35. Chapter 35
Chapter 35
Delilah
T hough I might not be a particularly lucky person, I’m one to look on the bright side of things. Surely there’s people who have it much worse.
They probably don’t have wolf DNA in their veins, but maybe they have a nosy neighbor, or an allergy to chocolate. Still, I sometimes can’t believe the awful timing my spurts of bad luck do have–and yet here I am. Half naked, that song from my early 2000s playlist about how shit is bananas, biting on my tongue hard enough to draw blood. Because of course, as my mind slipped to this morning, heat was pooling low in my stomach, and I was getting out of the shower to drape myself in a towel, a single claw decided now was the perfect time to maim my shin. As visibly as possible.
“Cedric! Is something wrong?” I gasp, twisting my body uncomfortably in an effort to hide the damage.
“I called you three times and you weren’t answering,” he says, eyes bright. “What happened to your leg?”
See? Not particularly lucky.
There’s no point in playing dumb, is there? I glance to my left, eyeing the razor as if it were a glass of water in the desert.
“This isn’t very glamorous, but I was shaving and my hand slipped,” I say with a little laugh. I barely restrain a huff or relief when I feel the claw I’m hiding behind my back retract.
Cedric squints, his lips pursed. “How sharp is this razor of yours? That,” he says, cocking his head toward my leg, “looks a lot deeper than a razor burn.”
“I have sensitive skin, it’s no big deal. I’m sorry I worried you,” I say with a shrug.
He nods, though I can tell he’s not entirely sold.
“Do you mind if I take a closer look?” Those nine words are enough to send my heart thundering against my ribcage. It’s not like he’s going to see the gash up close and go, “ Oh, yeah, definitely a claw mark .”
Unless.
I nod and he steps closer, kneeling next to me, and I wonder whether anyone else has ever had Cedric Campbell at their literal feet.
“May I?” he asks, like he did before brushing my wet-tangled hair. So much has passed between us since then, when we knew so little about each other and I’d never seen him smile. Now, though it’s the same question, it feels loaded with something altogether different .
“Sure,” I say, infusing my smile with every bit of warmth this man makes me feel.
His brows furrow in concentration as his fingers touch my leg, a zing of sensation shooting up my body from the simple contact. He carefully holds up my calf, inspecting the wound. “It’s not as deep as it looks, but it must hurt,” he says, so I quickly nod in agreement. “Do you have any disinfectant?”
Because I can’t tell him that it will fade on its own in a few hours–perks of accidentally hurting yourself as a werewolf, I guess–I tell him he can find my small collection of medical supplies in the cabinet to his right. He moves quickly and efficiently as always, retrieving the pale green bottle of disinfectant, cotton pads and a bandage I don’t remember buying, all without straying too far from me. As he pours a generous amount of the strong-smelling liquid on the pad and dabs it gently on the wound, I bite back a hiss.
“Does this happen a lot?” he asks casually, though his expression is still pinched.
“Do I have a dashing Brit with a penchant for frowning at my disposal a lot? I wouldn’t say that.”
He looks up at me, frowning, thus proving my point, and I can’t help but laugh. “It does,” I chuckle. “I don’t know if you’ve noticed, but I can be pretty clumsy.”
“Stop, I never would have guessed,” he says mildly.
“I liked you better when you weren’t making jokes all the time,” I say with a smirk.
“Did you?”
I shake my head, softening the curve of my mouth. “I always like you.”
A few beats of comfortable silence pass, so much so that I nearly forget the absurdity of this entire situation. I don’t feel self-conscious at all, in front of him like this, with my hair plastered to my face and body wrapped in a shapeless towel.
“I know you’d probably say tending to a razor burn doesn’t require a masters or shiny plaque, but it looks like you’ve done this a thousand times,” I tell him, almost fascinated by his confident movements. His long fingers are meticulously wrapping a bandage around the wound when he says, “I have. Little brother, and all that.”
“Has he changed much since then?”
He makes a sound that is similar to a snort, but somehow is far more elegant. “Not one bit.”
I think of what Cedric told me about his father, how he’s making life near impossible for Cedric and his brother alike, and I place a damp hand on his shoulder, stroking my thumb in the curve of his neck. “For what it’s worth, I can tell you’re a good brother to him.”
His hands still on my leg before he looks up at me again. Something cloudy passes in his eyes for a second, though they trace my face as if trying to memorize it.
“Are you going to be more careful, from now on?” he asks, surprising me.
“With razors?”
“With everything,” he says thickly, fingers now caressing my skin. “Given there won’t be a dashing Brit, as you said, to take my place.”
I shake my head lightly, a few drops of water trickling from my hair and toward my breasts. Cedric’s dark eyes track their movement before traveling back to mine. God, it’s unfair how handsome he is. It’s unfair that something brought him to me, and I don’t get to keep him. It’s unfair that I’m getting to know myself better than I ever have, and all the things I want, now that he’s here. But do I still want them if I can’t share them with him?
“There won’t be anyone at all to take your place,” I say.
Cedric
I press my thumb gently into the back of her leg, trying not to stare too openly at the smooth expanse of skin longer than necessary, and failing rather spectacularly.
How she thinks she can say things like that and not want me to eat her alive is beyond me.
“Cedric?” she adds then.
“Yes?”
“Have you started cooking yet?”
“Well, no, because your kitchen isn’t stocked enough, which is why I was going to–
“I’m not hungry anymore.”
“I was going to order in, but it’s not–”
“Cedric,” she repeats, my name lost in a breathy laugh. She opens her mouth, but says nothing else, and when her fingers curl into my shoulder, I realize what she meant. Something sharp and hot coils in my stomach when I get closer to her, still, notably, on my knees.
“I see,” I say, my hands traveling from her calves and up, up higher, Delilah’s breath hitching in her throat. “This morning wasn’t enough, was it? Do you need more?”
“Yes,” she says, quietly but determinedly. I love this side of her as much as the sweet, tender one.
“Are you going to spread your legs for me?” I ask, my palms now curling around the portion of her thighs that isn’t covered by the towel. I’m trying my absolute best not to peel it off her myself.
Delilah’s eyes look more green than brown right now, and they catch the light when she nods, placing her hands on top of mine. She slowly pries her legs apart, my fingers digging into her damp skin. Bloody hell .
I lean closer, nibbing lightly at the softness of her inner thigh, eliciting a small whimper out of her.
“You perfect creature,” I say reverently as I get closer to her core, one of her hands coming to rest on my nape, urging me near.
“I’m going to take care of you, alright?”
She nods again, frantically, her eyes alight with a lust I can only mirror. I move my hand slowly, pressing my thumb into her in lazy circles.
“I–I’m ready for more,” she says after a minute.
“That you are,” I say, marveling at her wetness. Had she been thinking about this? I breach the few inches that separate my tongue from her, licking up in a languorous stroke.
“Oh god,” she whispers, her fingers digging into my hair. “Please don’t stop.”
“I have no intention to,” I rumble against her, tasting her again. She jolts lightly when I apply more pressure, and I clutch my hands tighter around her legs. She’s breathing more heavily now, and I can tell she’s holding back.
“None of that,” I say as I look up at her, her eyes squeezed shut opening at the sound of my voice. She meets my gaze again, parted lips and rosy cheeks worthy of an angel. The towel is slipping, the precarious knot coming undone. “Beautiful.”
“So are you,” she says with a small smile. “I can’t believe that’s like, the first thing I ever told you. ”
“The first thing you told me was something about me being hard,” I say with a smirk before plunging my tongue back inside, her resulting moan aptly shooting straight to my cock.
“R-right, even worse,” she laughs lightly. “You remember.”
I press my fingers tighter into the sides of her legs as I continue, keeping her tiny jolts at bay.
“I told you,” I say before trailing one hand up, up, until I’m pushing one finger inside her. “There is no forgetting you.” I plunge a second finger for a minute, until Delilah pushes herself forward on the lip of the bathtub, fucking herself on my fingers.
“Oh–”
“Are you close?”
“ Yes .”
“Good.” I stroke her with my thumb one more time before returning to my ministrations, my rhythm increasing along with her rapid breaths. I’m not stopping until she comes apart for me.
A litany of Cedric, Cedric, Cedric accompanies every lap of my tongue, and it’s only scant minutes until I’m pressing deeper into her, and her legs tremble as Delilah comes on my tongue.
The low moan in my throat seems to push her impossibly further, her fingers clawing at every inch of my skin as she struggles to find purchase, body utterly out of her control. Then her grip on me goes entirely slack, the towel fallen below her heaving chest baring her to me further, a swirling of sensations coursing through my entire body.
“You did so well,” I tell her, my hands still on the sides of her legs, somehow unable to let go of her. Painfully aware of how hard I am. I lean my head into the side of her knee, closing my eyes. I reopen them a few seconds later to the sight of Delilah’s shower-frizzled hair, eyes soft and slowly refocusing as her thumb strokes my cheek.
“I’d really like to repay the courtesy,” she says quietly.
“You already have,” I say. Because it’s not about me, and being the cause of her pleasure is more than enough right now.
“I know I said I wasn’t hungry,” Delilah hums after a while. “But when you said you were going to order in… What did you have in mind?”
My lips quirk against her skin.
“Anything you want.”