Chapter 30 A Definite Reaction
A Definite Reaction
Ifelt him jerk under me, startled. Then his body seemed to turn liquid all at once. His back arched as he moved instinctively to meet my fingers.
I slid my palm deliberately over his cock and he choked on the last sip of his drink.
Voltaire burst out in a laugh. “I see she’s remembered where your equipment is.”
I started to pull away, a little alarmed at the intensity of Bones’s reaction, but his hand wrapped around mine before I could, and held me there.
It’s all right, he thought tautly. You might’ve warned me, but it’s fine.
I felt my face warm even before Scar let out a deeper, colder chuckle. “She’s blushing. How absolutely adorable. I think this one might actually be worth more than a one-nighter, Bones. Are you going to let us watch you break her in?”
“No,” Bones growled, setting his empty glass down on the grass.
He looked up at me, and when I met his gaze, I nearly flinched. His eyes turned positively predatory as I watched.
“Go on, love,” he said, quiet.
I explored him cautiously through the black, tailored trousers he wore, and he sucked in a small breath.
He was already hard, which maybe shouldn’t have surprised me, given all the half-naked witches around us, but gods, he was big.
I’d sort of known that, based on some of his reactions while we were sharing magic, especially when he really leaned into me, but it was different when I actually held it in my hand.
When I started exploring him for real, tracing the hard line of his cock through the material, he went totally still.
You said anything, right? I asked, a touch mockingly. Too far, Bones?
He didn’t answer.
I lowered my face by his, and kissed his neck.
I felt him tense again, but I only hesitated for a breath.
Using my tongue in light circles, I worked my way gradually up to his jaw, lingering on the muscles of his neck.
I tasted his pulse, and his fingers tightened where he still held my hand on him.
His other hand rose, and his fingers wrapped into my hair.
I don’t like this, he told me, his thoughts taut. The blonde.
It was your choice, I reminded him.
He didn’t answer.
When I raised my head to look at him, his jaw looked clenched.
“Sorry,” I said aloud, but soft. “Did I interrupt your conversation?”
He shifted his body to one side without speaking, and pulled my leg and knee around towards the back of the chair.
Shifting the other way, he yanked my other knee and thigh up on his other side, so that I sat astride him.
Gripping my arse in both hands, he dragged me up against him.
I don’t know what he saw on my face, but it made him smirk.
Too far? He quirked an eyebrow. Say the word, Shadow.
He held my gaze, his expression unmoving. When I didn’t respond, something in his eyes grew more heated. Still staring at me, he wrapped an arm around my waist.
I glanced slightly to my right, and found Voltaire and Scar.
Instead of staring at us like I’d expected, they seemed to have relaxed into the normalcy of the situation.
The two of them were talking to Pants and several other mages who sat across from them, now about some movie they’d all seen at Bonescastle Theater.
I saw Scar flag down a goblin to order more drinks, and noticed his hand lazily massaging the breast of the witch he’d brought with him.
He pulled down the top of her dress as I watched, exposing both of her breasts to the night air, but she only sipped at her drink, seemingly indifferent.
“Hey.”
I returned my eyes to Bones.
“Poor form, love,” he said softly. At my pursed lips, he jerked his jaw in the direction I’d been staring. “Looking at other mages, especially right now. We may talk shit, but we generally don’t gawk.”
I nearly snorted. Only when you’re getting public blowjobs?
A muscle on his face ticked. He shrugged, his expression unmoving. We were a lot drunker when that happened. And it came from a specific dare. He quirked an eyebrow. Are you hoping someone dares me to eat your pussy in front of them? I can start a pool, if you want.
I felt myself flush.
He tugged on my lower back with his fingers, a near question.
Walking closer to him on my knees, I looked down when his spine turned liquid a second time, his back arching seemingly outside of his control.
His hands gripped my waist, and he pulled me closer still, so that my crotch pressed firmly against his.
“Fuck,” he muttered.
That time, his fingers tightened insistently in the straight, blonde hair he’d given me. Without warning, he pulled my mouth to his.
He’d kissed me before.
He kissed me on the Great Lawn in front of the Fountain of the Furies, almost exactly a year ago now, and honestly, it messed me up for weeks. At the time of the kiss itself, it shocked me more than anything, enough that I couldn’t think at all while he actually did it.
To be fair, I nearly died that night.
My brother nearly died. I’d been in shock.
I’d just taken a bath in the freezing cold lake, mostly to wash an entire layer of my aunt’s blood off my skin.
Bones had just been shouting at me and threatening me.
He’d then thrown me completely off-balance with the kiss, so I hadn’t been able to view it with anything approaching objectivity.
I’d told myself I didn’t care about any of that anymore.
He had, after all, made it crystal clear what he thought of me afterwards.
I’d maybe known there was some rationalization going on there, some wishful thinking on my part, at least. I’d been avoiding what was going on with this bizarre “arrangement” I found myself in with him again, after it nearly wrecked me the first time.
I’d told myself I didn’t care. I’d repeated it ad nauseam, maybe to convince myself.
Even tonight. What in the Underworld gods was I doing?
Why hadn’t I found some way to listen in from a distance, like he’d done with Golden Sun? Why hadn’t he suggested that, or tried it, at least? Why had we chosen to do it this way, knowing exactly what would be expected of both of us?
For him, it couldn’t possibly matter.
After all, as we’d just established from my light scan of Maskey, and from Bones’s own admission, at least one of the women he’d brought to these “gatherings” had given him head in front of all of them.
This was a routine for him, something he did to appease his father, and to get off with a warm body as a prop, at least. He’d made it more than clear he was used to strange women having their hands and mouths and whatever else on every part of him.
He barely seemed to care who it was, even when it was me.
So what exactly was my problem?
Why couldn’t I just blow all of this off, too?
His mouth found mine, somewhere in the midst of those panicked, crashed-together thoughts, the realization of just how stupid I’d been, how utterly delusional. I was on the verge of panicking about it, so maybe it was better he distracted me before I could go all the way there.
He angled our mouths together and groaned lightly when they first met.
It wasn’t like our first kiss.
It was shockingly, disturbingly tender, not the angry, half-savage kiss he’d given me in front of the fountain.
He pulled back after he’d done it, and I thought that would be the end of it, but he kissed the sides of my lips and mouth, shocking me again when he leaned his whole body into mine, groaning again as he took his time, kissing my throat, using his tongue and lightly-grazing me with his teeth before returning to my lips.
I’d expected matter-of-fact, indifferent, even rough, and maybe I could have dealt with those better, but something about this was exponentially worse.
He sat up when I kissed him back, squeezing his arms around my waist and back, that time under the cloak. He pulled me against his chest, his fingers stroking my spine through the thin blouse I wore as he went back to kissing my throat.
When he returned to my mouth the next time, he leaned up to deepen the kiss, and I could feel him breathing harder under my hands.
I forced my mind silent.
I forced myself to close my eyes, to stop thinking.
I wrapped an arm around his neck, leaning into him in return, and he kissed me harder, his tongue hot in my mouth.
His fingers traced my cheek and jaw, my throat, down to the base of my neck.
He kissed my mouth again, making me gasp, and when I rocked up against him, his other hand slid down to my arse and tightened.
He shocked me by speaking aloud, if quiet.
“Put your hand on me again,” he said, his voice rough.
I didn’t let myself think about that, either.
I reached between us, and that time, I massaged him more slowly, matching his pace, the more sensual way he was kissing me.
I reached lower than before, too, sliding my palm up over him deliberately when his breath caught.
I kept going, stroking him even when he stopped and closed his eyes, breathing harder against my neck. His magic grew hot on my skin.
His fingers clenched in my shirt as I felt him building.
“Fuck.” His voice deepened. His fingers gripped my thighs hard enough to bruise. “Fuck.”
He stopped me some minutes later, capturing my wrist.
He let out a low groan into my mouth when he kissed me again, arching up against my hand. His own hand found its way between my legs, under the short skirt, his fingers pressing against the silk knickers I’d worn. He groaned aloud when he felt how wet they were.
Gods, Shadow.
I felt panic ripple through me when he pressed the thoughts into me.
He kissed my throat, buried his face against my skin.
Don’t move, he murmured in my mind. Gods, try not to overreact.