Chapter 36 #2
The small recess can’t be more than five paces deep and the same across, but there’s something grand about it all the same. The sapling at its far end is already budding. Delicate white flowers sprout between the pebbles strewn across the earth, heedless of the season.
And several more butterflies swoop between those flowers in a spiraling dance.
A startled laugh tumbles out of me alongside Julita’s gasp. “I think Inganne must have blessed this place.”
I venture forward and graze my fingertips over a few of the flowers. Their petals slide against my skin soft as silk.
The godlen do work in mysterious ways, my ghostly passenger remarks.
A butterfly flaps over to me and lands on my hand, its feet tickling my knuckles. Then it takes off again, as if it was simply coming by to say hello.
An unexpectedly carefree air comes over me, as if nothing could be all that wrong when places like this exist. As if the godlen of creativity and play herself has reached down and blown the worries from my head like seeds in the wind.
I turn, expecting to see Rheave gaping at our surroundings in awe… but he’s looking at me.
There’s something like awe shining in his eyes all the same.
He steps closer to me and touches my jaw, his gaze fixed on mine. “Ivy… I want to kiss you again.”
Julita giggles. All right, I can tell I’d better take my leave.
As her presence dwindles in the back of my head, I wet my lips. The warmth that motion provokes spreads through the rest of me.
But one of us has to be at least a little sensible about this situation, don’t we?
“You know,” I say, doing my best to keep my tone even, “there are a lot of things that usually come with kissing. At least, when you aren’t just scratching an itch and figuring you’ll never see each other again.”
Rheave eases slightly nearer. “Like what?”
It’s harder to think the more his beautiful face fills my vision. “Well, you’ve seen how I am with the other men. We have a relationship. We support each other. We’re committed to tackling problems together and spending time together and, um…”
The daimon-man’s expression has become increasingly puzzled. “Don’t you and I do those things too?”
“It’s not exactly the same. We’ve never talked about or decided where this is going.”
“That’s easy.” He traces his fingers along my jaw to my chin and then back to the crook. “I want to be here with you and see how it can be. I want to experience everything we could have. I’ve got nowhere else I need to be—I’m happy to stay with you wherever you go.”
He offers himself up so easily, my heart squeezes in response. “I shouldn’t be your whole world. There are other things you like.”
Rheave makes a dismissive sound. “Those are all things I can enjoy while I’m with you. I’ve had the whole world, Little Vine. I had it for more years than I know how to count. Nothing I found in it ever made me as happy as you do. That’s why I want so much to be able to make you happy too.”
A rush of emotion chokes me up before I can speak. Memories of all the moments turned brighter by his presence flicker through my mind. “You do make me happy.”
The daimon-man smiles brilliantly and must decide that’s answer enough to his earlier suggestion. He dips his head and captures my mouth.
The kiss is just as sweet as the first one, sending a giddy shiver straight through the core of me. Warmth floods me from head to toe, flaring into a more thrilling heat when Rheave nudges me right against the gully wall.
I give in to the impulse to tease my fingers into his soft curls, and a rough sound works from his throat. He kisses me harder. One hand stays cupped against my jaw while the other trails up and down my side until I gasp.
“We need to stay quiet,” I mumble against his lips.
“Hmm. Then I should keep doing this.”
He claims my mouth again, his confidence growing. His hand travels across my torso, lingering on my breast when the skim of his palm earns him a whimper I try to swallow.
His hips rock against mine. There’s no missing the bulge between his legs that grazes my sex, setting off sharper pulses of desire.
A thread of fear creeps through my haze of arousal. Am I really doing this? Making out with a man who’s not even exactly a man—and wherever else this will go if I let it?
Do I really know what I’m getting into?
My body tenses, and Rheave notices immediately. He draws back just far enough to meet my gaze, his dark curls falling across his forehead. “Is this all right?”
He looks so unsettled by the thought that it might not be that my stomach twists. I can suddenly see how it might go if I push him away again, put up my walls out of that fear.
I’ve already run off on him once. If it happens again, he’ll never trust that I really do want him enough.
I’ll ruin whatever odd relationship we’ve started to build here.
And the thought of losing this—him, everything we could be—frightens me more than the uncertainty of where we’ll end up.
I want him. I do. This strange man who makes the strangeness in me seem a little more okay.
I trail my hand down to his cheek, holding his unearthly gaze that shines with longing and devotion. “It’s wonderful.”
Rheave’s brilliant smile comes back. “I think so too.” He nuzzles the side of my face and drops his head to nibble the side of my neck. “I feel… so much. I don’t even understand everything my body wants.”
When would he ever have experienced sexual desire before? I don’t want to push him into anything he’s not ready for.
“Just… do what feels good,” I suggest. “What feels right. If it feels right to all of you, not just your body.”
He makes an urgent sound and presses his groin against mine. “I feel like I should sink right into you. Like we’re too far apart. But you’re right here.”
Okay, I guess I won’t be the one pushing us along quickly.
I swallow hard, my own growing sense of urgency thrumming through my veins. “That’s normal. It would be easier—usually you take off your clothes—but we can’t really do that here.”
Rheave lets out a low growl. “I’d like to touch all of your skin. But I— Do you want to wait?”
Another pump of his bulge against my sex propels an honest answer out of me on a surge of need. “No.”
The daimon-man tilts my head back so our mouths can crash together. His kiss is demanding but without a hint of cruelty, as if he’s only asking me to offer up what he knows I’ll joyfully give.
His other hand sweeps over my chest, pausing to massage one breast until I moan into our kiss, then slipping down to my waist. He skims the curve of my ass before gripping it and pulling me against him even more tightly.
This time, it’s me absorbing his groan into my mouth. My whimper echoes it as he grinds against me.
“Not quite enough,” he mutters. “Not quite—”
He yanks the skirt of my linen dress up to my waist and fumbles along my trouser underskirt until he finds the ties. As he leans into another kiss, he flattens his hand against my bare belly beneath the fabric and then slides it downward, beneath my drawers as well.
The brush of his fingers over my clit sets off a flare of pleasure. I stifle a needy mewling sound as well as I can.
Rheave delves farther, devouring my mouth as he plunders the slickness between my legs. He strokes over my folds and lets out a shaky breath.
One finger slips right inside me. He muffles his next groan against my hair.
“This. This is where I fit.”
All I can do is nod, my hips swaying with his teasing caresses. He strokes me several more times, both our breaths getting more ragged by the moment, and then withdraws his hand to lift it to his face.
His fingers gleam with the evidence of my arousal. Watching me, he sniffs them and then flicks his tongue over the collected slickness.
The sight sends a pang of hunger through me as if he licked me right on the spot those fingers were fondling earlier.
“Mine,” he murmurs. “All for me.”
A giddy laugh tickles up my throat. “And what do you have for me, my daimon-man?”
Another growl escapes him. “I need…”
He wrenches at his own clothes. As soon as it’s clear he’s sure about this, I help him yank his trousers down.
When he tugs his straining cock free from his drawers, I can’t resist gripping it and stroking it up and down.
Rheave lets out a hiss that’s pure heat. “That… That is very good just as it is. But I want more.”
He yanks at my thigh sheaths so he can drag my pants and drawers down to my ankles. Then he hefts me up against the side of the gully. Only my cloak protects my bared ass from the cool earth.
My cloak and his hands, clamping around me as he presses toward me, angling my hips up to meet him.
As his shaft slides between my folds, we sigh in unison. Pleasure crackles over my skin as if he’s let loose his supernatural energy on me in the most delightful possible way.
Rheave pushes into me until we couldn’t be closer, his cock stretching my channel with a perfect heady burn. He stops there, his head bowed next to mine.
His voice comes out achingly tender. “This is where I belong. With you. No matter where your magic takes you, I’ll follow. You can always reach for me.”
Sudden tears prick at my eyes. But then the daimon-man eases back to thrust into me again, and the rush of bittersweet emotion is carried away by a sensation that’s all bliss.
I clutch at his shoulder, my other hand digging into his curly hair. Every buck of his hips sends a deeper swell of pleasure through my body.
“I’m not letting you go either,” I promise him between fractured breaths. “I’m not letting them take you away.”
He makes a strangled sound and plunges into me faster. His fingers dig into my ass. “Cling to me, my little vine. Like we’ll be twined together always.”
My arms tighten around him. He adjusts our position with his next thrust and manages to hit the sweetest spot inside me.
That’s all it takes. The surges of bliss expand with just a few more strokes until they crash right over the edge.
I sob and shudder, holding on to Rheave for all I’m worth.
“Oh,” he mutters. “Oh.”
He shudders in turn, the movement of his hips turning jerky as he finds his own release inside me.
He hauls me right up against him and buries his face in the crook of my neck. His breath sears across my throat.
“I’ve got you,” he says, like he did when he held me through the worst of my magic’s torment.
In that moment, I believe him. The only question is who’s going to save the rest of the kingdom.