Chapter 11 Iris #2
"Then we have a week to prove to you that you don't need it." My voice softens. "A week to show you that you can choose. That you're safe to choose."
When he opens his eyes, they're bright with emotion. "What if I'm not ready? What if it isn't enough?"
"Then we figure it out together." I move my thumb across his cheekbone. "The book said we need to be intimate. Vulnerable with each other. Maybe... maybe that's how we learn. How we both learn to trust this."
His hand comes up to cover mine. "Are you sure? After everything I said..."
"I'm terrified," I interrupt. "I'm terrified of letting go of control and having the transformation fail.
Terrified of not being able to surrender properly.
Terrified that I'll do it wrong and lose you anyway.
" I take a shaky breath. "But I want to try.
I want you to have the choice, even if it scares me. "
We stand there in the middle of the path, snow beginning to fall around us, both admitting our fears.
"I want to try too," he whispers. "I want to believe I can be more than what she made me."
"Then let's go home," I say softly.
This time when he kisses me, it's not soft and sweet, it's desperate and hungry and full of all the fear and hope we're both carrying. When we break apart, we're both breathing hard.
"Home," he agrees roughly.
We barely make it inside before we're kissing again.
The door slams shut behind us and Cadeon presses me back against it, his mouth hot and demanding on mine. I make a sound: need, want, and thread my fingers through his hair, pulling him closer.
"Bedroom?" I gasp between kisses.
"Too far."
"Living room?"
"Closer."
We stumble through the cottage, kissing and touching and shedding layers. My coat falls to the floor. His coat follows. By the time we reach the living room, my hands are under his shirt, exploring the cool planes of his chest, the ridges of old scars.
He groans when I rake my nails lightly across his skin. "Iris, fuck."
"I want to touch you. I want to feel you." I tug at his shirt. "Can I?"
"Yes. God, yes."
He pulls his shirt over his head in one fluid motion, and I have to stop and just look at him. He's beautiful, so much lean muscle and pale skin and old scars that tell stories of survival.
"Your turn," he says, voice rough with want.
My fingers tremble as I unbutton my blouse. He watches every movement, his eyes dark and hungry. When I shrug the fabric off my shoulders, leaving me in just my underwear and s slip, his breathing stutters.
"You're beautiful," he breathes.
"So are you," I whisper as I strip off the rest of my clothing.
He pulls me flush against him, skin to skin, and the sensation is overwhelming. His coolness against my warmth. The solid strength of him. The way he holds me like I'm precious.
We sink onto the couch together, a tangle of limbs and kisses. He lies back and I straddle him, just like that first time we kissed. But this is different. More. Only his trousers still between us.
I rock against him experimentally and we both gasp.
"Fuck," he breathes. "Iris."
"Good?"
"So good. Too good." His hands grip my hips, guiding me into another roll of my hips against his. "Do that again."
I do, and the friction is perfect. I can feel how hard he is beneath me, can feel my own body responding with wet heat. Through the bond, sensation doubles over. I feel my own pleasure and echo of his, building and feeding off each other.
"This is... " I can't finish the sentence, too caught up in the feeling of him beneath me, his hands on my hips, his mouth on my throat.
"I know." He nips at my pulse point, then soothes it with his tongue. "I can feel you. Feel what you're feeling. It's incredible."
His hands slide up from my hips, over my ribs, until his thumbs brush the undersides of my breasts like he’s afraid to touch me fully. I arch into the touch, wanting more.
"Can I?" he asks.
"Please."
For a moment he just looks at me, drinking me in. Then his hands cup my breasts, thumbs circling my nipples until they peak.
"Beautiful," he murmurs. "You're so beautiful."
Then he leans up and takes one nipple into his mouth.
The sensation shoots straight through me. I cry out, my hips jerking against his, and through the bond I feel his satisfaction, his pleasure at making me feel good.
He lavishes attention on first one breast, then the other, using his mouth and hands until I'm writhing on top of him, desperate for more friction, more pressure, more everything.
"Cadeon, you’re torturing me."
"I know." His hand slides down between us, pressing against me through my skirts. "I’m ruthless, remember. Here?"
"Yes. Oh god, yes."
There's too much fabric. Too many layers. I shift off him long enough for him to strip his trousers.
His eyes are nearly black as he takes me in and resumes his seat. "Come here."
I straddle him again and this time when I rock against him, there's nothing between us. All skin, his cool, mine burning hot.
"That's it," he encourages, his hands back on my hips, helping me find a rhythm. "Take what you need."
I brace my hands on his shoulders and move, grinding against him. The friction is delicious, maddening. Not quite enough but somehow too much at the same time.
“I want to feel you.” I gasp. “Really feel you."
"Not yet." His voice is strained. "If we do this, I want to do it right. I want to take my time with you. Make you feel everything."
"I'm feeling plenty right now."
He laughs, breathless. "I can tell. I can feel it through the bond. You're close, aren't you?"
I am. The pressure is building, coiling tight in my belly. Every roll of my hips brings me closer.
"Let me help." His hand slides between us. His fingers find where I'm slick and aching.
"Oh... " The word comes out as a moan.
"This?" He circles my clit with gentle pressure.
"Yes. There. Please don't stop."
He doesn't. He keeps one hand on my hip, guiding my movements against him while his other hand works between my legs. The dual sensation, the pressure of him beneath me and his fingers on my clit, is overwhelming.
I feel his pleasure at touching me, his awe at how I respond to him. It feeds my own arousal, amplifying everything.
"You're so wet," he murmurs. "So perfect. I can't wait to taste you. To feel you come apart for me."
His words push me higher. "I'm going to soon...I'm close."
"I know. I can feel it." He increases the pressure, the speed. "Let go, Iris. Let me feel you come."
The orgasm crashes through me like a wave. I cry out, my whole body shuddering as pleasure rolls through me in pulses. Through the bond, I feel Cadeon's reaction: his awe, his satisfaction, his own arousal spiking as he experiences my climax secondhand.
I collapse against his chest, trembling and gasping. His arms come around me, holding me close as I come down.
"That was enchanting. I can't find words,” he says. He presses a kiss to my temple, my cheek, my mouth. "You're incredible."
I can feel him still hard beneath me, unfulfilled. I shift my hips experimentally and he groans.
"What about you?" I ask.
"I'm fine."
"You're lying. I can feel you through the bond." I lean back to look at him. "I want to make you feel good too."
"You did. Feeling you come..." He shudders. "That was better than anything I've felt in a hundred years."
"But you didn't..."
"I don't need to." He cups my face. "This isn't about keeping score. I wanted to give you pleasure. That's enough for me."
"What if it's not enough for me?" I rock against him again, deliberately. "What if I want to feel you lose control? Want to know what you sound like when you come?"
His grip on my hips tightens. "Iris..." It’s low and deep, like a warning.
"Please." I kiss him, slow, wet and warm. "Let me touch you."
For a moment I think he'll refuse. Then he nods, and his hands fall away from my hips.
"Show me what you want," I whisper.
He takes my hand and guides me against his skin.. "I want your hands on me."
He's hard and cool and silken, and when I wrap my hand around him he makes a sound I've never heard before. Raw and desperate and entirely undone.
"Like this?" I stroke him slowly, learning the shape of him, what makes him gasp and tense.
"Yes. Just like that." His head falls back against the couch, his eyes closed. "Gods, Iris."
I feel what he feels: the pleasure of my touch, the building pressure, the need for release. It's intoxicating, being able to feel his response to me.
I experiment with pressure and speed, watching his face, feeling his reactions through the bond. When I twist my wrist on the upstroke, his hips jerk up into my hand.
"That's, fuck, that's perfect."
His control is fracturing. I can see it in the tension of his body, feel it through the bond. He's trying to hold back, trying to make it last, but I don't want him to hold back.
I want him wild. Undone. All mine.
I lean down and press my mouth to his throat, right over where his pulse would be if he were human. "Let go," I whisper against his skin. "I want to feel you come."
That's what breaks him.
He comes with a shout, spilling over my hand, his whole body going rigid with pleasure. I feel the intensity of his release: overwhelming, mind-blanking, perfect.
When he finally goes limp beneath me, I'm trembling almost as much as he is. Feeling his orgasm through the bond was like experiencing my own all over again.
"Holy Gods," he breathes.
I can't help but laugh. "Good?"
"I don't have words for what that was." He pulls me down for a deep, languid kiss. "You're dangerous, you know that?"
"Me? I'm not the centuries-old vampire."
"No. You're worse." He tucks a strand of hair behind my ear. "You make me feel things. Want things. Hope for things I thought were impossible."
The levity drains away, leaving something tender and raw between us.
"Like what?" I whisper.
"Like a future. Like I could have a life instead of just an existence." He strokes his thumb across my cheekbone. "Like I could be loved."
My breath catches. "You could. You are."
His eyes search mine. "Am I?"
The question hangs between us, weighted with vulnerability.
I could deflect. Could make a joke or change the subject. But we just promised to be vulnerable with each other, and this is where it starts.
"Yes," I say simply. "I love you, Cadeon. I think I've been falling in love with you since the moment I walked in that door. Maybe even before that."
He stares at me like I've given him the world. "Iris," he whispers.
"You don't have to say it back. I know it's complicated and scary..."
He kisses me silent. When he pulls back, his eyes are bright with emotion.
"I love you," he says, clear and certain.
"I don't know when it happened. Maybe when you insisted on sitting with me after my nightmares.
Maybe when you taught me to cook wassail.
Maybe the first time you looked at me like I was a person instead of a weapon.
" He shakes his head. "Whenever it started, I know it's real.
The most real thing I've felt in two hundred years. "
I kiss him again because I don't have words. Because my heart is too full for words.
When we finally break apart, we're both smiling like fools.
"So," I say, glancing down at our state of undress. "That was quite an evening."
He laughs. "It was. Though perhaps next time we should actually make it to a bed."
"Next time?" I raise an eyebrow. "Confident, aren't you?"
"Given that we have a week until solstice, and the bond transformation requires intimacy..." He trails off meaningfully. "I think there will definitely be a next time."
Heat pools low in my belly at the suggestion. "Oh?"
"Definitely." He nips at my lower lip. "I want to taste you properly. Want to take my time learning every inch of you. Want to make you come on my tongue, my fingers, eventually on my cock." His voice drops to a rough purr. "Want to hear you scream my name."
I shiver. "That's... quite a to-do list."
"We have a week." He pulls me close again. "I intend to make the most of them."
Later, after we've cleaned up and dressed (somewhat reluctantly), we sit together in the kitchen while I make dinner.
Or rather, while Cadeon makes dinner and I sit on the counter watching him.
"You know," I say, "I could help."
"You could." He looks up from the vegetables he's chopping with perfect precision. "But I like having you there. It feels..." He trails off.
"Normal?"
"Right. It feels right."
I swing my legs, content to watch him move around the kitchen. Through the bond, I can feel his quiet happiness. His peace.
"A week," I say softly.
He sets down the knife and comes to stand between my knees, stooping so he can brace his hands on my thighs. "A week until the bond transforms. Until I get to choose you, freely and completely."
"You're sure? That you'll choose to stay?"
"Iris." He tilts my chin up. "I'm not going anywhere. Ever. You're stuck with me."
"Promise?"
"I promise. I choose you. Every day from now until forever, I choose you."
I pull him into a kiss, soft and sweet and full of promise.
"Every day," I whisper against his mouth. "I choose you too."