Chapter Four #2
He exhaled a long, slow breath, almost as though he had been holding on to his breath for hours.
It was possible he had been. After all, he did not need to breathe to live.
But it was a strange and unrealistic thought, clearly without basis in fact.
Without breath he could not speak, and it seemed he had yet to stop talking with her.
In fact, he had not exchanged so many words with someone other than his brothers or his generals in a very long time.
“I like the way you feel as well,” he said, the words coming out of him like a growl.
“Then we shall spend quite a bit of time feeling each other,” she promised him with confidence. It made him chuckle.
“You’ll get no arguments from me,” he said.
“I like that you are furry,” she said with a smile as she raked gentle fingers through the hair at the center of his chest.
“I like that you are not,” he replied, making her laugh.
It was a light, musical sound. As musical as the rest of her voice.
Yes, he thought. That was the perfect term for it.
Soft and melodic. And just as compelling as the mischievous smile that spread across her lush lips.
Lips that hovered barely an inch above his own.
“I think I’m going to kiss you,” he said roughly as his hands closed tightly around her hips, his fingers sinking into the soft flesh of her buttocks. “And then I’m fairly certain I’m going to fuck you.”
“Is that what you call it?” she asked lightly. “Fucking? Hmm. I like it. It’s a fun word. Hard and to the point.”
“I’ll show you hard and to the point,” he said hoarsely as he spun them about until her back hit the bedding and he was looming over her. He felt her legs lock around his waist and he grew harder from finding himself entrapped by those long, beautiful legs.
Unable to resist a moment longer, he covered her mouth with his own, kissing her with savagery and an intensity he had not realized he was capable of.
Her mouth was lush and deep, and he explored every corner of it as fiercely as he could.
His tongue tangled with hers, and the depth of the link made his head spin and buzz with need and arousal.
It seemed the more he kissed her, the more ferocious that need became.
Meanwhile, her hands kept busy on his skin.
Her fingertips danced, her palms stroked.
She was touching him everywhere she could find bare skin.
Her touch coasted down his back, burrowed beneath the waist of his pants, her fingers gripping at his backside and dragging his hips forward into the lee of her thighs.
“Mmm,” she purred as his sex rubbed up hard against hers, where he was still clothed and she was decidedly not. “Is this where the fucking begins?”
“It’s already begun,” he assured her as he lifted away from her just long enough to strip his tunic from her body.
He took a moment, his breaths coming hard, to look down on her.
Yes, he decided. This was a good place for her to be.
Beneath him in his bed. His lust for her was almost blinding …
almost a little frightening. But he excused his fervor.
He was long overdue for this. He gave little thought to the idea that he felt much more strongly about this than he should be feeling for a casual toss of a random wench.
But she was nothing to him, he reassured himself.
Nothing more than a much-needed moment of pleasure.
He gave himself over to that as he let his mouth slide along her sweet skin, her slightly salty flavor streaking across his tongue as it glided down the length of her breastbone.
He shaped her right breast in his hand, kneading the flesh of it almost desperately.
He needed her on such a visceral level. Escape.
Yes. He needed escape and she was going to provide it.
“Yes,” she encouraged him with a sibilant s, as though she could divine his thoughts.
Her fingers crawled through his hair, her hands embracing his head as he drew his mouth to the tip of her breast. He opened his mouth against her obligingly, his tongue darting out to taste her rigid nipple.
He closed his mouth over her at last and sucked her deep inside.
She gasped, her back arching up off the bed.
In truth, she did that frequently—curved her body up into his again and again, as if she longed to connect with him for every second possible.
As he pulled at her with his mouth, he let his touch travel below her waist and between her splayed thighs.
When he touched her intimately, he found her to be incredibly wet and slick; it was so inviting that he felt like he was strangling with the need to connect with her.
But he would not rid himself of his clothing and be free to just take her.
He didn’t want this to be over that quickly.
He felt they both needed more than the quick, unfeeling coupling he kept trying to relegate the encounter to, and in spite of his body, he found himself giving in to those desires.
He wanted her to feel pleasure, wanted her to get just as much out of the encounter as he hoped to get.
Thankfully she seemed hot and willing and wild enough to feel anything he needed her to feel.
Then her fingers were pulling at the fastenings of his pants, freeing him to her touch as her hand delved beyond and her fingers wrapped around his thick and straining cock.
He surged up into her hand, felt the glory of her fingers stroking the length and breadth of him, felt him pulsing to her touch.
It was blindingly blissful, everything he could want and more.
Almost too much. He surged into her touch again and again with blind thrusts of his hips, all the while seeking out her clitoris with his fingers.
He wanted her to feel the same beautiful pleasure he was feeling.
But it seemed as though he couldn’t focus beyond the feel of her touch on him.
Her stroke was erotic without feeling practiced.
She was simply seeking and learning, chasing down his every sound of pleasure, repeating herself each time she elicited an uncontrolled response from him.
Before he knew it, she had pushed his pants down below his hips, wrapped her legs tightly around him, and jerked their hips into a perfect connection that allowed his cock to slide through the infinite heat and moisture of her sex.
He was but a single thrust away from being inside her.
“Slow,” he ground out. “Great gods, you’re a hot little thing. Slow down before I—”
“Hush,” she breathed against his ear. “Hush and just take me.”
Honestly, he couldn’t have resisted the temptation even if he’d tried.
It was too much and he was in too much need.
He gave her what she was begging for, sliding through her wet heat one last time before looking into her eyes and entering her with a hard thrust. She gasped, long and loud, then released the breath in a lusty groan.
Her nails dug into his backside, her hands helping him in his second thrust, the thrust that seated him most firmly inside her.
“There, now. Now who is burning as hot as a star, hmm?” he asked her.
“Is it me?” she asked him, making him laugh.
“Yes, it is you.”
“Oh, good. For a moment I couldn’t tell. You are so hot you are burning me from the inside.”
Her words enflamed him. He thrust into her again and again, his mouth crashing onto hers as he devoured her every way he could think of.
She overwhelmed him, rocked him to his core, clawed pleasure out of him seemingly from the bottom of his forsaken soul.
The feeling was unexpected and disturbing, almost disturbing enough to make him withdraw from her.
But the lock of her legs and the escalating fever of her body made that impossible.
He began to drive into her in earnest, working himself up, telling himself this was no more than a selfish pleasure.
Her reactions meant nothing. His reactions meant nothing.
None of it had any deeper meaning than the simple physicality of the joining.
“Gods above,” he swore fiercely as the need to orgasm tore through him. Yes, he thought. He was going to take his pleasure and that would be the end of it. The end of her. The end of them.
And yet he couldn’t seem to make himself take that pleasure Without making certain she was right there with him. Why should it matter to him? Why should he care? he asked himself. She had given herself up to this thing with no promises from him. He owed her nothing.
But there was something about hearing her pleasured cries in his ear that was too compelling by far. It would not be right unless he took her over the edge with him. It simply would not do.
He thrust into her grasping body, listening to her pleasure ramp upward in the air around them.
He staved off his need to come until she threw back her head, throat arching up toward him, and shouted in exultation.
He surged into her once again and let blinding pleasure sweep through him.
He came hard and fast, the clutch of her body around him more than any sane man could bear.
Gasping for breath, he collapsed upon her body, too weak with release to give a care to his weight against her. She was sturdy enough, he thought dazedly. She could bear up until he got his legs under him once more.
Still, after a moment he rolled onto his back and then stared at the colorful bed curtains where they attached to the ceiling as he felt her snuggle up against his body under his right arm.
He was growing cold quickly and concerned she was as well.
He used the last of his energy to draw the covers up over them before he did something he never, ever did …
He fell asleep within trusting reach of a total stranger.