Chapter 33 Ramsey #2
I draw a ragged breath, because this is only part of the story.
“He threw me out of the house while I was still bleeding, trying to keep my ruined eye from falling out of my face, and shut the door. For four years, he got his wish. To everyone else, I was dead and gone and forgotten. Until one night, I was bouncing at some shitty, back alley club, some of my brother’s friends recognized me.
They were drunk and thought they’d make an example of the fallen prince, and attacked.
My world exploded into white dragonflame as the first ever moratus dragon took flight and didn’t stop until he landed at our ancestral stronghold.
My father stood there, happier than a kid getting Christmas presents from Santa Claus himself, when he realized what I was.
“Ever since, he’s tried to get his hands on me, on my dragon.
To be the crown prince again, to be his puppet, to fucking—” I sneer, disgusted, “to breed more dragons. He sent Council Enforcers to hunt me down when I refused, but Church convinced them to vote on sending me here instead of letting him lock me up where I’d be at his mercy.
So.” I exhale sharply. “That’s the kind of man my father is. That’s who you’re dealing with.”
I don’t know what I hoped for when I flick my eyes to hers, but it’s not the hard look I get.
“You are not disfigured, Ramsey. You aren’t ruined. And fuck anyone who made you feel that way, because there is nothing shameful about surviving what you have. Not then, not now.”
Her words aren’t soft.
They aren’t pitying.
They’re like a hot knife, cauterizing old wounds.
Even if her scent wasn’t burned into my brain, I’d still find her among the dancers winding ribbons around the Maypole.
I can’t take my eyes off her. It’s not just the red sundress she’s dangerously close to spilling out of, or the wildflower crown that catches her hair in the evening breeze.
It’s the joy that makes her skin glow as twilight descends on the clearing where the witches have set up their Beltane celebrations against a backdrop of twinkling fairy lights.
A legitimate cornucopia of food and drinks is at one end, and two massive piles of wood at the other.
Stop being a fucking coward.
Fuck you, I’m not a coward.
Says the man too scared to ask his woman for a dance.
She’s not mine. Yet.
That’s not what you told the serpent.
The memory of Thane staking his claim on her weeks ago still makes my blood boil. I’ve listened to her talk about having him and Killian in her classes and their little fucking study group. Bit hypocritical for the snake to call me a wyrm with how hard he’s trying to win her good graces.
He’ll never get the chance now. Not after she and Luther nearly killed each other.
Until she wears our bite mark around her throat as a necklace, nothing is certain.
She’s not ready for that. Neither am I.
My patience has limits.
What patience?
Precisely.
I roll my eyes as my dragon recedes into the back of my mind, content to watch through my eyes.
I finally step into the clearing, ignoring the shocked stares that follow.
Her breathless laughter draws me to where she and her friends are getting drinks.
When one of them notices me standing behind Nyx, she screams in surprise.
“What?!” Nyx cries out, but her friend only points at me. I’m close enough that her hair and dress brush against me when she faces me.
“Jesus Christ, dude. Make some noise next time.” She smacks my chest with the back of her tiny hand, and the girls freeze. Good, my reputation precedes me. A laugh rumbles deep in my chest as my dragon preens at their terror.
She hands me a plastic cup full of the same horrifying excuse for alcohol they’re drinking and pokes my chest. “Take this. Stop that.”
Her wide grin can’t hide her blush as my dragon purrs, “As you wish.”
“Good boy.” I chug my drink to save my own dignity when her words have the same effect. She giggles and shakes her head when I hold out my empty cup in silent request for a refill.
“We’re going to run out if you keep that up.”
“I’d be doing you a favor, that shit’s toxic.”
“Hey, I tried my best!” one of her friends argues.
I crook my eyebrow. “You made this?”
“Do you know how hard it is to brew moonshine that doesn’t give you a hangover?”
“No.”
She deflates, and sighs. “Well trust me, it’s really hard.”
Nyx pats her on the back. “Don’t stress, you’re doing amazing, sweetie.” The four of them burst into laughter. Even if I don’t get the joke, her happiness makes my chest tighten.
“Have you guys met Ramsey?” Nyx asks breathlessly, wiping tears from her eyes.
“Babe, pretty sure you’re the only one he hasn’t tried to barbecue, so no, we haven’t met.
I’m Brynne,” the brunette points to herself and then the other two blondes, “That’s Tori, and Evie.
” When I don’t respond, they all look at me until Nyx stands on her tip toes and tugs at my shirt for me to lean down.
When she whispers in my ear, my cock throbs as her warm breath touches my neck.
“This is the part where you say, ‘nice to meet you’.” She lets go of my shirt and our lips almost brush as she rocks back on her heels. When she looks up at me her eyes are wide with the same realization.
“Nice to meet you,” I say, eyes still locked on hers. Brynne snorts and loudly announces someone’s calling them over, then hooks her arms through Tori and Evie’s, and then we’re all alone.
“Remind me to thank her later,” I murmur, and Nyx laughs before grabbing my hand.
“Come on, I think they’re about to light the bonfires.” I let her drag me around the edge of the crowd until we get to the other end of the clearing where the rest of the revelers are gathering. I recognize the Priestess in her white robe, but not the full-blooded Fae man next to her.
“Oh shit!” Nyx whispers. “That’s the Fae from the Council. Corvus.” The dark-haired, yellow-eyed Fae stand tall, unnaturally still as Esmé addresses the crowd.
“Tomorrow, the world will wake beneath the dawn light of the Sun in Taurus. Venus reigns over this new season of life, honoring the cycle of creation and rebirth as divine feminine and masculine surrender to the sacred night and bear fruit in the blessed day. Tonight, the fires of Beltane breach the Veil and light the way for our memories of the past to dance with our dreams of the future, united in the warm embrace of the present. Venus invites us now to celebrate Fate’s greatest act of love—the tethering of our souls to this world, and each other. ”
Her words hammer at the dark, forgotten part of me that cracked open last week when Nyx said I wasn’t ruined, driving the wedge deeper until everything I’ve held back risks pouring out.
It was easier, before her, to forge my anger, pain, shame—all of it, into a weapon to hurt the world before it could hurt me again.
From the corner of my eye, her friend Evie lights both bonfires with her magic, and I look down at Nyx.
The reflection of the flickering flames make her eyes look more red than before her epiphaneia.
And she’s still holding my hand.
When I rub my thumb across her knuckle, she smiles up at me, and the dam breaks.
Wordlessly, I pull her with me as I duck behind a tree at the edge of the clearing. Even cut off from the warmth of the fire, the heat between us grows.
“Where are we going?” she asks breathlessly.
I push her up against the tree and lean down to whisper in her ear. “Do you trust me?” She shivers, and her pupils are blown wide when we lock eyes again.
“I trust you.”
Those three magic words snap the last threads of my restraint, and I crash my lips to hers.
I cup her face as her taste explodes on my tongue and she melts into me with a desperate moan that catapults me back to New Years Eve, when she dry humped my cock through my jeans and we came together.
I break the kiss and rest my forehead against hers, watching our mixed breath fog as we pant.
“Come with me?” She nods, and I take her hand, leading us through the trees on nothing but instinct.
The darkness shifts when my vision distorts and the world explodes with light, illuminating a smaller clearing just up ahead.
When we break through the trees, I watch as she’s bathed in moonlight under the glittering stars.
“Holy shit.” She laughs, turning in a circle as I watch. When she comes back to me, I trace the light that pours over her exposed skin until she shivers again.
“Cold?” I ask, and she shakes her head with a wry smile.
She reaches up with one hand and hesitates. “Can I touch you?”
“Yes,” I whisper, unable to conceal the raw desperation. Her fingers brush my lips, tracing the scar that drags my smile down, the ones that travel across the bridge of my nose and cut through my ruined eye, bisecting my brow.
No.
Not ruined.
Her touch is soft but certain as she tucks a strand of hair behind my ear and cups the nape of my neck, pulling me down into another kiss.
The urge to touch her everywhere is overwhelming.
I run my fingers down her sides, brushing her breasts, palming her ass so I can lift her.
She wraps her legs around my waist and then I’m lowering her onto the cool grass.
Just like New Years, my hips slot perfectly between her legs like I was meant to be here.
Like I belong here.
Like I’m home.
My lips trail down her neck as her fingers twine in my hair and I pull down her dress, revealing the most perfect breasts I’ve ever fucking seen, and I tell her so.
She laughs, but it turns into a moan when I cup her them and tease the straight bar through her nipple with my tongue.
She holds my head to her chest even as her hips begin to writhe beneath mine, and then I’m meeting her thrust for thrust.
Using one of the moves I taught her, she rolls and flips us so she’s on top of me straddling my hips.
The sight of her—swollen lips, tits out, pierced nipples glistening from my mouth with the moonlight shining behind her—it’s better than any dream.
She pushes up my shirt and runs her hands over the planes of my stomach, and then leans over me and licks up my chest.
“Fuck, I’ve wanted to do that for so long.” She laughs, kissing down my body until her hands meet my waistband, quickly undoing my jeans and wrapping her warm hand around my throbbing cock. My head tilts back and I tense, trying desperately not to blow my load too soon.
“Can I—”
“Fucking Fate, please yes—” She chuckles, and then her hot mouth engulfs the tip of my cock and I can’t hold back the pained groan that escapes.
I sit up to watch her lick and suck and fist my cock, the sight of which nearly sends me over the edge.
She draws me down to the back of her throat and pulls back off with a smile. “You taste good.”
“If you keep talking like that I won’t last.” She only laughs and swallows me back down, but she’s not the only one who wants a taste.
I lift her off my lap, spin her around so she’s straddling my chest with her ass in my face, and flip up her dress to expose her lace-covered pussy—fucking delighted at how easily it snaps when I pull it to the side.
My mouth waters when I finally set sight on the promised land that’s taunted me since the first time we met in the library, and I pull her hips to bury my face in her wet cunt.
The movement makes her tip forward and she takes me to the back of her throat, making me moan.
I map her pussy with my tongue, memorizing what makes her jerk and press her ass back, seeking more. When she presses behind my balls with one hand and works my cock with her other fist at the same time as her tongue plays with the crown of my cock, I pull my head back and gasp.
“Nyx, Jesus fucking Christ—” she laughs and posts up on her knees, turning back around so her pussy hovers just above me. Precum is dripping from my tip, desperate to find a way inside her.
So close.
So fucking close.
My dragon roars in triumph in my mind at the sight of her bare cunt mere inches away from sinking down on my cock and making all my dreams come true. But the sound cuts through the fog of lust and longing suffocating me.
And that’s the moment I realize we need to stop.
“Wait. Wait, Nyx, fuck.”
She freezes. “What’s wrong?”
“We can’t—I can’t—” I choke out, shaking my head, trying to find the words even as I stare at the space that separates us.
“Ramsey?” she asks, frowning in concern as she lifts her leg over me and kneels by my side while I try to control my breathing through the dragon’s shrieking rage in my head.
“I didn’t think we’d—”
“Did I do something wrong?” she asks softly, and the hurt in her eyes nearly breaks me as she pulls away and fixes her dress, leaving me in the cold.
“No, never.”
“Then what?”
“I just—fuck.” I run my hands down my face. “I don’t want to do this if it’s just casual. I can’t.”
“You…what?”
I tuck my dick back into my pants despite every fiber in my body protesting and sit up, cupping her face.
“I didn’t think we’d do this. Tonight. Ever,” I exhale sharply, shaking my head.
“But this isn’t all I want. I want more.
And I know if I get it, if I know what you feel like cumming on my cock, I won’t stop.
” She searches my eyes, even the white one, and I can only pray to whatever deity that’s about to curse me for being such a fucking idiot that she sees what I don’t have words to express.
“Please tell me you understand?” I whisper, rubbing my thumb over her cheek. When she closes her eyes and leans into my touch, I let out a breath I didn’t know I was holding.
I rest my forehead against hers. “I’m sorry.”
“Me too,” she whispers, eyes full of the same regret I feel.
If I have her now, I’ll never let her go.
And that’s not fair to her.
She’s not ready for that.
Neither am I.