tear-damp eyelashes.
The sensation of damp heat seeped faintly through her tightly closed eyelids, adding an absurd, eerie intimacy. Shiliu didn’t dare open her eyes, could only cry out incoherently.
“No, stop, don’t lick.” Flustered and desperate, she could only beg him with words fragmented by gasps.
But Li Xuanci was determined to press his advantage.
The more Shiliu avoided him, the more wantonly he tasted her with his tongue. Even through her thin eyelids, he could feel her eyes darting about nervously behind them.
“Be good.” He coaxed in a low voice, like a hypnotist.
Shiliu instinctively shook her head, finally managing to put some distance between them. She opened her eyes to look at him, her eyelashes still adorned with fine, glistening tears.
But the moment she opened her eyes, she was ensnared by Li Xuanci’s deep, heavy gaze. It was pitch black, without a trace of light, like a calm sea on the night before a storm, concealing waves capable of swallowing a person whole.
Shiliu, for some reason, felt a surge of grievance. How could he bully her like this? She knew Li Xuanci was wicked, but perhaps because of the Shared Fate bond, or perhaps because of some indescribable reason, she had unconsciously developed a small dependence on him.
Tears welled up uncontrollably in her eyes again. She looked at him plaintively, hoping to beg for a little leniency.
But Li Xuanci showed no mercy whatsoever. Instead, he drew closer.
The tips of their noses were almost touching, yet he deliberately maintained a hair’s breadth of distance, letting them hover just apart, tangling and rubbing, their breaths mingling into one.
“Be good.” His breath lightly fanned over her, intimate like a lover’s whisper, yet within that intimacy lurked a dangerous edge.
“Otherwise, I’ll strip you bare right now.” The tail end of his sentence lifted slightly, even carrying a hint of pleasure.
“No!” Shiliu’s fingers clenched, resisting instinctively. But when she met Li Xuanci’s gaze, so close at hand, she knew she couldn’t escape.
A strange calm descended upon her amidst the despair. What good was fear? Just think of it as being bitten. It was better than him thinking up other tricks to torment her, to make her hurt. Thinking this, Shiliu closed her eyes and tremblingly extended her pink tongue.
Li Xuanci looked with satisfaction at the prey before him.
Eyes closed, trembling, even her eyelashes were quivering slightly. She only extended a tiny bit of her moist, red tongue. It seemed timid, but it wasn’t submission.
Li Xuanci reveled in this seemingly docile pretense. He wanted to break her spine, but he didn’t want her to truly bow and kneel too quickly.
Watching his prey struggle, thinking itself clever, within his palm was an utterly gratifying thing. It constantly stirred his desire for conquest, reaching its limit after brief, superficial satisfaction.
He quietly watched that rosy tongue, waiting patiently, not moving a muscle. Only when Shiliu grew restless and tried to pull away did he, at the moment she was least prepared and most caught off guard, fiercely take her tongue into his mouth.
This couldn’t be called a kiss. It was blatant conquest.
Li Xuanci wantonly sucked on her tender tongue, almost as if he wanted to devour it whole.
Shiliu could barely breathe. She couldn’t even swallow her own saliva fast enough. It formed ambiguous, silky threads between their entangled tongues, which he swallowed down along with her breath.
But he still wasn’t satisfied.
Li Xuanci pushed further into her mouth domineeringly. With a deliberate and wanton posture, like a sharp blade slicing open the seal of a letter, he rubbed the tip of his tongue against her lip line. He even slowly, deliberately, sensually licked over the edges of her teeth, leaving behind a spine-tingling itch.
The ambiguous sounds of sucking mingled with staccato gasps, all trapped within the confines of the bed curtain. Even without seeing anything, the slender, winding sounds alone were enough to make one’s ears burn.
Shiliu’s mind was hazy, relying solely on instinct to draw thin breaths from their tightly pressed lips and teeth, even unconsciously sucking on his tongue.
Though her strength was like a kitten lapping water, it only further provoked this man who devoured her.
Li Xuanci tightened his arm around her waist, sealing her breath. But just as she lost herself in the kiss, he silently slipped his hand into the collar he had earlier loosened.
With one sharp tug, he tore the clothing from her shoulder.
The sound of tearing fabric and the cool touch of the air on her exposed skin jolted Shiliu awake.
Her small hands pressed against Li Xuanci’s shoulders, trying with all her might to push him away. But her tongue was still caught in his mouth, their breaths entangled, making her resistance feel like a lingering caress.
“You pro… promised… if I used my tongue, you wouldn’t…” she managed between gasps, yet never fully pulling away from his lips.
Each word became a small kiss.
Finally somewhat satisfied, Li Xuanci mercifully withdrew slightly, but only to mimic her, pausing just above her lips. Each word of his reply was punctuated with a kiss.
“What I said was, if you didn’t behave, I’d strip you now. But I never promised to let you go afterward.”
The arrogant pleasure in his eyes threatened to overflow.
A stinging ache welled up again in Shiliu’s eyes, and an inexplicable sense of grievance bubbled up uncontrollably, like fish blowing bubbles.
Why is he so wicked? Why does he always bully her? And why is she so foolish, letting him bully her like this?
Li Xuanci watched her reddening eyes, almost wanting to laugh, yet feeling his teeth itch with the urge to bite and gnaw at her, to devour her flesh and blood, to swallow her whole before he could be satisfied.
So pitifully stupid. So stupid it made him laugh. So stupid it made him want to lock her away by his side, never letting anyone else lay eyes on her.
He half-heartedly suppressed the violent pleasure rising within him, putting on a facade of civilized reasoning as he leaned close to her ear.
But before he could speak, Shiliu warily stammered, “Wh-what are you doing?!”
Li Xuanci paused for a moment, then replied with a low, hoarse laugh, as if it were the most natural thing in the world, “You.”
Shiliu’s eyes widened instantly, and she scrambled to crawl away, hands and feet flailing, only to be dragged back and pinned beneath him.
“This time, I won’t bully you.”
“If you can hold back from coming, I’ll let you go. I won’t go back on my word.”
His gaze swept over her, filled with dark desire. He leaned down, and Shiliu instinctively retreated, but he still trapped her, his breath hot against her ear.
“You’d better hold it in.”
He bit down on the side of her neck, speaking with malicious pleasure.