Chapter 12
Sky
The road out of Frostholm was pretty and boring. I was going to lose my mind.
We’d been on the road the better part of a week, and Clover had not once exceeded the pace of a man strolling to a meeting he didn’t want to attend. I’d finished three of Moerrven’s novels and started rationing the fourth. I had, on at least one occasion, considered getting out to push.
My grandfather had a proverb for this exact feeling, something about patience, or rivers, or patient rivers.
I tried three times to put it back together and mangled it worse with every pass.
I sighed, and then I grinned, because he would have made me hold horse stance until I got it right.
I wished he was around to set me straight.
Then he would have stopped me from losing my mind.
The losing-my-mind part wasn’t because of the scenery, which was all rolling green hills, wildflower meadows, and crumbly stone fences marking off sheep pastures.
There was a whole pastoral fantasy postcard situation.
It was fine. Lovely, even. A normal person would have sighed with contentment and maybe written a poem.
I was not a normal person. I was a person who had spent two nights with the man I wanted sleeping three feet away on a separate mattress. I had a brand new riding crop in my bag and a troll that I very much wanted to play with.
Moerrven drove the way he did everything: with steady, competent focus that should not have been as attractive as it was.
His hands stayed relaxed on the reins, his shoulders broad and straight under his shirt.
His horns caught the morning sun, the ridged bases warm and dark where they met his scalp.
I knew what those bases felt like under my thumbs, knew the way he reacted when I pressed the trolgar point, knew the way his whole body shuddered and went soft.
I also knew he’d told at least three people in Stonedeep that I was his soulmate.
This was information I had learned to store as ammunition, which was probably unhealthy, but I couldn’t stop myself.
“It’s very quiet,” I said.
“It is peaceful.”
“Peaceful is what people call boring stuff when they want to say something nice.” I stretched my legs out on the bench, letting my bare feet rest in his lap, because I had taken my sneakers off an hour ago and he hadn’t complained. “How long until the next village?”
“Six hours. Perhaps seven.”
“Seven hours of this?”
“Of pleasant countryside, yes.”
“Moerrven, I spent the night six feet from a man who snored like a dying horse, and I couldn’t suck your cock and I have needs.”
His ears flushed blue. “We have discussed your needs in some detail.”
“I want you to know that sleeping three feet from you, fully clothed, after buying an entire leather goods collection, was genuinely painful.”
“I still don’t completely understand what you intend to do with the leather goods.”
I reached back and picked up the riding crop, turning it over in my hands for a moment, letting him think about it, before I tapped it lightly against my palm with a crisp snap. His jaw tightened.
“I am driving the wagon.”
“You are. You’re doing such a good job. Keeping Clover on the road, eyes forward, hands on the reins. Very responsible.” I shifted closer on the bench, tucking myself against his side. “I wonder how responsible you can stay.”
“Sky—”
“Remember how much you wanted to distract me from my sorrow?”
He frowned. “I did?”
“Yes. You can’t have me moping about the fact that a turtle could find Pip more quickly than we are.”
“We are making good time!”
“Are we?” I reached up and grazed the base of his left horn with one fingertip.
Moerrven’s hand spasmed on the reins and Clover flicked an ear back at the change in tension.
“Don’t stop driving,” I said. “I’m just going to sit here and keep you company.”
He exhaled through his nose. “You are not going to keep me company. You are going to torment me.”
“Mm, maybe. But you enjoy torment, don’t you?” I pressed my thumb into the warm groove at the base of the horn, right over the trolgar gland, and his whole body went rigid. I held the pressure for three seconds, then released. “What’s the trolgar telling you right now?”
“That you are—” He swallowed. “Pleased with yourself.”
“Accurate. What else?”
“Aroused,” he said. “It’s intense, far more intense than your other emotions, almost as if you’re deliberately projecting—”
“Am I?” I widened my eyes. “I don’t even know how to do that. Maybe I’m just naturally this horny. It’s been over twenty-four hours since I came, Moerrven. That’s a long time for me.”
“You say it as though it is a deprivation.”
“It is a deprivation.” I worked my thumb in slow circles on the trolgar point, and his breathing went ragged. His hands were white-knuckled on the reins. Clover plodded on, unbothered. “But I’ll stop if you want me to stop. Do you want me to stop?”
His lips parted. His eyes went half-lidded. “No, please don’t stop.”
“Good boy. Now, since we have some time, I’m going to have a little fun. Keep the lines of communication open. If anything is too much, just tell me.” I tapped the crop lightly against his thigh.
I eased my thumb back into the trolgar point, firm and unhurried, and held it there while I counted to ten in my head. His breathing quickened. His shoulders hunched forward. At eight, his lips parted and a low groan built in his chest. At ten, I released.
His whole body sagged, and the breath he let out shuddered.
I waited, let the sensation ebb, watched the tension drain from his neck and his hands soften on the reins, and the moment his breathing steadied, I pressed in again, harder this time, grinding my thumb into the gland.
His hips jerked forward on the bench. “Sky—”
“Shh. I’ve got you. Baby, just let me make you feel good.
” I held the pressure, then eased off, then pressed again in a slow pulse.
His head dropped back, his mouth opened, and a quiet, desperate whimper slipped out.
It went straight to my cock like a bolt of lightning.
I was hard in my trousers, had been hard since I picked up the crop, and the ache of it was becoming its own kind of torment. But I wasn’t done. Not even close.
I backed off and let him have a full minute of nothing. I ate an apple, let Poppy sniff at the core, watched the countryside roll past like I didn’t have a care in the world, like the man beside me wasn’t breathing through his teeth with his cock straining against his trousers.
Then I set the crop down beside me, shifted to face him on the bench, and started exploring.
I skipped the horns and went for his body, my hands sliding under the hem of his shirt, palms flat against the furnace heat of his stomach.
The muscles there were hard, ridged, and they jumped under my touch.
I traced the groove of his hip with one fingertip, following the line of muscle down toward his waistband, and his hand shot out and grabbed my wrist.
“Do you want me to touch your cock?” I asked.
“Yes.” The word came out rough and immediate.
“Not yet.” I pulled my wrist free and moved my hands higher, tracing his ribs, pressing my palms against his chest. His heartbeat hammered against the heels of my hands, a fast, heavy rhythm that told me everything his face was trying not to.
I found his nipple and pressed my thumb over it, and he hissed.
“Sky, please.”
“I love touching you.” I dragged my nails lightly down his stomach, every muscle clenching in a wave as I went. “Your big troll body is so sexy. I want to know every inch of you, every spot that makes you squirm.”
He moaned, shifting to try and get my hand lower. I pulled my hands back to his chest.
“Naughty boy. You don’t get that until you’ve earned it.”
“I don’t know why I like this. You are being very annoying,” he said.
“But you like it?”
He groaned. “It makes my mind go quiet. You make my mind go quiet.”
I knew why. And he was discovering it in real time. This giant, dignified man was realizing that he wanted to be denied, wanted to be teased, wanted to hand his pleasure over to me.
I leaned forward and nuzzled the bulge of his cock through his trousers.
I pressed my lips against the hard ridge of his shaft, breathing warm air through the fabric, and a groan broke loose behind his ribs.
I kissed my way up the length of him, open-mouthed, tasting the salt of his sweat through the cloth.
His cock twitched against each touch, and my own throbbed in response, and I pressed the heel of my hand against myself for a second of relief before pulling back.
“Can I show you what this does?” I picked the crop back up.
He nodded. His eyes were glazed, soft and desperate, and the blue had spread from his ears down his neck and across his cheekbones.
I started with light, exploratory taps on his thigh, learning what he liked.
I tapped just above the knee. His breath caught.
I moved higher, to the thick muscle of his inner thigh.
His fingers tightened on the reins. I went higher still, close enough to his cock that he flinched toward it, seeking contact. And I pulled the crop away.
“Keep your focus on the road, Moerrven, or we’ll have to stop playing.”
He blinked and sat up straight, giving the reins a tug. His cock was straining against the seam of his trousers, a wet spot forming at the tip where pre-cum had soaked through.
“Does it feel good, sweetheart? The slight sting of pain, the rush of fear?” I dropped the crop onto the bench and knelt up, pressing both thumbs into the trolgar points, and whatever he was going to say dissolved into an affirmative groan.
His hips rolled forward involuntarily, seeking friction, and I pulled my hands away.
“No,” I said. “Not yet.”
“Please. Sky, please.”
“Please what? Tell me exactly what you want.”
“Touch my cock. Please touch my cock.”