Chapter 14 #2
Her brows creased as she thought back. He’d been calling her that all this time, and she’d thought it was some kind of alien medical term, or possibly creative swearing.
“You could have mentioned,” she managed, unable to stop her voice cracking.
“I thought you understood.” He nuzzled at her nose with his. “You seem to know everything else.”
She huffed at him, her eyes half closing at the tender gesture.
“I understand ‘hold still’ and ‘that’s fascinating’ and ‘take a deep breath.’ Not—” She stopped, blinking quickly.
She wouldn’t cry. Not here, not now. She didn’t need to. They’d won… the hero had gotten the girl, and all that. And also, with the hard length of his cock pressing against her hip through his leathers, because crying would really kill the mood.
“Delilah. Look at me.” He cupped her face, tilting her chin up. “It means beloved and mate, and I love you all rolled into one.”
She bit her lip, then gave up and dragged him back down, kissing him with desperation and every ounce of terrified joy she’d been hoarding.
“I love you too,” she gasped against his jaw. “Now get naked before I lose my damn mind.”
“Your wish is my command,” he growled.
Rolling away, he shucked his ruined leathers with a grace of movement she couldn’t help admiring. This beautiful, graceful, dangerous man was hers. All hers. His jacket hit the floor, baring that broad, scarred chest. Then his hands dropped to his belt and her mouth went dry.
“Enjoying the show, kelarris?” he murmured, amusement and seduction warring for dominance in his deep voice.
“Oh yes,” she replied, motioning toward the rest with an indolent wave. Or as close to it as she could manage. “Please do continue.”
He held her gaze as the leathers loosened. Shoving them down over his lean hips, he kicked free of them and his boots. Then he stood in front of her naked. Absolutely and gloriously naked.
She let her gaze trail down him. Over the silver hair like a mantle over his broad shoulders, over every inch of his scarred, heavily muscled torso and further…
Heat rolled through her, pooling between her thighs.
His cock stood thick and proud against his belly, flushed dark, the tip already weeping. She lifted her gaze to meet his and let her knees drop open in invitation.
“Beautiful,” he said, dropping to his knees in front of her.
His big hands slid around her ankles, strong fingers gentle as he traced delicate patterns over the skin there. His eyes darkened as his thumbs brushed against her, his gaze traveling up the insides of her thighs.
Then he grabbed her ankles and yanked. She slid down the mattress with a squeak. It should have been embarrassing, but he shouldered his way between her thighs and a second later his mouth was on her.
“Oh, fuck—” she gasped as he dragged his tongue between her folds.
He found her clit and her back arched off the bed. Her hands flew to his hair to hold him in place, exactly where she needed him.
He rumbled approval against her flesh, the vibration shooting up her spine, and she whimpered. Then he closed his mouth over her clit, suckling.
Her vision went white.
“Kellat—” She panted, heels digging into the heavy muscles of his back as she writhed against him. “Ohmygod, please. I need—”
He lifted his head, and the sight of him, his lips wet with her and his eyes blown wide and black, nearly sent her over the edge.
“I need you,” she demanded, tugging at his hair. “Now.”
He climbed over her, fitting his hips between her thighs to fit the broad head of his cock against her. She caught her breath at the size of him, and a second later, he pushed.
The stretch burned so perfectly she moaned, her nails scoring his shoulders. He was so big, but she loved that initial moment of resistance before her body yielded.
Bracing himself over her, he worked himself in slowly, rocking his hips back and forth. He entered her one thick inch at a time, his jaw clenched tight as he watched her face.
“More,” she urged, wrapping her legs around his waist. “All of it. Now.”
“Impatient,” he ground out, but snapped his hips forward anyway.
He bottomed out with a groan from the center of his chest. She cried out, her head falling back as he filled her completely. For long seconds, his cock throbbed deep inside her, buried so deeply that she didn’t know where she ended, and he began.
“Look at me,” he commanded.
She dragged her eyes open. He was braced above her, silver hair falling around his face like a curtain. His gaze locked on hers, fierce and possessive, and then he started to move.
It was slow at first. Rolling thrusts that dragged his cock over that one spot inside her, the one that made her see stars. Then he upped the pace, his thrusts harder. Faster. The bed creaked beneath them, the sound lost under the wet slap of skin and their ragged breathing.
“Mine,” he snarled, his hips pistoning. “Say it, kelarris.”
“Yours,” she gasped, meeting him thrust for thrust. “I’m yours, Kellat. All yours.”
Shifting angle, he ground against her clit with every stroke. Heat built and within a few strokes, she shattered.
Her climax crashed through her in violent waves, her pussy clamping down on his rigid length. She screamed his name, her back bowing up off the mattress as pleasure cascaded through her.
He snarled something in Latharian and drove deep. Once. Twice. On the third thrust, he slammed home and stayed there, roaring his release against her throat. His cock jerked and pulsed inside her, flooding her with the heat of his seed.
For long moments, she couldn’t move. Neither did he. He stayed braced over her, his forehead against her shoulder, his breath hot and harsh against her skin. She could feel him still twitching inside her, still hard, and she clamped down just to feel him groan.
“Kelarris,” he mumbled, pressing a kiss to her sweat-dampened neck.
“Beloved,” she whispered back, a smile curving her lips as she nestled in his arms.
She’d joined the LMP as a means to an end, a way to escape life on Earth. She thought she’d find a comfortable life, nothing more.
She certainly never thought she’d find the perfect (alien) guy, and the other half of her soul.
Delilah snored.
Kellat smiled in the darkness.
It wasn’t a loud snore… the kind that would wake anyone up. It was just a tiny, little kitten-soft sound at the back of her throat every so often. There and gone again before he could be sure he’d heard it at all.
And it was perfect. Completely and utterly perfect. The kind of sound he could listen to his whole life and never get irritated.
She was draped across him like she’d been made to be there, with one leg thrown over his thigh, and her cheek pressed against his chest. Her hair spilled across his shoulder and chest, but he didn’t care even when it tickled his lip.
He stroked his hand through her hair, gently working out the knots from her captivity and the battle with Z’Saai.
Kellat’s jaw tightened so much his teeth ached.
That draanthic had put her in a cage. The moment he’d seen her behind those bars, something in him had snapped.
Had gone so quiet and cold that even now, with her heartbeat steady against his side, he couldn’t think about it directly in case it tipped him over the edge again.
He closed his eyes, breathed deeply, and stroked her hair. Used her to ground himself.
His heart. His kelarris.
Sighing in her sleep, she nestled against him, and that trusting little move made his heart ache all over again.
Her hand lay against his ribs, right over the bruising from one of the prototypes that had caught him.
He hadn’t felt it at the time. The need to get to her had blotted out everything else.
All he had been capable of thinking of was getting her out of there, and getting her to safety.
When she’d looked at him in the aftermath of the battle, her eyes wide and bright, and told him he was an idiot…
He leaned down to press a kiss to the top of her head, his lips curving into a smile.
He was an idiot. He’d been a monumental, prize-winning idiot from the moment she’d woken up and he’d decided not to tell her they’d been matched. Fortunately, she was far wiser than he was and now she was here.
In his arms.
In his bed.
Snoring.
He rested his chin on the top of her head and breathed her in. She smelled like smoke and machine coolant and underneath it, pure Delilah. The scent he’d memorized in his medical bay all those weeks she lay under his care.
“Kellat?” she mumbled, half awake.
“Here.” His voice was low and rough. “I’m here.”
She burrowed closer, her nose pressing into the hollow of his throat, and went still again.
He closed his eyes.
He’d spent decades learning the body. Every system, every structure, every way flesh could break and be mended again. None of it had taught him anything about this. About the way holding one small human female could feel like the center of the universe clicking into place.
She’d told him she loved him. She’d forgiven him. She’d taken everything he’d done wrong and every stupid, cowardly word he’d said, and she’d looked at him with those bright eyes and kissed him anyway.
He was never going to get over that. Not if he lived a thousand years.
She shifted in her sleep, her leg sliding higher across his hips, and the possessive heat that rolled through him was tempered now — banked, not extinguished.
She needed sleep more than she needed him again.
Her body had been through hell, and he was a healer before he was anything else.
He knew the toll the last hours had taken. He’d let her rest.
But later, when she woke…
He smiled into her hair.
Later, he was going to take his time.
But for now Kellat lay in the dark with his mate in his arms and let himself be happy.