Chapter 29
Growing some lady balls, I dragged myself out of my bed and went to face the rest of the house’s occupants. As I walked out onto the deck, Milo looked up at me with big, sad puppy-dog eyes. I guess I’d hurt his feelings by taking off like a scalded cat yesterday, and that made me feel even more terrible.
Pushing down my guilt, I tried to come up with something to say to him that was better than you dicked me so good, I had an existential crisis.
I could feel the heat of Nate’s body at my back, and I looked over my shoulder at him. He just lifted his chin, making something inside me relax. I strolled over to Milo and sat on his lap, kissing him soundly on the cheek. I could feel the weight of the stares from Erus and Tryp, from where they sat over on the other side of the pool.
“I’m sorry. I didn’t mean—” Milo placed a finger over my mouth to stop my words, then replaced his finger with his own lips. The soft kiss had a world of feelings.
“You don’t have to be sorry. I thought I’d rushed you. I thought I’d ruined everything and that you regretted being with me.”
I snuggled into his massive chest. Gah, this guy. It was hard to imagine I’d only known him a week—my soul felt like I’d known him for a lifetime. Several lifetimes, even. “Not a single regret.” I leaned up and kissed him once more, and he gave a shuddering sigh of relief.
“Thank fuck, because I can’t look at the pool without thinking about you screaming my name, and getting hard.” He stood up, still holding me like a baby, and strode to the other side of the pool. As we got closer to Tryp and Erus, my chest got lighter and lighter. It wasn’t painful being away from them, like it had been with Milo that first night in Heraklion. More like when all three of them were together in the same spot, it felt like the sun was shining softly on me and everything was all right.
Happiness. That was the feeling.
Milo plopped me down on the lounger between them, and Tryp snuggled closer, rubbing his cheek on me like a cat.
“Sorry,” Erus muttered. “He’s been dying to scent mark you since you bonded.”
I flushed pink, but smiled goofily. It was like that happy, tipsy feeling you got after a half glass of good wine. “And you?”
He grinned. “I’m better at restraining myself,” he teased, though maybe he was chastising his errant friend. Boyfriend? Lover? Twin? Man, this was getting kinda weird and very mythological, I guess. They hadn’t exactly been known for keeping the family lines distinct.
“You guys aren’t actually related at all, right?” That was probably a completely inappropriate thing to ask, but I kinda really wanted to know.
Tryp looked up from where he was running his cheek on my shoulder. “Goddess, no. I’m far too handsome to be related to this guy.”
Erus rolled his eyes. “We were created to be the opposite sides of the same coin. I was born into a high-class family, he was born into one of the poorest. He is brave and brash”—Tryp snorted in derision—“and I am careful and considerate. But the one thing that anchors us both is that I love him more than anything or anyone in this whole world. Including our former Goddess.” The including you hung in the air, and I was pretty okay with that. “We share the same soul. It is hard to express that kind of relationship to anyone else.”
I nodded, because I could only imagine. Actually, no, I couldn’t. The concept of a soul was such a weird idea to me. I mean, as a society, we talked about souls, but I’d always just assumed it was a human concept we used when teaching young children how not to be psychos, or to explain why music made us feel the way we did.
Until recently. Obviously, now the idea of a soul was probably fundamental to my continued existence.
Erus was looking longingly at his other half rubbing on me. Tryp was pressing his body to my stomach now, and it should feel weird, because I mean, it was fucking strange. These guys were completely unknown to me a week ago. They had lion heads, for fuck’s sake. But instead, it just felt nice, felt right, like I was being claimed.
So I lifted an arm and waved Erus closer. “Do you want to…?” I waved a hand in Tryp’s direction. The relief that flashed across Erus’s face made my heart clench. He leaned against my chest and rubbed his cheek in short, sharp motions on my clavicle.
Despite their closeness, their hands remained in respectful positions, though maybe I wouldn’t have minded so much if they’d wandered a little more. I looked up at Nate, who was still on the other side of the pool, sunglasses over his eyes so I couldn’t tell if he was watching this display or not. Was this okay? I knew he was okay with Milo, but this felt intimate in a different way.
He didn’t barge over here and yank me back into his arms, so I just had to trust that if he had a problem, he’d tell me. He wasn’t exactly a wilting flower. He was a fucking God of War.
Still, I raised an eyebrow at him, and he gave a tiny hand gesture that I took to mean it’s fine.
Tryp flopped back with a contented sound. “Finally. I’ve been dying to do that for days.” He winced. “Sorry. I just meant to do your cheek, but once I started, I couldn’t stop.”
Reaching out, I stroked my fingers through his golden hair. Maybe that was too intimate too? Trying not to second-guess myself at every turn, I continued the motion, and when my fingers scraped against his scalp, he actually purred. Or a strange, gurgling noise deep in his chest that might have been a purr.
It actually shocked me into stilling. “Uh…”
Erus laid back and laughed. “That was a good noise. I think Tryp likes your stroking.”
“So it really was a purr?”
He shook his head. “We can’t purr. But we can make, like, a happy thumping sound in our chest when something feels good.”
So fucking strange. “Do you have any more lion-ish traits?”
“I like to fuck from the back—does that count?” Tryp laughed, nudging my fingers with the top of his head again. I went back to scratching his scalp, and he swallowed down the noise he’d made before. It was kind of cute.
Erus rolled his eyes at his lover. “In answer to your question, not really. We are far more man than beast, and other than scent marking, a slight possessiveness, and the odd noise, we don’t really possess that many qualities to the creature whose visage we share. We aren’t lions. We are Genii. It’s different.”
Tilting my head at him, I tried to remember what he looked like. I’d only seen their other forms in flashes, right before I keeled over in shock. “Can I see again?”
Tryp lifted his head to look down at me. “Will it make you faint? Because I think the God of War might thump me if I make you pass out once more.”
There was a grumble of agreement from across the pool that let me know that Nate was indeed paying attention to what was going on.
Shaking my head, I grinned at Tryp. “It’s fine. I’m expecting it now. Besides, I’ve seen Milo in his full bull glory. I’m becoming desensitized.”
A look passed between the two Genii, but Erus nodded, pulling back a little from my body. I tried not to pout at the loss of his warmth.
Then, beside me, was a gloriously beautiful man with the head of a lion.
Holy shit. Holy fucking shit.
Although the size of his head didn’t change, just morphed into the face of a lion, his mane was huge and flowing. And so fucking glorious. And the eyes in that lion face were still Erus, watching me with cool intelligence as I lifted my hand to his face, brushing my fingertips through the soft fur on his face. He tilted his cheek hard into my hand, rubbing it firmly against my skin.
Scent marking me again.
Tryp huffed. “If I knew I could mark her in my lion form, I would’ve waited.”
I turned and looked at him, my eyes wide as I laughed. I was stroking a half-lion man now. What even was my life?
Tryp obviously took my expression to mean I wouldn’t mind him scent marking me again, but as a lion this time. “Really?” Nodding, I laughed at his whoop of joy.
He was slightly darker than the light golden coloring of Erus. The light and the dark. That big lion head was stroking all over my body once more, starting at my hands and moving up my arms. At my shoulder, his huge tongue came out and licked my pale, freckle-spotted skin. I squealed. It was rough, like a cat tongue, but huge.
Erus huffed. “Keep your tongue to yourself, Tryp.”
Tryp made a low grumble. The kind of sound that would never come from a human mouth. But his next words would. “He didn’t say that when I was tonguing his balls the other night,” he whispered in my ear, and I made a choking noise. That sensation on any kind of private part sounded awful. Like sandpapering your testicles.
I was saved from replying by his furry cheek rubbing against mine, and I got a face full of mane. But with his smooth, muscular chest pressed against mine and Erus on my other side, it was like being in a sexy sandwich. A fully clothed sandwich; at least for now. My body didn’t really want to listen to my head when it said fucking a lion was weird.
I owed Eleanor Heber from the seventh grade an apology. Simba really did deserve his place in the top ten sexiest cartoon characters of all time.