30. Wren
Wren
It’s no hardship to stay awake and watch the others sleep.
The rise and fall of Helene’s chest, the way her eyes dart back and forth between closed lids… The dreams must be good. Soft and easy.
The kind of dreams she deserves.
The ones you wish for after rough days.
Her feet rest on Forest’s lap with Nicholas sprawled at her side, the two of them falling into oblivion together with their voices low, neither one aware of their audience.
I shouldn’t have eavesdropped. My ears burned with the lilting cadence of her whispered fears and concerns. Now one of us stays sentimental in the face of darkness
Frigid cold and sharp lightning push and stress the seams of this house. It seeps through glass to reach us here.
My shadows speak and assure me of Audra’s rest.
The only respite she’ll get from visions and prophecies.
And maybe even a gift, if I’ve been good enough to get one.
I drag my fingers through Helene’s hair to muss the strands already roughened by sweat and fists. There’s no resolution to the need or the chaos. There hasn’t been in thousands of years, and when her lips part on a sigh, I wonder if this is finally the beginning of the end.
I’ve been lost to her for centuries. So you learn to savor the small moments.
I pull free of the warmth of the pile to face her, cradle her, kiss her neck. And when her body melts into mine, when her head angles over her shoulder and mouth opens wider, desperation crashes.
I swallow a groan of my own and kiss her back.
In sleep, she tastes like woodsmoke and mountain air, a remnant from days as long lost as sentiments and scruples are in this modern era.
She’d only seen a fragment of the memory. She’d pulled us out of it before she got to the part where we fed Hellevi with more than our bodies. When her tongue wrapped around stout cherry stems and her eyes darkened, juice dotting her lips and chin.
The same juice marked all of us by the time we'd exhausted each other.
It’s a danger to stay so deeply entrenched in the past.
To make the most of the present and the craving,
I drag my hand down the soft plane of her face as shadows dance across her spine. They pull her free and turn her on her side, flush to me, until the heat of her core seeps through my skin.
I was the first to take her this time.
Eat it, you bastards.
She’s soft and open and mine alone for the moment.
She’s also slow to react in sleep. Slow to wade up through the mire of exhaustion to speak when I trail kisses along her cheeks.
“Wren?”
I break away to bury my face in the crook where neck meets shoulders and absorb her racing pulse against my lips. Soon enough she’ll claw for me. Now, in the in between, there’s nothing but pleasure, nothing but trust, and I know if I glide my hand lower, she’ll already be soaking.
“Helene.” Lust shreds my voice.
This is why I’ve never been able to let her go. In a world where my people play games, where love is nothing but currency, she stands alone as a solid singularity.
There will never be anyone else for me.
Dragging my teeth higher, I nip the corner of her jaw before claiming the kiss, swallowing the moment she comes awake. She sighs into my mouth as my shadows drag her closer. My cock juts between us. Her legs fall on either side of my hips with her core drenching my length.
This stolen encounter means everything.
Years of celibacy, of not having her taste coating every part of me, it does something to a man. To be parted from the one real thing—
I trace patterns across her hips and the lush curve of her ass.
She arches, and her eyes flutter open to meet mine. “Wren.”
“I love the way you say my name,” I whisper.
Gently, I brush between her legs and dip a finger inside of her without warning. She tamps down on a cry, and her teeth saw her lower lip. Her head falls.
Breath catching, I push another knuckle beside the first, working her until her thighs twitch.
Forest moans in his sleep, turning on his side. Nicholas remains still. Resting, but never easy.
“Do you want me to fuck you?” I kiss her deeply, maintaining eye contact. “How much do you want me to fuck you while the others sleep so that they wake to the scent of your desire? Knowing I’m the one who filled you first?”
She shakes her head like it’s not fair for us to do any of it. Or maybe fair isn’t the right word.
I curl my fingers inside her pussy and stroke. “I think you secretly adore the way we make you feel. You love it when you beg me.”
Helene stares at me like she’s the one in control here even as she unravels. I push the base of my palm to her clit to increase the friction.
Shadows encircle the strands of hair corkscrewed into sweaty spirals.
“Beg me to get you off.”
I growl into her ear as she clenches tighter around my fingers, milking them, her pussy fluttering with want.
It’s never been about ownership. She knows, without words, she’s the one pulling our leashes tight.
“Come on, monster. Beg.”
She shakes her head. “No.”
I twist to brush against her G spot and she gasps inside my mouth. Her body knows what her mind refuses to accept. She grinds her cunt closer, forcing my fingers deeper, aching for what I offer.
Her eyes drift close as the orgasm shudders to the surface. I stop all movement, holding her still, my palm flat to her clit.
“Beg,” I repeat, darker.
Denying her the climax she wants when she’s silent, I withdraw my fingers.
“What are you doing?” she asks.
“Isn’t it obvious?” In the next beat, angle my cock to her cunt. “I’m punishing you.”
She cries out when I push inside of her but it’s the most amazing fucking thing I’ve ever heard. Shadows circle her throat and tighten.
She’ll never plead with me, which is the best part of our game.
I roll on to my spine and dragging her with me. Her legs fall on either side of my hips and I hold her raised above me.
Desperation beats in her every heartbeat.
She scowls, and I force her down, penetrating her roughly.
Instead of saying anything, Helene lifts her hands to my shoulders as she raises off my cock and rolls her hips on the way down. Fucking me in place of answering. She picks up the pace, and I let her ride me.
But the second she closes in on her orgasm, I grip her waist, holding her aloft again, memorizing the defiant challenge of her features.
“You love this.”
Our eyes meet and lock and she clenches down on a groan.
She shakes her head and squeezes her eyes shut. “You don’t know me.”
“Liar.”
I surge up into her and my cock stretches her as she warms around me, her nails biting down into my skin, leaving long red grooves. They’re marks I’ll wear gladly.
I know enough to read where to touch her.
Shadows drag across her slit, desire coating us both. She picks up the tempo, and I stop her, grab her, kiss her. Brutally.
Forcing her to take everything I’ve got.
She grips me like she’s drowning.
I lap at the crook of her neck, driving my hips up to fuck her. The pressure increases in my balls when she clenches me tight, her response thrilling.
Anticipation crashes and tightens my stomach.
I laugh at her desperation, at the way she drives her body down to impale herself on me.
A growl vibrates through me. Someone’s awake. Twin eyes burn like gleaming coals in a barely banked fire.
I quicken my pace, fucking up into her and pulling free until only the tip of my cock is clenched in her cunt, her back bowed for more.
Always wanting more.
“Please,” Helene pants. “Shit, Wren. I need—”
“We know what you need.” I thrust deep, and when I open my eyes, Nicholas has crawled closer, predatory, rising on his knees behind her to kiss her neck and bite his way along her spine.
Wisps of shadow float around her, circling her arms, her thighs. Stroking her skin and memorizing her curves.
I’m everywhere. Working her over, coaxing her toward a drop she won’t return from.
I won’t stop him this time.
If he loses himself when he comes like a fucking murderous teenager, well then—
But I know I will.
“I want you both,” Helene whispers hoarsely. “But I don’t want to break.”
“No one is going to hurt you.”
Her desires are pure sin. Will we use her within an inch of her life? Without question. Will she accept three massive, brutish men at the same time? Oh yes.
And she’ll love every moment of it.
Every angry, rough, filthy moment of it.
Nicholas grabs her by the waist, drawing her off me with a satisfied growl.
My cock bobs free glistening with her cream.
Helene yelps when he sets her on her knees, maneuvering behind her, covering his body with his tawny skin. A stark contrast to her paleness.
And through it all, Forest has stayed still. Watching, marking us while we’re oblivious to his attention. My shadows thread through the room and bind us.
Let the fucker watch.
Darkness slides over Helene and pools along her spine, her neck, her hair.
They bleed over her breasts, cradling her in my power.
Nicholas tightens his grip on her hips and slides his cock to her slit. Working her without pushing inside.
His hands dig into her softness but there’s no hint of his earlier craze. No indication he’ll lose control and drain her dry.
Forest and I will both monitor him carefully like it’s some unspoken rule and, frankly, an imposition.
I work my erection, squeezing the blunt head while Nicholas takes his sweet time butting against her entrance.
“Ruin.” He grunts out the nickname before slamming home hard enough to send the bed crashing into the wall.
Shadows flow over her chest, down her arms, along her collarbone.
Helene’s eyes roll into her head.
Nicholas slides his hand to the base of her neck and angles her down, her stomach pressing to the sheets and her ass lifted as he pounds into her.
His muscles flex, my shadows twining around them. Forest has the same idea I do. He works himself.
I suck in a sharp hiss when he bottoms out and his fangs puncture his lower lip.