Chapter 13
CHAPTER 13
Sarah
“ T hat was…”
“Really hot,” Deacon said as we dressed, looking a bit troubled even though we’d just enjoyed a few amazing orgasms. “But we did not come here for that .”
I side eyed him while adjusting the hem of my tunic shirt down to my knees. “ I didn’t come here at all,” I reminded him. “I was drugged and brought against my will.” But then I thought about my wording and gave him a sinful smile. “Okay, well, I did come here, but you know what I mean.”
He smirked at my choice of phrase, then grew serious. “Apologies for thinking I was helping you by bringing you here. I did not know what else to do.”
I leaned against him, and he wrapped me in his muscular arms. Because of our height difference, I snuggled against his abdomen. No matter how fucked things were, it always felt better to be pressed against him or Jac.
“I understand what you mean,” I whispered, feeling fatigued to my marrow. “I also don’t know what else to do. But I’d like to go home.”
He tangled his fingers in my hair and used the strands to tip my head back, so he was looking down at me and into my eyes. “You still do not wish to call upon your mother?”
I couldn’t explain everything I had meant when I said I wanted to go home. So I answered his question, instead. “No. I meant what I said. I don’t want her to see me like this. She is a world-class worrier, Deacon. And given her circumstances, I don’t think it’s fair to do to her.”
He nodded. “Very well, then. Let us go home.” He extended his hand, and I took it, before we walked outside.
I was surprised to see Jac’s ship there, not Deacon’s. “We took Sovereign ? Not Allegiant ?”
“I did not wish to disturb those convalescing in my ship.”
“Right, right.” Made sense. “How are they all?”
“Last I heard, much better.” He cast a smile my way. “Ode thinks Mock will be able to walk at his union to Silence tomorrow."
I was gutted by the thought of anyone being injured on my behalf. “I am so sorry this happened.”
We boarded the ship and he got us into the air. The suns had set while we were in the temple.
After we were on course to Halla, he turned toward me. “We are all sorry this happened, Consort. But it is not our faults. There is one at fault for all of this, and we will deal with him in due time.”
Of course he was referring to Rex. I nodded and stared at the horizon, while the colors painted the sky. I didn’t want to talk or think or feel anything else. I was so wrung out by everything that had transpired the past few days. Every flashing light on the dashboard ate at my brain. The sounds of the ship were a punishment. Even the gentle movements of Deacon’s expert flying seemed like a shattering of my bones.
I swallowed hard and found my voice. “I’m going to lay down until we get back.”
He gave me a gentle smile I did not deserve. “As you wish.”
I left for Jac’s quarters and though it was far smaller than Deacon’s on Allegiant , I didn’t care. Little more than a tiny room with a bunk by comparison, I tucked in under the covers and dozed off. But my dreams were really just soaring thoughts. More noise.
When we arrived back home, I was grateful no one tried to speak to me until I was in my cottage. Deacon had gestured for them to leave me be. As soon as I opened the door, Jac looked at me with expectant eyes, but he said nothing. I brushed past him and went to the bed.
Deacon softly asked from the doorway, “Do you want company?”
I nodded and my companions joined me, but neither of them crowded or snuggled. It was like they knew to give me my space, and I was grateful.
At first.
After laying there for an hour unable to fall asleep, I needed to get up. Ladrian body heat was profoundly warmer than humans, and I was melting between them.
No, not melting. Not really. But I feel gross. What is it?
Dirty. I feel dirty.
Maybe a shower would help?
I crept to the bathroom and cranked the shower head on the coldest setting. But I kept feeling the water for the temperature and even though I had melted between Jac and Deacon, I couldn’t stand it. Cold water would never clean the filth off of me. I turned it fully in the other direction and found what I needed.
The steamy water cascaded down my skin, too electric. Instead of soothing my body, it woke me up. My mind raced. How could I explain to my companions that something inside of me had been left broken by Rex? And it wasn’t even broken by him, not really. It had been broken by my companions.
When they stole me away from my world.
I loved them more than anything, but I could not change the fact that when they had abducted me, a part of me was left on Earth. Coming to Halla was not my choice. Initially, staying on Halla was not my choice, either. Back then, I had wanted to go back to Earth. Even now, when I told Deacon I wanted to go home, I had meant Earth . Not to stay, but to visit.
There was no way to say that without upsetting my companions. So, I tried to keep it to myself. When Rex was with me, I felt…so many things. But the most important one of all was that I hadn’t felt alone anymore.
I felt fuller. Completed.
When he left my body, it was as though that broken part of me that I had worked so hard to ignore became undeniable. Like the difference between seeing a room with a flashlight and seeing a room with all the lights on. His absence flicked the lights on, and I didn’t know how to turn them off again. For that matter, I didn’t know if I should.
And if I told either Jac or Deacon any of that…I didn’t know if there was a way to come back from it. How could I explain that it wasn’t because I had Rex as a passenger? It was that I had a passenger. Who the passenger was did not seem to matter.
But is that entirely true?
I continued to let the hot water pound against my body as my thoughts whirred. One thing Rex was good for was my sex drive. He whispered such naughty things in my head. Just thinking about that aspect of him made me smile. As the water touched every part of me, I wanted to do the same. I thought about his bathtub, floating peacefully until my body went to war with itself. My left hand caressed my tits, while my right hand went for my clit. Those dirty words coming from him. My own filthy thoughts. I had made him leave before I really went at it, but some part of me knew I was doing a bad thing.
And I liked it.
Did I like it? Or did he?
It was hard to tell the difference in that moment. I stroked all over my body and gave myself to the memory. Rex had been the most powerful person on Halla but didn’t have power over me—I had power over him. And I had liked that. But when he coaxed me into relaxing , as he put it, I wondered who had the power then. The question drove me closer to another orgasm. I gasped as my pussy ached to be filled. I was so close.
The bathroom door opened, and I froze in place.
Jac saw me through the shower glass. Saw what I was doing. His face went from half asleep to wide awake. Hungry. Hard. He strode to the shower, slid the door open, and stepped in. Without a word, he turned me around and pulled my hips back.
He licked up my neck and murmured, “What were you thinking about?” before he entered me. We grunted together from the force of his thrust, but he remained buried inside of me. Not moving. “Tell me.”
It was hard to make words with his cock so deep in me, my body already aching for release. “The night…when Deacon was jealous. The belt—"
He growled, “Yeah, the belt.”
Then he grabbed the top of my shoulders and slammed relentlessly at my body with his. Our wet bodies collided again and again, the slap of him against my ass was like a spanking that I so richly deserved. He took a fist of my hair and pulled it straight back, like I was his ride, and he would tell me where to go. His other hand reached around for my clit.
He snarled, “So wet and tight, fuck!”
I was. Everything I had thought of before he had walked in had gotten me there. Now with him inside of me, I couldn’t breathe, couldn’t think anymore. I had done all the foreplay for him.
He released my hair, and I nearly fell forward, but I caught myself on the hot stone surface of the shower wall. Jac stayed on my clit, though. His free hand wrapped around me, reaching for my breasts and hauling me upright against him. Then he stopped.
“Not like this.” He pulled out and spun me to face him. Lifting me onto his cock, he ordered, “Legs around me. Good. Hold on tight.”
I belted his neck with my arms, holding him close. I knew he was strong, but we were both wet and I didn’t want to fall. He pressed my back against the hot stone for leverage and fucked me like that.
It wasn’t two strokes before I came all over his cock. Screaming, smacking the wall, his shoulders, kicking, I had lost all control of my body as he pumped into me. It was like he wanted to test the integrity of the wall with my back as he continued to pound me relentlessly. His whole body arched and roared as he came. I would have sworn his sound had come all the way from his toes.
We made out until his cock softened completely and slipped away from me. Afterwards, we cleaned up without a word between us. Not until we were drying off did he ask in a sly tone, “Didn’t feel like using your new trick?”
“It’s a gift,” I corrected him. “Not a trick. Magicians use tricks.”
“Right, right. But not really what I meant.”
I knew exactly what he meant, but I just didn’t have it in me to go another round. “I think I’d rather try to sleep, if that’s okay.”
“Of course it is. I just didn’t want you to think I was a quitter,” he said with a twinkle in his eye.
I laughed and rolled my eyes before he kissed me again. He took my hand and led me to the bed. I crawled in behind Deacon on his side. He fidgeted, tail thumping against the mattress, until I pet his shoulder. Then, he settled and was out again.
Jac’s steady breaths on the back of my neck tickled, but soon, they soothed me to a deep, dreamless sleep.