Chapter 40
Gunnar was pretty sure, for all the shit that’d happened in the last few weeks—the brushes with death, the angel, and the manticore venom— this was what would kill him in the end.
I’m yours, from her sweet mouth. Audrey.
He lowered his forehead to hers, her breath warm on his lips as he mumbled, “I don’t deserve you,” and kissed her before she argued.
There it was, the trust, enough for her to sink into him, into their kiss. To let him cradle the back of her head in one hand, her jaw in the other, and angle her head just so, and he owned her mouth.
No fight, just beautiful, consuming submission, and he drank it up with tongue and teeth, gentle, soothing after each nip at her lips, each bite and suck at her tongue, and Gunnar kept his eyes closed, pretty sure his vision was tunneling as all the blood in his brain fled to his cock, hard enough to drive nails already.
From a kiss.
No, this was more than a kiss.
Everything.
He growled against her mouth, and she gave up those little noises for him again, precious whimpers and gasps and sighs, both hands holding his one wrist. She tried to keep up with him, yielding as he guided her, taught her, showed her how to lick back at his mouth, and when he drew away, trying to give her a second to breathe when she rocked into him, she whined.
“Perfect,” Gunnar whispered against her kiss-plumped lips, brushing his over her cheeks, her nose, her forehead. Felt how the praise warmed her already flushed skin, how she tried to shake her head in protest, but he didn’t allow it. “Perfect,” he repeated, firmer, a rasp in voice now as he dragged his nose along that elegant neck. “And mine.”
He kept worshiping her throat, sucking against her pulse point enough to mark, a hummingbird between his teeth. Hated what he put on her skin would fade, but just an excuse to place more, really, any time she liked. And she liked, if the way she squirmed, the way she restlessly shifted her thighs together was any indication.
If her fucking scent didn’t give it all away; fucking hells, he wanted to bury his face in her cunt. And he would. Oh, how he would.
Slow and gentle, he reminded himself again and again, intellect and instinct oddly aligned. For all he’d threated to ravish her minutes earlier, she was his.
Nothing had ever belonged to him before. No one ever wanted him enough to fight for him, to believe in him, to keep him. Exquisite, that might have been the right word for the woman in his arms, in his heart.
Everything.
Gunnar groaned at the thoughts, the rolling mantra, at her scent, the hot want on the air, her desire sweet as everything else about her. He’d never shake it, never get it out of his system, and he’d never fucking try.
He scooped her up by the thighs, and she gasped, falling forward against him. Soft, warm skin in palms, those perfect tits of hers pressing against his chest through his shirt—damn if that hadn’t been driving him crazy, her wearing his clothes. Her arms flew around his neck, her legs squeezing his hips.
More of that scent. Wet for him already, he’d bet his ass on it. He felt the radiant heat of her core against his stomach. A few fumbled steps forward and he lowered them both to the bed, careful to keep his weight from crushing her. He hissed, his hips cradled between hers, his erection pressed against her virgin cunt.
“Oh gods,” Audrey’s voice went shrill, grasping at his shoulders at the intimate contact, and he shushed against her lips, soothing, drawing her in to a tender kiss. Letting the moment stretch, let her acclimate to what it felt like to have him over her, his body above her, and she trembled, then relaxed, feeding him with more of those perfect noises.
He kept the kiss, one hand tracing down her body, lifting the shirt up high enough that he could run his thumb along the line of her cotton underwear. Practical, no frills or a show. Just who she was, his perfect girl. She tensed again, and he broke the kiss to nuzzle into her throat, against her jaw.
“Alright, sweetheart?”
“Yes,” she whispered, her single word a tiny pant.
He bit at the collar of the t-shirt, tugged. “Seems uneven.”
Audrey blinked up at him, hazel eyes luminous in the moonlight, the curtain still pulled back from watching the deer. He knew how he looked; dark hair falling forward, hungry black eyes, but she saw him, not the monster.
No, she’d showed him, hadn’t she?
He was a man, not a monster. He’d just been a slow learner.
Gunnar grinned down at her; she was a damn good teacher.
“What?” He didn’t know if she was asking about his shirt comment or his stupid grin, so he leaned back and tugged at the shirt, helping her sit. She let him, didn’t protest as he peeled it from her body. Knew his expression darkened when the moonlight hit her pale skin, as she settled back on the mattress, dusky nipples perking with the chill.
He shook his head when her arms lifted, clear she meant to cover herself, and she stalled, then folded them over her stomach instead. Found himself lost for a few seconds, gaze roving over her slight curves, the scar on her left bicep from the hellfire attack in the ESC, the faded marks from where she’d been stabbed the night he saved her the first time. Her delicate hip bones, the white cotton and the promise underneath. Gunnar breathed like he’d just fought for his life, realizing she studied him with the same intensity.
He watched her watch him for a few seconds, knowing she lingered on the scars covering his chest. Without thinking, he reached down and took one of her hands, pressed it over his heart.
“I’ll always keep you safe. Don’t matter what it costs.”
“I know,” she whispered, fingers tracing the raised skin, her eyes shining now. Tears? When he frowned, she shook her head. “It’s silly, but... I never felt safe, never in my whole life until you.” A tear raced down to her hair, disappeared. “Thank you.”
Gunnar caught her hand, kissing her fingertips. Holding them against his lips, just watching her, captivated.
Everything, well, it really was simple, wasn’t it?
Lowering down, he pressed his forehead to hers against, inhaling the happiness, the sunshine radiating from her skin, her desire for him so much more than what he’d ever really understood the desire to be. He kissed where the tear traced, then her cheek, then near her ear.
Told her he loved her.
Everything, he repeated, and her soft sob before she grabbed his face and both hands and kissed him for all she was worth. It took his fucking breath away. Then she giggled, he chuckled, then growled and sucked another love bit into her neck, because all this?
He wanted her more than he’d ever wanted anything in his life.
“Let me love you, sweetheart,” he said, pressing his lips to her clavicle, sternum. A lick along the underside of her breast, a tender suck on the side, before he palmed her entire tit and laved her nipple, savoring her desperate little cry, a breathy mewl making his cock twitch against her hot center.
“Fuck, more of that,” he growled, switching sides, teasing back and forth until both nipples were red and wet and swollen, and Audrey gasped his name between frantic pants. “More of you.”
He tugged at her underwear for emphasis, patting her hip gently as he pulled and she lifted for him, and fuck if he didn’t take his time, running his palms over her pert ass, giving a squeeze, before pulling the garment off and tossing it aside.
Gunnar had to pause, kneeling over her, squeezing his cock to keep from going off at the site of her, naked under him. Truly felt like an animal, groaning as he palmed her thighs and pushed them apart.
“Jonathan!” Her voice jumped an octave, surprising coloring her scent, her entire body tensing.
“Gorgeous, look at you,” he growled. She turned her face away, covering it with her hands, and he let her, for now. Delicate between her legs like everything else about her, the patch of curls above her sex slick, her cunt swollen and ripe for him, so much so her inner thighs were damp with her want. “Smell so fucking good.” He kept one hand heavy, holding legs her open, as he brushed her with a single knuckle, she rocked her hips, chasing him. “That’s right, beautiful. I’m all for you.”
“Jonathan . . .”
“Too fast?”
“No,” she whimpered, “Just . . . I’m . . .”
“What, baby?”
Audrey shifted her hips, restless, hungry. All of it radiated from her scent, obvious on her glistening folds. He touched her again, spreading her a bit, finding her clit and giving it a slow circle. She let out a choked noise, still covering her face.
“Tell me,” Gunnar said, his voice a low rumble, easing off to a featherlight touch. His mouth fucking watered, but he needed words.
“You’re staring,” she whimpered out.
He chuckled. “Yeah, sweetheart, I am.” Shifting his weight, he settled between her thighs, his chest against the sheets, that pretty cunt a breath from his mouth. “Are you telling me to stop?”
Her laugh was strained, a whine to it. “No, I... it’s okay?”
“You’re perfect, woman,” he growled, nipping high on her thigh, running his tongue higher, hips jerking into the mattress as he tasted the arousal on her leg. “Fuck.” Took a few breaths to steady himself, soothed a hand up and down her leg, squeezing gently as he hefted it over his shoulder, then the other. “You touch yourself?”
Another whine—embarrassed, he could tell, and fuck if it wasn’t adorable and sexy, both. “You’re really asking me this right now?”
“I am.”
A huff, mumbling from behind her hands, “Yes, but never here. Because you’d know...”
Yeah, he’d have smelled it, no question, and the thought made him grin. But also, “Nothing to worry about now,” he chuckled out, and before she could protest, he licked a stripe across her cunt, groaning at the same time she let out a startled moan.
“Fuck,” he grunted, his vision spotting again, pressing his hips hard into the bed, trying to avoid humping the fucking mattress. “Your taste...”
The sounds she made for him; he might have thought her in distress if he wasn’t mapping every inch of her cunt with his tongue and lips, drinking up everything she offered him. Twitching and shifting, whimpering, gasping, and it only took about a minute for those hands to drop, grabbing at nothing until he gave her a hand to anchor herself. She squeezed hard enough his knuckles ached, and hells if he didn’t fucking love it.
Took his time too, learning her. Learning how sucking hard on her clit was too much for her, but when he ran his tongue just inside her, she shuddered each time—but it distracted more than built her up. How she let out her embarrassed little whine when he spread her open with his free hand but pressed herself into his face when he licked her up and down, then swirled a few times on her most sensitive spot. How she squeezed his hand harder when he traced a finger around her opening, how she trembled, her scent thickening, sweetening.
Fuck, he wanted to go down on her for hours, but he had a feeling once he made her come, she’d need him to let off, and she was climbing quick. And he also needed to prep her a bit, because she was small. Tiny.
He was not.
Gunnar teased again, slicking up his finger before he dipped inside, testing, enough of a barrier there still she’d bleed when she took him. Gunnar tried to shove the thought away, focused on what he could do to ease the inevitable discomfort. They both groaned when he sunk in further, even one finger a tight fit, but her body pulling at him, so hot and wet.
He was about to lose his fucking mind.
Gave her clit a good suck, earning him a little gasp, but the distraction let him get all the way into her, savoring how she pulsed around his finger, his dick aching, and he curled, grinning at her shocked cry, how her back nearly arched off the bed. He put pressure against her hips with their tangled hands, holding her down.
“Oh!” Gasps, faster now, all the wild noises and knowing he’d be the first and only man to hear this? To own this, to give her this. Almost laughed, how close he felt to coming, grinding against the bed while he ate at her.
A few more slides and he found the exact spot she needed, felt the change as her muscles tightened head to toe, her thighs trying to close around his head, and suddenly it was the only thing in the world he needed, his woman coming on his mouth.
Careful, he added a second finger, her reply a more strained, less comfortable sound, which immediately faded into pleasured whine, then another little “Oh, oh gods,” and then she tipped, spilled into bliss because of him, and he carried her through it, gentling only once the clenching stopped and her cries turned to desperate little sobs. He pumped his fingers a few more times, pressing, stretching, and easing before he left her body.
Damn, she was vision, and he couldn’t take his eyes off her face as he climbed up over her body, limp and sated, those pretty cheeks flushed bright, her gaze hooded and shiny, her lips parted as she panted to catch her breath. Then she reached for him, touching his cheeks, his jaw, his hair, tugging him in for a kiss.
“Sexy,” he growled against her lips, and she laughed, breathless, and then her breathing hitched when she felt his cock, heavy against her. Her eyes fluttered shut.
“Jonathan,” a little gasp again, fingers tightening in his hair.
He rubbed her hip, hitching her thigh up, slicking himself with her come. “You want this?” Half question, half sudden disbelief. His mouth in her, sure, but this...
No hesitation, just a reedy, “Yes, Jonathan, please...”
A grunt, a tingle racing through his body, down his spine, and settling low on his back, heavy in his balls, and he took himself in hand, stroking a few times, lining himself up and pressing.
Then he stalled, blinking down, fixated on where their bodies met, his senses ratcheted to the sky when she tensed again. Licked his lips, kept soothing up and down her leg; hells, she was soaked for him, ready, wanting. He...
Gunnar blinked again, trying to anchor himself, his mind in a scattered haze.
When Audrey whispered, “What’s wrong,” her beautiful scent touching with concern, fresh nerves, sudden embarrassment, he shook his head. Closed his eyes.
“I don’t want to hurt you.”
Relief in her scent; she understood at least his hesitation had nothing to do with her. Those soft fingertips petting him, soothing him now. “I know it will, a little. It’s okay. I want this. With you.”
Gunnar nuzzled into her palm. “Tell me, if...”
“If I need to stop. I will. I promise.” Truth, entirely, and when he still hesitated, she whispered, “Love me.”
Fucking hells, she’d end him.
He didn’t know how or when, but this woman, everything began and ended with her now. He laced his fingers with hers, gripped her hip tighter, and rocked forward, enough to slip inside, feel her part for him, welcome him, and he kept the momentum despite her whimper of discomfort, needing this part over as fast as she did.
Inside her, well, all the imagined heavens couldn’t have possibly compared, and he wasn’t buried to the hilt yet. He pinned their joined hands to the bed—he needed to keep himself upright before he fell onto her, into her, got lost for the rest of his damn life.
Then he smelled her blood.
“Fuck, sweetheart. Audrey, baby, okay?” He kissed her forehead, left his lips there, tasting the sweet and salt of her skin, trying desperately to keep still. The leg he wasn’t holding wrapped around the outside of his thigh.
“Yes, I’m . . .” A little hiccup, a whine. “Don’t . . . don’t stop, I’m okay.”
Shit. Fuck.
He moved his arms under her shoulders until he cupped her head in both palms, his mouth against hers, not kissing, just breathing.
She smelled like truth and love and trust, so he pressed forward into her, the stretch of her around his cock like nothing else. Her gasps at his lips as he adjusted the angle a bit, pulled out a bit, then buried himself, all of him, into her beautiful, perfect body.
“Jonathan,” she gasped, then again, his name, her head titled back against his palms, his lips against her chin as he fought to be still, a shudder running through them both. “Jonathan, oh gods... it’s so...”
“Good,” he slurred against her skin, her sweet skin, a growl slipping out when she shifted under him, fluttered around him. Fucking hells, all of them, she was so, so fucking tight. He was about to lose his grasp on reality. “Fuck. Fuck, sweetheart,” he mumbled as he licked at her jaw, the side of her mouth, barely coherent. “You feel so fucking good, so fucking good.”
“Yes,” she whimpered at him, for him. She must have felt it, the way he trembled now, every muscle in his body fighting the urge to thrust, to claim, to move. Then she whispered, “Love me,” again, and the sound he made in return wasn’t human.
The first stroke, he kept slow, steady, an even slide out and back into her, and she grabbed at his arms as he moved, and they both moaned, and then his fists tightened in her hair, and he had to kiss her, needed her mouth.
Rolled his hips, again, again, deeper. Somewhere between fucking into her and making love, he decided, because the feral way he held her, the way he ravaged her mouth, was at odds with how controlled he kept his thrusts. She kept getting wetter, tighter, with each movement, as discomfort faded from her scent.
She was all want and need now, and love, and sunshine, everything.
Another growl, a harder thrust, and she titled her hips up to meet him, and he was in deeper, and this time her cry rattled through his skull to his hindbrain, the animal in him all male pride at the sounds he pulled from her.
“Audrey,” he snarled, nipping at her lips, their faces not even an inch apart as he took her, her eyes tightly shut. “Look at me, sweetheart.” He didn’t recognize his own voice, hoarse with need, and then she looked at him, her expression all fascinated, drowning pleasure.
He did that to her. He’d do more.
It about killed him to pull away enough to snake a hand between their bodies, but now that he knew how she sounded when she came, he needed it again. Now that he knew what she felt like around his fingers, he’d fight ten more angels to feel her around his cock.
“Oh...” A frantic little sound, her gaze snapping to his, her skin flushing darker, all the way to her tits, which jerked each time his hips met hers. Confusion, surprise, then realization.
“That’s right, sweetheart. You’re gonna come around my cock.”
Audrey made a strangled little noise, turning her head to the side, trying to hide, but she couldn’t, not from him. Not from the burst in her scent, the flutter around his cock as he pressed, lengthening his pace, because there, right there, he felt each twitch in her body when he rubbed just where she needed. Quickening his fingers, giving her clit a little pinch to keep her attention.
“Look at you, taking me,” Gunnar rasped, then almost laughed, as he added, “Owning me.” She blinked up at him, her expression wild, almost panicked, and the second she started to crest, he added, “Letting me love you like you deserve, sweet girl.”
And she broke for him, under him, gorgeous in her pleasure, watching her an almost out-of-body experience. That alone kept him from coming with her, the focused, rabid desire inside him to wring every bit she’d give him from her body. Her cunt clenched over and over, her back bending off the bed as she gripped the sheets and sang for him.
He slowed as she did, stopped when her cries shifted to little mewls, and lowered himself against her body, both of them sticky with sweat. Gunnar kissed her, her neck, her cheeks, little pecks everywhere he could reach until she gave him a sated, delirious giggle. She nuzzled at his cheek and he nuzzled back, tasting her scent for any lingering pain or discomfort, pleased to find none.
Then she shivered, which caused her cunt to tighten around his cock, and he groaned against her neck.
“Jonathan?” Half-question, half-pant, her fingers playing across his biceps, shoulders, running through his hair. “What do you need? What do I do?”
He huffed against her throat. “Just need you,” he mumbled, laving just under her ear, another shiver racing across her skin as his hips pumped lazily into her.
“No, I mean for you. How do I make it good for you, too?” Concern touched her scent, even as the aftershocks still made her tremble under him.
Another laugh; he felt almost drunk and loved how her voice hitched with each stroke; fuck, he could do this all night. Maybe they would. “Baby, if this was any better for me, I’d be dead.”
“Be serious!”
“I am.”
“But you didn’t... how do I...” She frowned then, looked like she might cry, shaking her head when he growled and went after her lips again. “How do I make you... you...”
Ah, he got it now. Shushed her, again when she tried to protest, and said against her mouth, “I’ve been barely keeping myself from coming this whole damn time, sweetheart.” When she kept frowning, her confusion clear, he nipped at her chin and rolled his hips again, which got a little frustrated, pleased noise from deep in her throat. “Almost came when I tasted you the first time.” A lick along her jaw, and she was still trying to argue with him. “Woman, I’m not done with you yet. I don’t want to be done with you yet.
“I want to fuck a few more orgasms out of you before I come, Audrey. Trying to pace myself, take care of you. Keep it slow, for you.”
Despite being as frazzled as he felt, he could tell, her breathing still erratic, Audrey told him, “No.”
“No?” He chuckled at her, teased, “That’s not what you want?”
“No,” she whispered, her desire and nerves and the sweet scent that was just her and love encompassing him. “I don’t want just what you think I want. I want you to... to...” Oh, he knew he was in trouble then, the determined look in eyes, the little jut of her chin.
Then she went and said, “Fuck me like you need.”
Gunnar stilled, resting his head on her shoulder. Had to bite down on her shoulder, a little harder than intended, right where that tendon met her shoulder, right where he’d like to leave a bruise that would take weeks to fade. Maybe something more permanent, that beast inside of him wanting to make sure she knew, everyone knew, she was his.
She gave a little moan when he did, and his cock throbbed. He ground his hips against hers.
“Careful, sweetheart.” He traced the indents he’d left on her skin with his tongue, darker pleasure zinging up and his spine, gathering in his groin. “You need to mean it when you say things like that to me,” he slurred, couldn’t help himself, he was slipping. “Especially when I’m buried in your perfect cunt.”
“I mean it,” she whispered, her lips against his hair now. She brought her arms around him, hugging him close. “I want all of you.”
He bit again, harder, pulling on her hair to open her throat to him more, inhaling deep, searching for the truth, and there it was.
She had no idea the power she had over him. Power he’d willing given her, because he’d never tasted anything like the knowledge she could break him, and he’d let her.
Gunnar slipped from her body, drawing a surprised protest that turned to a little squeak as he rolled her on to her stomach, nudged her legs apart with a knee. Drew her up on her hands, ass and hips in the air for him, a hand smoothing up her spine as he crawled behind her.
Yes, yes. This. Fuck, she was a sight, wet and on display, swollen from the pleasure he’d already given, empty and wanting more of him. All of him.
He caged her under him, his chest against her back as he caught her jaw, turned her face toward his, panting against her cheek, against the corner of her mouth. Tasting her scent with his open mouth.
“Mean it,” he repeated, his voice guttural. He ran his cock along her, reveling in the violent shudder than wracked her entire body.
“I meant it. And I promise I will stop you if it’s too much.”
The world, Gunnar mused, he’d destroy it for her.
He thrust his cock back where it belonged, his vision tunneling at her call, her strangled moan as he held her face, kept himself up with one arm anchored to the bed, savoring the feel of her, how she gripped him like a vice, and even though he’d opened her virgin body to him, she was still too tight to be fucking reality. The animal he was, deep down, was rapidly slipping the leash he fought with day after day, minute after minute. Every second when it came to her, but she’d extended the invitation; that’s when he realized she might be his, but she was the one who held the leash now.
“Perfect,” he growled against her mouth, his last coherent thought as her fingers wove between his against the sheets, and he let her have him.
He fucked her like he never dared to dream about, walking the edge as he slammed into her from behind, over and over, keeping her mouth right there, right at his, so she could taste every one of his strangled growls, his aching groans, her name pouring from his mouth, along with mine, mine, mine, echoed back in her desperate pants of yours, yes, yours.
When he came, Gunnar about went blind, because she followed him over the cliff with his name still on her lips, the name she gave him, her body arching and draining him fucking dry. She gripped his hand tighter as they fell together, her tears sweet when they reached his lips, her scent wild with pleasure, feral almost, and not a hint of regret or pain or fear.
“Jonathan,” she whispered, a little sob, a hiccup. Exhausted, but happy. And his.
“I know, sweetheart,” he said against her skin, his head swimming. “I know.”
“I love you.”
“Everything,” he confirmed, nuzzled her cheek. “You’re everything.” Dizzy, but then he recalled how women liked to hear the words, not an equivalent, so he added, “Love you, woman,” and her little, contented sigh?
He’d keep it forever.