Chapter 21 #2
I’m so hard I’m shaking, body locked in a tension that’s half-agony, half-bliss.
The woods are cold but I’m burning. My forehead is slick and my jaw is clenched, every muscle strung tight as wire.
Emery pulls back, lets my cock fall against her cheek, and swipes her tongue around the tip, slow and taunting, like she’s tasting the aftermath of a dare.
The sight of her there, on her knees in the dirt, eyelashes clumped with tears and spit shining on her chin, is so obscene I almost cum from that alone.
“Fuck,” I groan, unable to keep it quiet.
She grins up at me, lips swollen, breath ragged through her nose, and then dives back down, faster this time, relentless.
I knot my hands in her hair, not guiding so much as begging her to keep going, and she only redoubles her efforts, bobbing her head in tight, deep strokes that make my stomach pitch with every pass.
I’m seconds away from losing it. There’s a tightness in my gut, a sparkling pressure behind my eyes. The scrape of her palate makes me see stars.
Emery must feel it, too. There’s a shift in her rhythm, a quickening, and when I tense up, she moans greedily around the head, like she wants to pull the climax out of me by sheer force of will. She milks me with her fist, thumb circling the slit, and every nerve in my body screams for release.
I drag her off at the last possible second, clutching her face in both hands, desperate to keep from blowing apart.
She blinks up at me, dazed and triumphant, and I can taste myself on her lips as I pull her into a savage, teeth-clashing kiss.
Her body presses flush to mine, heat radiating through layers of clothes.
I want to laugh at how much of a mess we’ve made—the dirt on her knees, the saliva streaked across her mouth, and the absolute lack of shame in her eyes.
If anyone stumbled on us now, they’d see a pair of ferals rutting in the woods, halfway to mating frenzy, but I don’t care. I want to claim her, mark her, make her forget anyone else ever existed. I want her to remember me with every breath. Every heartbeat. Every trembling minute of her heat.
Emery breaks the kiss first, panting, forehead resting against my chest. I run a thumb under her chin, tilting her face up so she has to meet my eyes.
“Didn’t know you were that hungry,” I rasp, voice shredded.
Emery grins, wicked and sharp. “Don’t pretend you don’t love it.”
“Could get used to it.” I want her on her knees for me every night for the rest of my life.
Emery nips at my jaw, breath hot and desperate. “You can be rougher, you know.”
The words land like a spark in dry grass. I want to tear her apart, but I want to worship her, too. I don’t know how to do both, but fuck, I’m going to try.
I drop to my knees, palms on her thighs, and shove her skirt up over her hips.
Her scent is so thick in the air I can almost taste it—sweet, sticky, delirious.
The panties she’s wearing are already ruined, soaked through, and I hook my thumbs in the waistband and drag them down, slow enough to make her whimper.
Fast enough to make her gasp. She tries to step out of them, but her legs are shaking, so I hold her steady, kissing up the inside of her thigh and licking the salt and heat from her skin.
Emery’s hands tangle in my hair, yanking hard enough to hurt.
She’s not trying to be gentle, not anymore.
I nose up along her slit, tongue flicking at the slick, and she shudders so hard she nearly collapses.
I can see the tremble in her knees. Her breath hitches.
Her entire body is tuned to this one need.
I flatten my tongue and drag it up the length of her, slow and greedy, gathering every drop of her heat-slick.
Emery tastes like sugar, bright and wild, and I want to drink it straight from the source.
Every time I circle her swollen clit with my tongue she lets out this tiny, broken sound that makes me want to destroy her, but gently.
I wedge my shoulders between her knees and pin her to the tree, opening her wider, taking what I want and giving back twice as much.
I look up. She’s staring down at me, eyes gone dark with need, mouth open in a silent gasp. There’s something raw in her face—gratitude, maybe, or worship, or just the animal fact of her being in heat and needing me to fill her. Whatever it is, it makes my chest ache.
I slip a finger inside and feel for the ridge, the spot that makes her legs jerk. She moans, loud and unselfconscious, and then holds a hand over her own mouth. I smile against her skin and pump my finger deeper, curling it just right while I suck her clit.
Emery comes undone in seconds. Her body arches up, thighs crushing my head, her whole frame shaking like she’s trying to pull the stars out of the sky.
She rides the aftershocks, eyes rolling back, fingers still clamped over her mouth to stifle the scream.
I don’t stop until she digs the nails of her other hand into my scalp and yanks me up, desperate for air or maybe just for more.
I rise, lips smeared with her, and she clings to me like she’ll drown if she lets go. Her breaths come in fast, shallow bursts, her face flushed and shining. I drag my mouth along her jaw, licking sweat from her neck, and she shivers so hard I feel a second-hand tremor.
Emery’s so fucking beautiful like this, raw and ruined and proud.
“Knot?” I whisper.
Emery nods. “Please, god. Yes.”
“Not god, just me.” But Emery might be a goddess. I really fucking believe that.
I stand and hoist her up so her legs wrap around my waist. Her nails dig into my shoulders. I line up and push inside her, slow at first, then all the way. She’s so hot and tight around me it almost hurts. I have to brace myself to keep from losing it immediately.
I fuck her against the tree, each thrust hard enough to make the bark shudder. She meets every stroke, hips grinding, voice high and wild with need.
“Fuck, you feel so good,” she moans. “Please, Bastion, I need—”
“I know,” I whisper, kissing the corner of her mouth. “I know, angel. I’ve got you.”
The knot comes fast, swelling at the base of my cock, and when I press it against her entrance, she whimpers, desperate.
“Do it,” she says. “Please, do it.”
I push, gentle at first, then harder, until the knot pops inside her. She screams, the sound pure pleasure, and her body clamps down so hard I see stars. I cum with her, pulse after pulse, knot locking us together. The feeling is raw, animal, perfect.
We ride it out, shaking, clutching each other, until the world calms.
Emery laughs, breathless, forehead pressed to mine. “You know, I always wanted to do it outside.”
“Exhibitionist,” I tease.
She grins, teeth sharp in the moonlight. “I’d do it again, too.”
We sink to the ground, still knotted together, her back to my chest. Both of us stare up at the sky. The city glows below and the stars twinkle above. For once I don’t feel like I’m being chased.
I wrap my arms around Emery and hold her close. She burrows into me, humming contentedly.
We stay like that, not talking, just breathing together, until my knot deflates and I can slip free. She turns in my arms, curls up on my chest, and for the first time in months, I feel like I’m exactly where I’m supposed to be.