Chapter 8 #3
“Why?” He laughs coarsely. “I’m an eater and a seeker myself. I devour. I hunt. I consume people and use them up.”
I reach out, my fingertips wandering the blue forest of his bearded jawline. “Are you going to use me up, Beresford?”
“I can’t.” He moves in closer, his breath quickening.
“You’re deeper than they are. Richer where it counts.
I could dive into you, swim for years, and never reach the bottom.
I could swallow your soul for ages, and yet no matter how much I consumed, you would remain wholly yourself. That is why I love you.”
His words catch me in the heart like a hail of tiny, glittering arrows. I don’t pause to contemplate my answer. “I think I might love you, too.”
He gives me a questioning grin, tinged with hope. “You think you love me?”
“I become more certain of it each time we’re together,” I whisper. “But we’re not supposed to be saying any of this to each other when our acquaintance is so new.”
“Yet here we are.” He moves over me like a mountain, bathing me in his heat and shadow. His bearded mouth finds mine, and I revel in the salty warmth of his lips. “Sybil, will you let me ruin you for anyone else?”
“I think you’ve done that already,” I whisper. “But I’m always happy to let you try again.”
“Remember, you will be the only one coming tonight. I will be suffering, and enjoying the torture immensely.” He gives my chin a playful tweak before taking my petticoat in both his huge hands and ripping it down the front.
I can’t help the little sound of distress that escapes me when he destroys the piece of clothing I worked so hard to embellish.
Beresford notices immediately and halts, with the ruined garment still clutched in his fingers. “What is it?”
I bite my lip, struggling against the truth. I’m embarrassed to admit how few items of clothing I own, or how long it took me to sew the salvaged lace onto the petticoat he so casually demolished.
“I shouldn’t have done that.” His voice aches with repentance. “You liked this nightdress.”
“It’s old. It shouldn’t matter.”
“But it matters to you, and therefore it is of infinite importance to me. I will have it mended.”
“No need.”
“Then you shall have a new one. Fifty new ones.”
“Beresford.” I cup his face. “It’s all right.”
“I’m sorry. Sometimes I don’t understand humans—women.” He corrects himself hastily, but my brain latches onto the phrase.
I don’t understand humans.
An odd thing to say. Not a sentence that the average man would speak, even by mistake.
My mother has repeated a particular mantra to me and Anne over the years: “Believe what a man tells you about himself by accident.”
Slowly, almost mechanically, I push Beresford’s head down between my legs, if only to occupy him so he doesn’t see me pondering his words.
He spoke as if he isn’t human. But he is, of course. Isn’t he?
He doesn’t want to talk about his past. He has no family. He moved here a couple years ago but didn’t introduce himself to anyone until recently.
“What changed?” I ask.
Beresford lifts his head, his beard glistening with my arousal. “I put my tongue inside you. You liked it before.”
“Not that. I was wondering why you suddenly decided to begin inviting people over. For your first couple of years in this region, you were practically a recluse.”
“That question is related to my past.”
“I suppose it is.” I sigh, relaxing against the pillows. “Forget that I asked.”
“You’re inquisitive tonight.” His eyes narrow with disapproval, as if curiosity is my least attractive quality.
“I’m human.”
For a long moment, he studies me. “Are you?”
A thrill of apprehension passes through my chest, and I sit up, more indignant than I should be. “Of course.”
“Of course.” He grins, his canines glinting. “Relax, and let me savor you.”
I flop against the pillows. Beresford spreads my ruined petticoat open and runs both hands up my body, pausing to squish my breasts gently and nibble at one of them before he returns to the space between my thighs.
I’m distracted, my mind shredded by worry and by questions. As amazing as Beresford’s tongue feels, I can’t bring myself anywhere close to an orgasm.
“I see you’re bent on challenging me tonight,” he growls against my inner thigh.
“I’m sorry.”
“Don’t apologize. I accept the challenge, and I will complete the task if it kills me. There’s something I’d like to try, if you’re willing.”
“What is it?”
“I’d like to take you out there.” He nods toward the curtain. “I’d like to eat your cunt in front of my guests.”
“Oh…” My skin flushes hot. The thought of seeing all those nude bodies coupling, of those people watching him devour me—it’s shockingly titillating.
Beresford’s eyes glint with satisfaction. “You like the idea.”
“No, I don’t,” I say, flustered, but I giggle immediately afterward, and he grins.
“You can stay wrapped in this.” He seizes a soft red blanket that’s lying nearby. “I’ll keep you covered with the blanket or with my mouth. But I will be naked.”
“You’ll be fully naked, in front of them all?”
“That’s right. You will be the queen, and I will be your willing servant for the night.”
Fuck, what if I summon something? I’ve been lucky so far tonight, but that could change at any moment. If a demon appears here, it will only fuel the suspicion that’s already simmering in people’s minds.
But what if I can keep my emotions in check?
What if, instead of hiding in a curtained corner, I join the party and let everyone see me with Beresford?
It could help my image. If nothing else, it will alert the guests to the fact that I know their most intimate secrets.
Perhaps they’ll think twice about turning against me, for fear of what I might reveal about their illicit activities.
I release a slow, trembling breath. “I want to do it.”
Beresford helps me remove the remnants of the petticoat, then wraps me in the red blanket.
I’ve never felt anything so soft, and I’m tempted to ask what kind of wool it is, but I refrain.
He can already tell that my mind is fragmented tonight, fractured by anxiety and curiosity.
That’s why he devised this plan. He’s trying to help me suppress all that noise so I can focus on the one thing he wants to achieve—my pleasure.
When he carries me back into the main area of the barn, my body immediately responds to the sight of so many bodies surging rhythmically.
They’re all in groups of two or three. Some move clumsily, awkwardly, hungrily, while others are graceful and practiced, a visual delight.
Inhibitions have vanished thanks to the incense and the wine, and everything is glazed with lust and sex.
Does Beresford understand what he’s doing, bringing so many of the young people of the region into one place for such parties?
They’re all going to have to live near each other for decades.
They’ll get married, have children, and go about their lives, all the while knowing what their friends and neighbors did in Beresford’s barn years ago.
All the concerns and questions fade from my head as Beresford places me in a big chair draped with furs. Once I’m settled, with the blanket folded over my body, he begins taking off his clothes.
His belt is first, sliding through the loops, falling to the floor. Then he unbuttons his trousers, and they slip down his legs. He kicks them aside. He’s already barefoot.
The long shirt he’s wearing drapes over his big cock, partly concealing it. Beresford unbuttons the garment slowly, holding my gaze.
All around us, the room has quieted a bit. The slap of flesh on flesh continues, but a quick glance shows me that most of the couples are watching us—watching him.
Beresford drops the shirt and stands before me in all his naked, sinewy glory. I’ve never seen anyone with a more powerful physique.
“Turn around,” I command.
His erection juts out before him, bobbing a little as he revolves in a slow circle.
I hold back a delighted gasp as his back comes into my view—powerful slabs of muscle, a tapered waist, and a pair of round, taut ass cheeks.
His ass is what I really wanted to see. And yes, maybe I wanted to show everyone here that I, the strange offspring of the Fallon family, the one they all tend to avoid, can claim this magnificent man as my own.
Everyone in the room either wants him or wishes they could be him. But he belongs to me.
That triumphant knowledge drives everything else out of my head.
“Come here,” I order him. “Kneel.”
Beresford gets on his knees between my parted legs. His fingers slide under the blanket, along my thigh, toward my center.
This time, I’m fully engaged in what’s happening, exquisitely conscious of the approach of those thick, hot fingers. I tremble when he gets closer, and I clutch the arms of the chair as his fingertips finally touch my pussy.
No one can see exactly what he’s doing to me.
I’m not exposed to any of them. But he is willingly displayed, loudly proclaiming himself my desirable and submissive servant, and I’m wet from the heady power of it.
When two of his fingers plunge into my opening, I gasp quietly with the tantalizing force of the penetration.
He curls those fingers slightly, working them inside me. Then he leans down, shifts the blanket, and puts his mouth on my clit.
I slam one hand onto his head, convulsively gripping his hair. I’m skating higher now, rushing upward to the peak faster than I expected. If anything demonic is going to happen, this would be the moment for it.
But there’s nothing. No sudden burst of otherworldly color, no shiver of wings or rasp of claws.
The other sexual trysts unfold around us in a merged cloud of soft, naked hues, skin in all colors—brown, gold, black, ivory, pink—but Beresford and I are vibrantly etched in my mind, blazing with color. He’s blue and I’m scarlet, and I want to scream his name but I won’t do it in front of them.