4. Carlisle
CARLISLE
N ightshade kept her sleeping. Her falling prey to its venom was tortuous, and I don’t care to think about what she's said nor what she’s done without me beside her in this realm.
Holding her close to me is a balm to my pain.
I wonder if she sees terrors in her sleep that would compete with the nightmares that linger in the underworld. Her cream silk nightgown would cover her body in modesty, but I’ve draped a throw blanket from her sofa around her frame as one would a babe. Both to keep her warm in the depths of the underworld we must venture, and also to disguise her and keep what has happened from prying eyes as best I can.
A coil and a single strand of hair were required from each of us. I give them willingly as I’ve done so many times before. Past lifetimes and each time, I waited for her to meet Hermes and bring her to the river Styx. The memories flick through my mind as I hold her soft curves close, and Charon, the ferryman, takes us from the land of the dead to the river’s bank.
The lights of the underworld, all the hells and heavens.
With Hades’ guard on my left and Asphodel Fields in front of me, I head toward the guard located just before the three judges, bypassing the field that makes you forget.
It was part of my punishment. I’ve done this so many times. But never with her in my arms.
My heart pounds as I make my way, my boots sinking into the soft ground, conscious of the eyes of judgement on me. It chills me to my core.
For thousands of lifetimes I’ve held Ivy in my arms, and for the first time it feels as though they’ll take her away from me…again. In all black, dark eyes peer through the shadow of the cape that drapes over the guard’s head. I’ve never seen his face. But I know the guard that waits for Lord Hades’ men.
Screams of terror are vaguely heard in the distance. This is the marketplace of souls. Where mortals are tested, where the weight of their morality is judged, possibly, for all eternity.
I start, clearing my tight throat, “I am of the army of the dead and?—”
“You may pass,” he says beneath his breath, barely sparing a glance.
My shoulders rise with a desperate need to move. To obey before he changes his mind.
“My thanks to Lord Hades,” I state, bowing my head and rushing toward my chambers with her in my arms. Her head lulls from side to side and I know she’ll wake soon.
The locking of the stone door with the iron key is harsh and loud. The “thunk” echoes in my chambers and that’s what wakes her.
She gasps as I lay her down in a high-ceilinged room with dark walls and thick pillars, everything expertly crafted to keep the space and balance and give a sense of awe to anyone who enters. Ivy seems both awed and terrified as reality dawns on her.
The beauty of her serene expression at peace in my arms vanishes and with her widened darting eyes comes the pain of her not knowing.
Ivy glances around, taking it in.
Her new home. Our new home.
Her body is stiff as if a prey realizing it’s been caught in a trap. Her beautiful gaze lands on the furnishings, each piece dark and solid, yet welcoming. The side tables and rugs are a mix of antiques fit for a palace, the richness in the curved wood and polished shine that never gets dull. Artwork painted by the most skilled hands in the underworld hangs on the walls. Every piece I picked with her in mind. Little memories of her in each piece. It was Hades’ version of hell I was destined to live. He said it was a gift. A compromise that was fair and just. And for so long I’ve lived without the one thing that gives me peace.
When he offered me this chance to have her, there was no reality in which I would refuse his deal.
Her eyes skip over the pieces. I can tell she wants to linger on some of them, but she doesn’t. Ivy’s only glancing at the elegance surrounding her. Even now, she frantically searches for a way out.
There is only one door. And with a flick of my wrist, the magic of this realm takes the key away.
As she scrambles for an exit, on shaky limbs, I can only look at her.
Her full lips. Her doe eyes. The fear in her expression, but also a desire that’s so close to the surface I can’t ignore it.
I don’t care if this is meant to be a punishment or a test. I’m too consumed with Ivy’s closeness.
I stalk toward her, slowly, and she freezes, her gaze focuses on me. Her eyes widen. She understands that for now she’s my prey, and I’m going to have her.
I’m impatient for her. More impatient than Ivy can ever know. I want her curves under my hands. Her warmth pressed against me. I crave her and for her to remember. I wish to tilt her face to mine so I can capture her mouth. I even desire her defiance. That spark she has reminds me of everything we’ll have again.
Ivy backs up one more step and her back hits the windowsill. She grasps for it without turning, her hands finding the edge, and lets out a small sound at her discovery that there’s nowhere else to run.
The iron press around my heart is turned tighter. The fucking pain I feel staring at her with such fear in her eyes is unbearable. Nearly so. Not nearly what it was when they told me she would be lost to me forever.
She has to look, then, turning her head to see out large windows behind her. Ivy must know from the inside of the tower that this place is like a castle. Not unlike the old city I tore her from. Not all of the underworld is this. The view outside should only confirm it.
“There’s nowhere else,” I tell her with a touch of a sympathetic tone, in case she’s still thinking there’s a means of escape she hasn’t found yet. “You might find joy in the view I offer here.” She does not know, but a lifetime ago—a few of them—we lived in Edinburgh. They gifted me this home because of that. A blessing and a curse.
“Take me back,” she demands.
“There is no way to do that,” I tell her honestly. “Not until the gods allow. Here is where we will remain forevermore.”
Ivy jerks her head around, eyes blazing. “This is?—”
“This isn’t real,” she says, almost to herself. “None of this is real.”
“If it’s not real, then let me enjoy you,” I offer. Desperate to kiss her. Desperate for her to stop fighting and fearing me.
She pauses, her chest rising and falling as she calms right before me. Her eyes drift down my body and then back to my stare. Please. Let me help you remember.
“Enjoy?” She plays as if she doesn’t know what I’m suggesting.
“Touch you,” I say, taking a step forward. “Kiss you,” I add. My feet stay planted though, not wanting to push her too much too quickly. “If it’s not real, there should be no harm.”
Ivy only leans against the sill, her heart racing fast enough for me to hear it pound and see her pulse fluttering in her neck. I breathe in deep, getting as much of her scent into my lungs as I can. It’s been weeks of following her through that rainy city, with storms that constantly try to wash her away, and I won’t take this closeness for granted.
“I promise you’ll enjoy it, too.” She will. I wouldn’t do anything less for her. She doesn’t have to believe me now, but I’ll show her.
“Do I know you?” she finally asks in a murmur.
“Yes,” I answer, hope cracking that vice.
“What do you want with me?” she asks.
“To love you.”
“This isn’t real,” she whispers again. When she smiles, the muscles in her throat tighten and my gaze is drawn there, my desire to kiss her just behind the shell of her ear intensifies. She loves it when I do that.
I move across the floor to her, closing the distance between us. Ivy stiffens at the windowsill, but there is truly nowhere else to go—she can only lean as far as the glass, and she’s not even doing that. I knew it. I knew part of her remembered me. Part of her craves my touch the way I have been craving hers. Her fast breaths tell me how much she’s wanted this and how she told herself she was afraid.
She can be afraid, if that’s how she feels, but she won’t be afraid for long. She’ll feel so much more than fear now that I have her with me.
So much more.
I lower my lips to her neck, bending slowly and deliberately, and at the last second, Ivy lifts her chin and gives me more access to her tender skin.
She gasps when my lips touch her neck, her heart beating hard just underneath her skin, and I groan into her heat when her back arches toward me.
My heart pounds with hot blood and desire like I’ve never known.
My Ivy.
“Ivy,” I murmur with devotion.
She makes a needy sound in the back of her throat and presses closer. Every inch of my skin remembers her touch. My entire body feels the need to hold her, to love her, to be enveloped in her scent.
I can feel how conflicted she is and at the same time how relieved she must be. This is not the touch of a woman who considers me a stranger. “Give in to me,” I whisper as if it's a demand, but instead it’s a plea.
Ivy throws her arms around my neck and pulls herself in closer, her breath warm on my cheek. It’s fucking heaven. She’s my heaven.
I drag my lips up her neck until I capture her sweet mouth. And then I lick into her, tasting her deeply. Her body is warm and soft under my hands, and her arms flex around my neck as I run my palms over her curves. I remember every bit of her body.
She makes soft noises into the kiss that don’t sound like protests at all.
I know that she likes it when I run the pad of my thumb under her breast and tease at one of her nipples. She likes it when I pull her in by the waist so she can feel how hard I am under my clothes. She likes it when I slip my hands under her clothes and take them off one by one, like I’m unwrapping her. Like she’s a precious gift, which she is, even if she’s being used to torment me, even if she’s being tormented herself for no reason I can fathom.
I expose her curves to the light of the underworld, lifting her nightgown up, and dip my head to kiss her collarbone.
Ivy throws her head back and lets her eyes flutter closed, clearly relishing the sensation, even if she’s too afraid to watch me give it to her.
It doesn’t matter if she can’t look at me yet. I don’t care. If she concentrates on feeling, she’ll remember. Every touch will help her remember. I have to keep my mind on that goal—every touch will bring the Ivy I know closer to the surface.
Even if it doesn’t, I’m too swept up in her to stop. The ache in my cock spreads until it’s everywhere in my body. My arms flex. I lick up the line of her neck, then over her other nipple, drawing a soft moan from her lips, then get to my knees and spread her thighs.
Ivy balances precariously on the sill while I open her to me and push my face into the soft, wet folds that I’ve been missing like I would miss my own heart.
She cries out, sweet and low, when I lap my tongue over her clit, gasping with every flick against the sensitive nerves. The soft oh s she lets out are pleas for more, though Ivy won’t let herself say the words. Either she doesn’t know my name or she won’t allow herself to say it.
I’ll make her say it. I’ll make her remember that she knows my name, that she knows me. She already knows she wants me. She already knows she needs this.
Ivy arches her back again, pressing her hips more firmly into my face.
I drink her in like I’ll never get another chance.
Ivy cries out, coming onto my tongue. It’s the first of many orgasms I’ll give her. Endless orgasms, if she wants them, and the taste of her sweetness overwhelms me.
I have to have her stretched out under me, so I lift her from the sill and capture her mouth again while I take us to the wide, cream, velvet chaise that she’d looked at before. Ivy sighs when I lay her out on it, a noise that hitches as if she’s giving in.
I can hardly spare the time to strip myself of my clothes. I shove at them carelessly until more of me is exposed.
That’s when Ivy reaches for me. It’s the first time she’s done it deliberately, her eyes hot as she drags her fingertips down the front of my chest. My cock twitches from that touch alone. Her eyelashes flutter in lust. And she drags her fingertips down the front of my chest. I love it. She feels like heaven.
“Please,” she says under her breath, as if she can’t bear to say it any louder. “Please.”
There’s no reply I can make to communicate how urgently I need her, so I simply slot myself between her legs and nudge her opening with the head of my cock. She buries her head in the crook of my neck and kisses me. My Ivy kisses me in the tender spot as her legs wrap around my hips. My heaven. My Ivy. My heaven.
Ivy gasps as I push in, then gasps again, the sound becoming a quiet moan as I fill her completely.
I close my eyes, relishing the sensation. I’ve needed this so much.
I’ve needed to feel her more than I needed my own sanity.
I’m gentle at first but with a single moan of “more,” I allow myself to fuck her more ruthlessly. Rutting into her and loving the pleasure and lust that covers us in the heat of the moment. Everything I remember, and more, because we’ve been separated.
Her moans are exactly the same. Her voice breaks and rises exactly the same. I haven’t lost her.
She comes on my cock as I drive into her, fucking her mercilessly, just the way she likes. Ivy clings to me, throwing her head back, dragging her wet mouth over my skin, biting wherever she can sink her teeth into my skin.
I can feel her everywhere around me, that sweet, tight sense of home.
“Ivy,” I growl into her neck, unable to stop myself, unable to hold back. It’s the only word that means anything to me. “My heaven.”