22. We
We
I felt the flutter.
My eyes popped open, and instantly, I tossed the covers aside and hurtled myself out of bed.
I nearly dashed to where I felt Aleksei , but then I realized I was only wearing panties.
I snatched up the shirt he’d worn with his suit at the photo op, shrugged it on and had started to race out of the room, when Aleksei burst into it and swayed to a stop.
I stared at him.
He stared at me.
Then I tore across the space and threw myself at him.
He caught me.
My arms were around his neck, my legs around his waist. He had one arm slanted at my back, the other tight around my waist.
“She fluttered,” I whispered into his ear.
“I know, my creature felt her and hauled my ass up here.”
I lifted my head to stare down at him in wonder.
I felt another flutter.
And then I felt something else.
I knew Aleksei did too when our mouths crashed into each other’s.
The kiss was heated but not long, before he broke it, took two steps toward the bed and threw me the rest of the way so I’d land on it.
My sex drenched as I bounced once before he pinned me with his weight.
Ready, raring, I heaved, successfully flipping him to his back.
Before he could take over, I forced myself into position between his legs and tugged his sleep pants down (and one could say, when I did that, he didn’t try too hard to take over). I grabbed hold of his thick cock, leaned in and drew him deeply into my mouth.
I cast my gaze up and saw nothing but miles of muscled chest, the arched column of his throat and the underside of his square jaw, but I heard his low, long groan.
Oh yes.
I worked him, pumping with my fist, sucking with my mouth.
His gaze came to me, burning amethyst.
I worked him harder, faster.
He reached, grabbed me under my arms and dragged me up his chest.
Then he tore my panties off me.
Heck yes!
I took hold of his cock again, positioned him, sat up and took him deep.
He grunted.
I moaned.
And then I rode, and rode, and rode .
Until he threw me off, on my belly, tugged up my hips and drove in again.
He fucked me. I reared back to get more of him.
Close.
I was getting so close.
He pulled out and rolled me to my back, pushing his hips between my legs, and I had him back.
As he fucked me, I took everything from him I could get, nipping, biting, scratching, licking, sucking.
It was animal.
Rapacious.
Carnal.
Aleksei captured my wrists and pulled them over my head, pinning them to the pillow in one hand. The other one, he hooked behind my knee and held it high, capturing me, containing me, controlling me.
I gazed in his eyes, my whimpers mingling with his grunts as he thrust and I rocked my hips to meet him, our flesh slapping in a primal tattoo.
“Go,” he growled.
I went, arching, aching, reaching for the stars he was offering and finding them.
I was coming down when I watched his head snap back and heard and felt his deep groan as he buried himself to the root, filling me with him and his seed.
His large body bucked off the aftermath deliciously, before he collapsed on me, only to immediately pull out and roll to his back at my side.
I was panting.
He was panting.
We kept doing that.
Eventually, he said, “ Right , evidence suggests when your creature fully awakes, sex is going to kill us.”
I giggled and rolled to press myself against his side, lifting up on my elbow.
When I caught his eyes, he concluded, “ That’s not a complaint.”
I giggled again and dropped my face to his chest, nuzzling it before I kissed it and lifted my head again.
“Your beast felt her?” I asked.
“I was making coffee and then I was sprinting up the stairs.”
It hit me then.
“I’m feeling you.”
His grin was roguish. “ I hope so. I put a fair amount of effort into it.”
I lightly slapped his chest and said, “ No . I mean, it started yesterday. I didn’t really notice it. When I woke up, I knew you weren’t with me, but I knew exactly where you were.”
His expression grew contemplative. “ You didn’t feel that before?”
“You feel me?”
His brows drew down. “ How much did you read about mates?”
“Well, I haven’t read about them, as in, did research or anything. I learned what I know from romance novels.”
“Novels,” he said.
“Yes,” I said.
“Fiction,” he said.
“Yes, that’s what novels are,” I replied.
He reached to tuck some of my hair behind my ear.
I loved it when he did that.
“Yes, bissi , I feel you. When you’re in close proximity, I don’t see you or know what you’re doing, but I always know where you are.”
Knowing that made me feel warm all over.
And that had happened to me yesterday too, I was just so into him, and we’d become deeply intimate, I didn’t process it.
When I was in class with Madam Garwah , no.
But when we were together in the penthouse, yes.
Oh my gods.
This was mega!
“What else is going to happen when she wakes?” I asked.
He turned into me, tucked his hands under his shirt at my back, drew me into his arms and tangled our legs together.
“Well, obviously, sex is going to be cataclysmic,” he remarked.
I smiled. “ It kind of already was. So I’d say apocalyptic.”
He assumed a smug look.
I rolled my eyes.
Males.
“What else?” I pushed. “ Can they communicate?”
“Yes.”
Whoa!
How awesome!
“It isn’t the same for everyone,” he continued.
“ What’s always the same, beasts will recognize their mates, maybe even before the human side will consciously do so.
This happened to us. I wasn’t sure what I was feeling, but he knew you were there before you even entered the building. I caught on when you did.”
I nodded, eager for him to continue.
“And they’re tuned in to each other. Like we can sense each other when we’re near.”
“Can they do it from afar?”
“I’ve heard tell of mated beasts tracking from a distance.”
More awesome!
“When they communicate, will we know what they say?” I asked.
“My creature is tuned to me. We talk as you would, say, to your cats. It’s more like we understand each other. The same for you?”
I nodded.
He continued. “ He’s also tuned to you. He’s cognizant of what goes on between us, the feelings we share, if not the things we say to each other.
He’s tuned to her, though he didn’t know she was sleeping or drugged, because as an animal, he doesn’t understand those concepts.
He sensed her as timid, shy, hiding, vulnerable, because he could feel her alive.
And in their way, they’ll talk to each other.
If we’ll understand what they’re saying, or to put it better, conveying, we’ll have to find out. ”
“But when she fluttered, he felt her.”
“It’s been probably two decades since he’s taken that kind of control of me when I’m in human form. But as an example of how he talks to me, I knew exactly what happened and why he was keen to get to you…or more to the point, her.”
“Is he communicating to her now?”
He smoothed his hands over my back. “ No , love. She’s with us, but not quite with us.”
“Oh.” I pouted.
“But this is progress. Today , Dr . Fearsome is sending a nurse to administer your?—”
Even held in his arms, in his bed, after having sex, at his words, my body chilled over.
“ No ,” I whispered fiercely.
He pressed me closer to him. “ Laura , you can trust her. She’s Fearsome’s sister.”
“I’d rather go to his clinic. I’d rather see them take the IV bag directly from supply.”
“I can have a machine delivered to test the contents before it’s administered if you like.”
“You can?”
“Absolutely.”
“I don’t want to offend her, but I’d like you to do that.”
“I think if you tell her what happened to you, she’d understand your hesitance around healthcare workers.”
Hesitant was understating it, and I blamed Buildmore and Fitzgerald for leaving me with that damage, because if you needed to trust anyone, you needed to trust doctors and nurses.
“It’ll probably go away,” I muttered.
“You endured something traumatic, bissi . Your reaction is understandable.”
I took in a big breath and let it go.
He tucked me close to him. “ I’ll comm Allain . Get him to source a unit to test the solution.”
“Thanks, drahko ,” I whispered.
“As you know, I have meetings today, and you’re going to your studio and to Madam Garwah’s this evening, but you need to carve some time in the next couple of days to interview aides.
Allain is sorting through resumes. He’ll have a shortlist for you by the end of today.
And he’ll sit on the interviews with you, for another ear and an informed opinion. ”
I scrunched my face. “ Do I actually need an aide?”
“So far, you’ve had one hundred and eighty-nine invitations to everything from coffee mornings, dinner parties, and the opening of plays to visits to pediatric units, with an abundance of schools across the realm wanting you to come to their art and theater departments to give speeches.”
I blinked.
One hundred and eight-nine invitations?
Aleksei kept going.
“You have your own detail now, and someone will have to have intimate knowledge of your schedule, so they can share it with your team in order that they can scout locations, send agents ahead of time to assess safety, decide personnel numbers, arrange travel and coordinate arrival and departure. And they’ll need to know these things with as much notice as possible.
I’d like to say you could go to the local patisserie to buy a treat on a whim, and if you did, they would scramble to arrange for you to do that.
But it’s a hassle for them, adds stress to their jobs, and hobbles them in being able to do it well. ”
“In other words, I need an aide.”
“Yes, darling,” he murmured, pulling us both up and arranging the pillow so he was resting his back on them, and arranging me so I was resting on him.
He slid his fingers through my hair tenderly, and I should have taken that for the warning it was, when he asked, “ I sense you’ll wish to remain working after we become officially engaged.”
Oh gods.
I was supposed to start royal duties upon our engagement?