Chapter 29 Tula
TULA
If Tony had hoped that parading his new girlfriend in front of her was going to make her jealous, he had achieved the exact opposite.
He'd freed her.
Now that Tula was no longer riddled with guilt over ending things with him, she felt lighter, more open, and happier. She could finally be with Esag with no reservations.
"Shira is perfect for Tony," she said. "She's bright and cheerful, and she doesn't take herself too seriously. She's exactly what he needs after the storm that was me."
Esag frowned. "Why do you refer to yourself as a storm? To me, you are pure sunshine."
He was so sweet.
She lifted her hand to cup his face. "I'm sunshine to you because you make me happy. I was moody and angry with Tony, which wasn't fair to him. It wasn't his fault that he wasn't you."
A smile lifted one corner of Esag's mouth. "I make you happy?"
"Yes." She lifted on her toes and kissed his lips. "And you keep me satisfied, which is not easy. I'm a very demanding, difficult female."
"You're not difficult." He kissed the tip of her nose. "Demanding, definitely, but I'm happy to oblige."
"You're so good to me," she said softly. "Tony will always be part of my life because of our son, but you are the one I want to spend eternity with."
His eyes started glowing, and she watched as the wariness in his eyes was replaced by hope. It struck her suddenly how unfair she'd been to him, accepting his love and basking in his devotion while holding back the words he so clearly needed to hear.
She'd been afraid. Afraid of making a mistake because of their complicated history, of not knowing what love was, and of her precarious situation. But she was not a coward, and it was time for her to own up to her feelings.
Esag wasn't Tony, with his quiet neediness and his inability to truly connect with her. He wasn't the parade of forgettable men who had drifted through her life in the harem, placeholders for a love that could never come.
Esag was the one she'd been waiting for, and she'd wasted too long hating him for hurting her sister's feelings, and for a thousand other things that had been out of his control.
Perhaps she'd hated him so much because she'd fancied him even then.
Even as a girl, she'd noticed how handsome he was, how bright his smile was, and how quick he was to laugh.
He'd changed, and he wasn't as cheerful now as he used to be, but she had a feeling that she would be able to peel away that layer of sadness and uncover the sunny underlayer she still remembered so well.
"I love you," she said.
The words came out easier than she'd expected, with none of the struggle she'd anticipated. It was a simple statement of fact.
Esag went very still.
"You love me?"
"Yes." She smiled. "I love you." She said it again, stronger this time, watching the way his eyes widened, the way his breath stopped, the way his whole body seemed to lean toward her like a flower toward the sun.
"I love you, and I think that I've always been a little in love with you.
Sometimes the line between love and hate is blurred.
I'm just glad I didn't realize it until now because loving you and missing you for five millennia would have been intolerable. "
He swallowed. "I can't say the same to you because it would sound obscene.
You were twelve, and I thought of you as the kid sister of the girl I fancied.
But I liked you a lot and admired your spunk.
Then you appeared to me in a vision, and you were all grown up and breathtakingly beautiful.
The spark was ignited right there and then, even though I hadn't realized it at first."
He kissed her then, gentle and possessive at the same time, pouring his heart into the kiss, and she kissed him back with equal fervor, pouring all the words she'd held back into the press of her lips, the stroke of her tongue, the way her fingers tangled in his hair.
"Take me to bed," she said when they broke apart.
Esag's eyes blazed with inner light. "As my lady commands."
He swept her up into his arms and cradled her against his chest with a strength and tenderness that was all Esag.
Laughing, she wrapped her arms around his neck.
He carried her to the bedroom and laid her on the bed with a gentleness that belied the hunger in his eyes, settling her against the pillows like she was a queen and he her loyal servant. Then he just stood there for a moment, looking down at her with an unreadable expression.
"What?" she asked.
"I'm memorizing this moment. I want to remember forever the first time you told me you loved me." He lowered himself onto the bed beside her, propping himself up on one elbow. "I could spend eternity just looking at you."
Thankfully, he did more than look.
He kissed her again, softer this time, a slow exploration that made her toes curl.
He undressed her slowly, reverently, as if unwrapping a gift he'd been waiting a lifetime to receive, as if this was their first time together, and perhaps it was because she'd finally told him that she loved him.
Each piece of clothing that fell away was followed by a kiss—on her shoulder, her collarbone, the swell of her breast. By the time she lay bare before him, she was trembling with anticipation.
"So beautiful," he breathed, his eyes traveling over her body with an appreciation that made her feel like a goddess rather than a mere immortal. "You are so incredibly beautiful."
"Thank you." She reached for him, tugging at his shirt. "But I want less talking and more undressing."
He laughed and complied, shedding his own clothes with considerably less ceremony. When he stretched out beside her again, skin against skin, Tula let out a sigh of pure contentment.
This feeling of connection, of being truly seen and loved for exactly who she was, was what she'd been missing all those centuries in the harem, going through one lover after another. This wasn't just sex. This was true intimacy. True connection.
Esag took his time, mapping her body with hands and lips and tongue as if he was learning her all over again. He lingered on the places that made her gasp, avoided the places that made her ticklish, adjusted his touch to match her responses with an attentiveness that bordered on telepathic.
When he finally settled between her thighs, she was already on edge.
"I love you," he said, holding her gaze as he slid into her.
The words, combined with the sensation of him filling her, pushed her over the edge she'd been teetering on. Tula cried out, her back arching off the bed, pleasure crashing through her in endless waves.
Esag held her, murmuring words of love and devotion against her skin, before beginning to move in slow, deep strokes that built up the pleasure all over again.
They made love slowly, tenderly, with none of the desperate urgency of their earlier encounters. This was different. This was a claiming and a surrender all at once, a physical expression of the emotional bond they'd finally fully acknowledged.
When release came for both of them, it was brilliant. Transformative.
Afterward, they lay tangled together in the sheets, her head on his chest, his hand caressing her back. The only sounds were their thundering heartbeats and their gradually slowing breaths.
"Move in with me," Tula said.
Esag's hand stilled on her back. "Now?"
"Yes." She propped herself up on her elbow to look at him.
"Let's make it official. Tell Davuh and Roven that you are moving out and transfer your workshop to the spare bedroom.
I don't like it that you work inside a closet.
You need space to grow artistically." She traced a finger along the line of his jaw, feeling the softness of his short beard.
"I already fall asleep next to you every night and wake up next to you every morning, but I also want your clothes in my closet. I want this to be our home."
His smile was slow and brilliant, like a sunrise over the ocean. "Tomorrow?"
"Yes." She settled back against his chest, satisfied.
"I don't want to move my workshop, though."
Tula looked up at him in surprise. "Why not?"
"The other bedroom should be for the baby." His hand moved to rest on the swell of her belly. "But even if this house had a third bedroom, I wouldn't want the workshop to be inside and for him to breathe in the dust."
That hadn't occurred to her, but he was right. Her son would be human for the first thirteen years of his life. Fragile. Their home needed to be pristine.
"You need somewhere to work."
"I'll build a shed outside where the sawdust and noise won't disturb you or the baby." He kissed her forehead. "Until it's done, I can continue working at my old place. Davuh and Roven won't mind. They're hardly ever there anyway."
"A shed," she repeated. "I like that. But with air conditioning and windows." She imagined herself walking out of the house to bring him tea or a snack, her big pregnant belly pointing the way.
Tears pricked at her eyes, but they were happy tears, the kind that seemed to come so easily now that she'd let go of the anger and allowed love in.
Esag was planning a future with her and her child, thinking about nurseries and workshops and all the practical details of building a life together.
A life. A real life, with a partner who loved her and a baby and a welcoming community to raise her child in.
After five thousand years of existence, she was finally going to live.
"I love you," she said again, because she could. Because she wanted to. Because she'd spent so many years believing that those words were never going to leave her mouth. Now that she'd set them free, she never wanted to stop saying them.