18. Stop Doing That
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
STOP DOING THAT
AURORA
D eke didn’t say anything else. Helping me to my feet, he guided me to a secluded spot near the house. Since we’d been there for hours, it was dark enough that no one could see us. I could barely see him, and he stood right in front of me.
That twisting, thrilling sensation spiraled through me like we were on a roller coaster with endless corkscrews.
Upside down.
Right side up.
The highest heights.
The steepest drops.
All in a matter of milliseconds.
I was breathing heavy when the world snapped into place around us. Being back in the cabin was enough to make my muscles unclench.
It looked nothing like the house I’d shared with Ryan. There was no meticulously manicured landscaping. No pool that was cleaned three times a week. No endless rooms that went unused.
It was small and cozy, and it might not have been mine, but after only a week, that cabin felt far more like home than the giant house in Georgia ever had.
Than anywhere ever had.
The world suddenly felt right , but I still couldn’t stop the tears that flowed down my cheeks. I’d never been a crier. Whatever dam had held them in was apparently blown to rubble because everything—all the pent-up emotions—came rushing out in nonstop tears.
They came even harder when Deke asked, “What curse?”
I tried for silence.
“Aurora, I asked you a question.”
I set Victoria down and forced a yawn that was mixed with the stupid tears. “It’s been a long day.”
I expected sweet, tender, patient Deke to let me off the hook. After all, he’d offered to delay his reunion with his siblings until I was ready. Siblings he hadn’t seen in centuries . Siblings he’d missed fiercely but was still willing to put me first—something that filled me with equal parts warmth, shock, and guilt.
Compared to that, I figured a brief reprieve was nothing.
I figured wrong.
His large hand wrapped around the front of my neck, and he tilted my head so I was forced to meet his eyes. “What curse?”
“N-nothing,” I stammered through my shock.
And something else.
Something that chiseled away at the heartache, mixing with the other rushing emotions to leave me a jumbled mess.
Using his firm yet still gentle hold, Deke backed me up until I was pressed to the rough wooden wall. His dark eyes blazed at my answer.
At my lie.
I inhaled sharply.
Not from fear. Never from fear where Deke was concerned.
But he didn’t know that. Guilt slashed across his face. It slashed through his stomach, and it echoed in mine. Dropping his hand, he started to step away. “Go pack.”
“Don’t make me go.”
“Wh—”
“Please,” I interrupted as I wrapped my trembling fingers around his wrist and shoved his hand back to my throat.
I wasn’t talking about Georgia. I knew Deke would never force me to return to a place I hated. To a man I hated.
I didn’t want to go anywhere else. Not unless it was with him.
But sick of my lies, he might not want to deal with the hassle of being my mate.
And that? That terrified me worse than Pastor Gideon, Ryan, and the scary man from my vision combined.
Times a million.
Panic outweighed my shame and fears and self-hatred, and my secret spilled out in a hysterical rush. “I was cursed to see things. Visions. Random peeks at the future. Like when you cupped my cheek in the kitchen, and I was content for the first time in my life. I saw that while we were in the woods, and that’s how I knew I could trust you. I don’t want to lose that.”
At just the thought that I was too late, more of those damn tears spilled free.
My words were a whispered, earnest truth. “I don’t want to lose you .”
I was up before my sentence was finished, and my legs and arms instinctively wrapped around his thick, muscular body. He stormed through the house and up the stairs, not quite transporting us but still moving faster than humanly possible.
Which made sense since he wasn’t human.
My mind caught up with our bodies, and defeat sank into my bones until I wanted to crumble like my walls.
Dissolve into nothingness.
But I had to keep trying. I couldn’t take the coward’s way out with silence. I had to fight.
“I’m sorry I didn’t tell you before,” I hurried on. “Please don’t send me away.”
He stopped so abruptly, I thought we’d topple from the momentum. “What?”
“Don’t send me away,” I repeated.
“Never. God, the archangels, and Levi him-fucking-self couldn’t pry me away from you, my one.”
That mostly extinguished flame of hope flickered inside me.
I tried to snuff it out before I got ahead of myself.
“But you told me to pack,” I pointed out.
“We both need to. We can’t stay. It’s too far from the others,” Deke said softly. “It was a risk to even come here. If I’m bouncing us back and forth every day and something happens, I could be no use to anyone.”
“Your magicks can run out?”
“Don’t know.” He lowered to sit on the side of the bed. I tried to unwrap my legs from his torso, but his hands spanned my thighs to hold them tightly in place. “How long have you had visions?”
“Don’t know,” I repeated his words. Not giving him the chance to think I was lying or being evasive as usual, I rushed on to share the story I’d only told one other person. “When I was sixteen, I woke up in the middle of the woods in Arkansas.” I was vaguely aware of his fingers reflexively tightening around my legs, but I kept talking to get it all out. “I was at the bottom of a bluff, so the working theory was that I fell while hiking.”
“You don’t remember?”
I shook my head. “Somehow, I knew my name was Aurora and that the accident happened on my sixteenth birthday. Everything else was gone. Doctors said I might eventually regain my memories, especially if I saw people I recognized.” That isolation that came from the rejection swirled in my churning stomach. “No one ever came looking, and I never got my memories back.”
Understanding dawned on his handsome face. “That’s how you knew how it felt when my siblings disappeared.” He cupped my cheek. “The loneliness. The frustration.”
I swallowed harder and nodded.
“Fuck, baby. I’m sorry.”
“It’s okay,” I said automatically even though it very much was not . “I’m not sure if I had my curse before the accident, but I woke up with it.”
“Why do you keep calling it a curse?”
My fingertips instinctively went to my chest. His sharp gaze followed the movement, so I dropped my hand. “Because that’s what it is.”
“What makes you think that?”
“I know it.” I gave a quick shake of my head to clear the guilt that threatened to overwhelm me, but it didn’t help. “And now you’re forced to be with me because of our souls, and I’m so?—”
“Our souls don’t make me want you,” he cut in.
In that split second, embarrassment flared through me so completely, I thought my red cheeks would start on fire.
And then it changed to a different kind of heat when he gripped my hips and tugged me closer. “It has fuck-all to do with fate, the heavens, or our souls. Even if we weren’t mates, I’d sacrifice the world and my left nut for a single night with you.” His cock began to harden beneath me as he lifted a hand to tangle in my hair. He fisted the strands, and a bite of pain went across my scalp to zip down like those nerve endings were connected directly to my sex. His head lowered until I thought he’d kiss me. Until I was ready to beg for it. Until he was all I could see. “I want you because you’re you.”
And then his lips finally crashed against mine, the power and desire in his kiss confirming what his words had claimed.
That he wanted me.
That he needed me.
Not as his mate.
Not as his burden.
But as a woman.
He tugged my hair again—rougher that time—and forced my mouth open to give him more access. Plunging his tongue in, he dominated my mouth as his hips rocked with a tormenting, brutal intensity. His hardness pressed against my core, and arousal surged to leave me pathetically soaked.
Desperation on a level I never knew possible stole my common sense. Doubt. Breath. Thoughts. My hands released their grip on his worn tee to shove between us. Needing more.
Needing everything.
My fumbling fingers had barely skimmed his belt when he released my hair and hip to grip my wrist, halting my valiant effort.
I worried that he was stopping me before we got carried away, but it was just so he could take over to efficiently undo the buckle and the button on his jeans, all while still tormenting me with skimming lips and a teasing tongue. His zipper remained up as he spanned my ribs with one hand and palmed the back of my head with the other. He left the space between our bodies.
Left the choice up to me.
I didn’t have to think twice.
With a decisiveness I rarely felt, I unzipped his jeans and tried to get my hand inside. Or free him from where his cock was angled down his leg in a way that couldn’t be comfortable. I didn’t care which option happened so long as the end result was touching him.
But my sign of surety was all he needed.
Standing, Deke turned and lowered my back to the mattress. He bent to keep our mouths connected as he hastily pushed off his jeans.
Like it pained him to do it, he tore his mouth away but stayed dipped low.
First to kiss my neck.
Then the strip of skin that was exposed between where my hoodie had ridden up and my waistband.
Then lower still as he unfastened the button to tear my jeans and panties down my legs.
The giant man who wasn’t really a man.
Who was literally made from the heavens.
Who was good and giving and so unbelievably sexy.
All six and a half feet of solid muscle gracefully lowered next to the bed.
Kneeling before me like I was deserving of his worship.
I tried to stop him. “You shouldn’t?—”
“Hush, baby.” His palms started at my knees before caressing up. Slowly, savoring it, he used his hold to spread my legs. Exposing me. At the intensity of his stare, I tried to close them again, but his fingers tightened as his gaze stayed locked on the most intimate part of me.
He reached one hand behind his neck to clutch his shirt and pull it over his head. His muscles flexed at the motion.
No wonder he’s able to lift me like I weigh nothing more than a dried, fallen leaf.
My view was cut short when his head dipped, and his beard and lips lightly teased along my thigh. Then the other one. Anxiety and tense desire battled until I wasn’t sure whether I wanted to shift away or pull his head to where I needed it.
I gave a weak push on his shoulder. “You don’t have to do this.”
But it wasn’t my choice.
Positioning my legs over his shoulders, he gruffly rumbled, “The fuck I don’t.”
And then he buried his head between my thighs. No teasing. No tenderness. No hesitation.
Like when he kissed me, his tongue speared in to taste and take and own .
Tangling one hand in the sheets and one in his soft hair, my hips ground shamelessly against his face. His groan vibrated against me, adding another surge to the sensations that rippled across my nerve endings, igniting each like a string of Christmas lights.
He followed the noise up with movement, and I lifted onto my elbow to peer down my body. Like it was him being pleasured, his eyes were closed in bliss as his tongue, teeth, and lips greedily worked me.
Feeling my gaze on him, he snapped his lids open, and we locked eyes. He held the intense contact as one of his arms dropped from my thigh and began moving.
It took me a long moment to realize what was happening.
He’s stroking himself.
I had a brief thought that I should be ashamed. That it was my job to satisfy him, and I was failing that duty by selfishly accepting his attention while he was forced to take care of himself.
But nothing about the moment seemed like a compulsory obligation to him. He wanted to do it. He was getting off on doing it.
Because of me.
Even if I wanted to stop—which I very much did not —I couldn’t. Random tremors went through my body, tightening muscles and making my breath catch. Sweat slicked my skin, made worse by the fact I still wore my tee, hoodie, and his flannel.
Heart racing, I forced myself to move away.
His grunt of displeasure was more animal than man as he tugged me even closer.
“I’m…” I couldn’t get the words out.
“Stop fighting it,” he bit out against me before literally biting my clit. His tongue rapidly flicked across the oversensitive nerves. He released his hold on my upper thigh to slide a finger into my slick sex and crook it.
My eyes rolled, and my back lifted from the mattress like I was possessed.
Like I needed an exorcism.
Again.
It would’ve been distressing had my brain held the capacity to think.
But the only thing I could focus on was the Carolina Reaper pepper that’d infused my veins to burn through my body until I erupted. Not in fire or magma. But in blinding pleasure that eviscerated me just as completely.
I wasn’t sure the euphoria would ever fade. I hoped it wouldn’t. Not until my clit grew painfully oversensitive and my body turned needy.
Empty in a different way than I was used to.
My attempt to move was again stopped by Deke’s bruising hold and rough growl of warning.
“I need…” I started before my burning lungs forced me to breathe.
To pause.
A break.
One minute to stop my sex from twitching and clenching because every touch and brush and graze is overwhelming to the point of near pain.
“More,” I finished instead.
That was apparently the right thing to say because Deke eased back, kissing down my thigh as he slid his finger free. Standing, I finally got a view of him.
All of him.
His tight black boxers were partially in place, trying—and failing—to restrain his hard-on. The waistband cut across where it was stretched up his stomach, leaving the rest exposed. And there was a lot of rest.
It was longer and thicker than I’d expected.
Feared.
Hoped.
Nope. Definitely not human.
I prayed his magicks wasn’t depleted from transporting us because I got the feeling we would need it to get that thing to fit.
“Don’t look at me like that,” Deke rumbled as he rubbed a palm over his beard, which was shiny with my arousal.
“Like what?”
“Like you’re even half as addicted to me as I am to you.”
I was about to tell him that I was. That with my limited experience to compare to, I already knew how wrong I’d been when I’d said I didn’t like sex.
That everything was different with him.
But thief that he was, he stole my ability to think again. Because with his eyes locked onto me, he ran his tongue up his hand. The same one that’d just wiped my arousal from around his mouth.
My eyes must’ve been as big as dinner plates at the filthily erotic act, but all he said was, “Waited centuries for you, and your taste still surpassed my wildest fantasies. Not wasting a single drop, baby.”
How did I get so lucky?
How did he get so un ? —
The thought was abruptly cut off when Deke hooked his thumbs in his waistband and pushed his boxers off.
Giving me the full view of the swirls of black ink and dark hair that led down to the proud, thick erection that sprang free like it was reaching for me.
Rude or not, I couldn’t stop staring at it as he put his knee on the mattress.
Right between my legs.
The pressure didn’t ease the ache there, but it helped. Then I lost that, too, when he rearranged my body up the bed.
Leaning back, he gripped the edges of the unbuttoned flannel I still wore. “Gonna fuck you while you’re wearing only this one day. But not today.”
So caught up in the heady lust that filled his hooded gaze, I didn’t argue when he pulled the shirts off.
No.
Desperate and distracted, I helped .
My tee cleared my head, leaving me in just a bra. The mood in the room changed rapidly and broke through my haze.
Belatedly, I noticed his tense body.
The way his jaw clenched so tight, a muscle in his cheek twitched.
When he studied my breast, it wasn’t with longing.
It was with anger.
His hand splayed across my chest. “What the fu?—”
And then he was gone.
“Again?” I shouted, crossing my arms as I scanned the room for his return so I could kick him.
I waited.
And waited.
And waited.
Whatever hope I’d had that he’d gone to get ointment or a bandage or even makeup to cover the ugly scar I’d somehow forgotten about faded with each stretching minute.
Tears burned in my eyes, spilling over as I crawled out of bed to put my shirt and hoodie back on.
I’m never taking my clothes off again unless I’m showering.
And even then…
Regret for getting carried away ate at me. I’d never forgotten the mark before. Not for a moment. I never wore clothes that could expose it. Even my swimsuit had a high neckline.
With Deke’s rejection settling into my shattered heart, I curled into a ball in bed.
It was weak. Sad. Pathetic .
But so was I.
Tears stained the pillow while I cursed fate, Pastor Gideon, the powers-that-be.
And Deke.