Chapter 34 #2
Yet she knew that control was tenuous. Knew it by the prick of his claws against her flesh, the quaking in his limbs, the twitching of his cock, knew it by the harshness of his breathing and the low growls rolling from his chest.
He was battling his own instincts, and he was about to lose.
“Telok, please,” Lacey panted, body quivering, skin damp with perspiration. She arched her back, squeezing her breasts in her hands as tears leaked from the corners of her eyes. “My luveen, my husband. No more. Please…”
“You are mine,” he declared.
“Yes.”
One of his hands lifted from the floor and flattened low on her belly. That added pressure deepened the sensations of his stroking cock. With his clawless thumb, he stroked her clit. “My joy. My pleasure. My purpose. My heartsthread.”
She let out a low, surrendering moan. “Yes.”
“Say your human words to me.”
Lacey’s brow creased as she tried to think through the euphoria assaulting her. “What…”
He pressed his thumb firmly on her clit, stilling it. Lacey cried out in pleasure and frustration.
“Say the words,” Telok demanded with a hard thrust, keeping his cock lodged in place.
“I don’t know what words you want!”
“Love,” he growled. His thumb lazily stroked her swollen clit. “I want your love. Need it.”
High-pitched, escalating cries escaped Lacey. Her thighs trembled, her core clenched, and a force she could not control beckoned her to close her eyes and surrender. But she refused, keeping her eyes locked with his.
“You have it,” she breathed, and his thumb quickened. “You have all of it, all of me. I love you!”
Telok hissed as he drew his pelvis back and drove his cock into her. “My Lacey, you are woven into my hearts.”
Whatever restraints he’d imposed upon his instincts shattered as soon as those words left his mouth.
He slammed his hand back down on the bedding, lifted her ass, and gave her everything she’d begged for and so, so much more.
She came apart, lost on a churning sea of pleasure as he fucked her wildly, viciously, possessively, claiming her body, her mind, her heart, her soul—all of which she gave him freely.
When he came, his roar reverberated through her.
Telok buried himself deep as his knot swelled and his seed erupted inside her in a hot flood.
He dropped, catching himself on his elbows over her.
His head hung as he trembled, his breaths fast and ragged.
All Lacey could do was wrap her arms around her mate and hold on as his vibrating cock and fluttering tendrils sent her into another climax that left her shuddering and weak.
Telok slipped his lower arms around her.
Drawing her close, he carefully rolled onto his back, bringing her along so she could lie astride him.
She rested her cheek on his chest and closed her eyes, listening to his hearts thumping, breathing in his scent, and basking in his warmth and the fullness between her thighs as aftershocks of bliss rippled through them.
He stroked his claws through her hair and down her back, grazing her spine and sending tingles through her. Even his claspers soothingly swept back and forth over the backs of her thighs. She felt cherished.
She felt loved.
“Rekosh once asked Ketahn what it was like to mate with a human,” Telok said after a long while, his low voice rumbling into her.
“Ketahn said unlike anything. I thought that meant it was very good. But I could never have guessed that when I mated with my human, it would feel…like this. Like every bit of joy and pain in my life was as small and unimportant as a single fallen leaf in the jungle, because what I feel with you is… It is everything, Lacey.”
Lacey’s heart constricted, and she lifted her head to meet his gaze.
He moved a hand to her face, gently tucking loose strands of her damp hair behind her ear before stroking her cheek with his thumb.
“This feeling is big. Too big to fit inside me. But I only want to feel more of it. It is fierce as a thunderstorm, and as gentle as a breeze through the leaves. It is fear, and hope, and longing, it is joy and eagerness, it is worry and the deepest calm. Vrix do not have a word for it, but I have felt it since long before I claimed you. It is love.”
Tears stung Lacey’s eyes, blurring her vision as she smiled. “Telok…”
His eyes softened, but they suddenly narrowed as his body tensed. Heat bloomed within Lacey as another flood of seed filled her. She whimpered, trying to fight back the orgasm threatening to overcome her, but she swiftly failed. She didn’t look away from him as pleasure rippled through her.
Telok slipped his hand behind her head, cupping it, keeping their gazes locked. As they both drifted down from their release, his other hands caressed her.
“I do not know what is to come,” he rasped.
“Tomorrow, we will plan, and after… I know there will be danger. There will be blood and death. I do not want you to go, but I will not stop you. And I will use all of my strength, my fury, and my love to shield you, because I cannot bear to lose this. Cannot bear to lose you.”
Those tears spilled down her cheeks. Reaching out, she cradled his jaw between her hands, wishing she could move closer, wishing she could kiss him and press her forehead to his, but she was caught in place by his knot. “You won’t lose me, Telok, and I will not lose you.”
She brushed her thumbs over the hard skin of his cheeks.
“I know it’s dangerous, but I… I need to be there.
I need to see with my own eyes that you’re safe.
There’s no way I could stay here, because the stress of worrying alone would kill me.
I feel like that’s all I did the whole time you were in Takarahl.
Every time you go out on a hunt, that’s all I do.
I wonder, over and over, if you’re okay.
If you’re going to come back. If I’ll get to see you again, even if you’re a jerk when I do.
Or if…if we unknowingly filled our last moments together with biting words. ”
“Ah, Lacey…” With care that shouldn’t have been possible from such callused, lethal hands, he wiped away her tears. “Even when I tried to stay away, my thoughts of you never ceased. And always I worried…who would keep you safe when I was not there?”
She pressed her cheek into his palm. “I swear I won’t do anything stupid. I’ll stay with the group and obey every order you give me. But you are my luveen, and I need to be there to protect you as much as you do me.”
Telok chittered, the sound as warm and soothing as his touch despite its roughness. “The kurghests will learn just how deep my little thorn can pierce.”
“Are you doubting my ability?”
“I would not dare.”
Lacey snorted. “You absolutely would.”
Moving his lower hands down her body, Telok curled his fingers around Lacey’s ass and ground her pelvis against him, coaxing a moan from her as another tremor wracked his body.
Cock pulsing, he growled. “No more talk of what is to come. Tonight, there is only us.”