Chapter 72 Taera
Taera
Nikolai assesses me for a long, quiet, terrifying moment before his lips tilt upward. “I’m a magician, you know.”
“Yes.” My deep blush betrays my desire for exactly that.
His smile widens. “I thought that was forbidden.”
“It’s not the only part of you I—” I bite my lip, struggling to meet his gaze. Inside, I’m a quivering mess. My heart races at his playful scolding, but I set my jaw. I still have to explain to him I don’t want to take the way other sources have.
“You don’t have to—” I start.
He presses a finger to my lips. “Whatever it is, I want to.”
My heart isn’t going to survive him.
A faint touch trails up my arm without his hands ever moving. My lips are electrified with magic beneath his brief attention, already craving more.
“I can give you anything, you know. I can be anything. Anyone.” As he speaks, the room blurs.
His face flickers—scales, glass, feathers.
I gasp when huge black wings unfurl behind his shoulder blades, one curling around us and caging me against his body.
I can’t deny the toe-curling arousal at his display of power.
Knowing there are only illusions—no real fabric—left between us, my magic quakes and pulses with heat.
“What do you want most, Taera?” he asks, showing me a smattering of what he’s capable of.
“You,” I whisper. I tuck my embarrassed, vulnerable face against his neck. But he catches my chin, nudges my gaze back, so our lips are nearly touching. His expression is unexpectedly gentle.
“I want you, too, Taera.”
His lips are on mine, and the world falls away.
There’s nothing but his warmth and my need to be closer to him than our bodies allow.
I tighten my arms around him, and he moans into my mouth, making me shiver.
He rolls onto his back, pulling me on top.
I try to shift some of my weight off him, but his dark wings curve around me, cocooning us together.
His sinful lips move over mine, and I lose myself in him.
There’s no air left, and I have to break away, panting. Nikolai chuckles, sweeping my tumbling hair aside and pressing a magic-laced kiss below my left ear. I gasp, and he rumbles his approval.
“My magic is yours if you want it,” he says.
“I do,” I whisper, “want it. I just… don’t know how.”
He smiles against my skin. “Want to learn to fly?”
When I nod, his arms tighten around me. I glimpse his wild grin, and then we’re falling.
His mind whispers away the bed beneath me, teases the walls apart around me, until there’s nothing but me and him. His magic engulfs me—engulfs us, together—plunging us into a breathless, delicious world of his wicked imagination.
All the breath is expelled from my body as we plummet. Nikolai laughs, and with the night air whipping past us, I can barely make out his dark feathers uncurling to their full, massive wingspan. Then he’s holding me tight, and his wings are catching the wind, swooping us upward.
I shriek, clinging to him. Rising higher and higher, we surface above the clouds until there’s nothing but stars. The moon hangs like a pendant, and when Nikolai carries me closer, I realize it’s a shimmering silver hammock.
Nikolai lays me along the curve of the moon, even as I laugh at the impossibility of what we’re doing. The silvery threads are cool and warm all at once, rippling out from where I touch them. None of this could ever be real. At the same time, it’s perfect. He’s giving me the moon and the stars.
His playful smile entrances me as he lowers his body over mine and his wings fold away to nothing. I’m squirming with a breathless mix of laughter and aching need. When he tilts his lips and kisses me, he tastes like starlight.
“Close your eyes,” my magician murmurs after stealing my breath yet again. I obey, and he whispers, “You can open them again.”
We’re back in Nikolai’s small room, our bodies flush together, both breathing hard.
I lay my head on his chest and listen to his heartbeat while the adrenaline dissipates.
“Do you have your own fantasies?” he murmurs.
My mind whirls with possibility. My embarrassment must carry through my magic, because his laughter rumbles through me.
“Would you like to share?” he asks.
I tell myself it’s our last night, and my throat dries. I’m unbearably exposed. But I want to expose myself to him.
“Can there be… two of you?” My cheeks are on fire. I would give anything to be swallowed by the desert itself. I try to squirm away, but he catches my waist and rolls us both onto our sides, facing each other. He cups my cheeks, lifting my face until I have to look into his sparkling eyes.
“You’re adorable,” he says. “I offer you anything in the world—”
“—and you want more of me.” His velvet voice is behind me.
I jump, looking over my shoulder. Another Nikolai is watching me, propped on an elbow, his torso fitting perfectly to the curve of my back.
In front of me, he chuckles again, and I look forward again, seeing him still there.
My heart gallops when two pairs of hands find my hips, my sides, and tangle in my hair.
The one behind me lowers his lips to my ear. “Fucking desert, Taera, I love the way your magic feels when you go crazy like this for me.”
“I thought you told me not to curse the desert,” I say, still glancing back and forth between the two of him.
“I like to break the rules…”
“…for you.”
“Which one of you is real?” I ask.
“Oh, we’re both real.” The one in front of me grins.
“But you can test us both, just in case,” the one behind me murmurs. They’re both propped up now, looking down at me, one Nikolai biting back laughter and the other smoldering with heat.
“Would you like any more of me, sweetheart?”
“Two is enough,” I stammer. My heart is already trying to beat right out of my chest.
“Don’t worry, we’ll take good care of you.” His eyes twinkle.
“Good girl,” whispers the darker one, making me tremble.
I tense my legs, squeezing my thighs together, which only makes me more aware of the two firm bodies pressing against mine.
The one in front of me is more reserved.
He pulls me flush against him, but his hips remain conveniently tilted to the side so he doesn’t press into me… like that.
The Nikolai behind me has other ideas. His hands grasp my hips, pulling my ass against his obvious hardness and letting out a delicious groan. I gasp, trembling with sensation and heat—so much heat—while my magic pulses like liquid fire in my core.
“Do you like that?” The magician in front of me is tender, beautiful, as he runs his fingers through my hair. Electricity courses through me as I realize he’s asking about the Nikolai behind me.
“Y-yes.” I’m panting.
“Good.” His soft lips caress my cheek, trailing playful kisses over to my ear, where he suckles and nips. My magic ignites in bursts of sensation that melt into pleasure.
“Oh—” I gasp loudly, then immediately snap my wide-open mouth shut, my face growing hot.
“Make all the sound you want, Taera.” His voice is the velvet I crave.
“It’s hot as fuck,” he growls from behind me, dragging his teeth down the side of my neck. I shudder with want.
“But—” I struggle to speak, even to breathe, as hot lips bite and suck the sensitive curve between my neck and shoulder. I never even thought Nikolai might bite me, but as I quiver between two hot, hard bodies, I decide I really, really like it.
When I can unclench my jaw without risking another humiliating moan, I whisper, “Quiet—we have to be quiet.”
Deep laughter rumbles against my back. “Oh, sweet little thing.”
Green eyes capture mine, twinkling alongside the dazzling smile on his lips. “I’m an illusionist, Taera. You can scream my name, and no one will hear a thing.”
The Nikolai behind me skims his palm up and down my side, then wraps his hand possessively around me so it splays across the bottom of my rib cage, almost—but not quite—brushing the undersides of my breasts. I forget how to breathe all over again.
I don’t know how long I writhe, gasping, beneath his touch, before I remember I want to touch him, too. I want to feel his skin and to make him feel as undone as I do. Being pressed between two hot, aroused versions of Nikolai threatens my sanity.
Letting go of his robes, which I didn’t realize I’d been clutching, I place my hands on his chest. Green eyes glint at me, and he smiles, which is all the encouragement I need.
I trace the lines of muscle, the breadth of him.
His chest rises beneath my fingers, his lips parting.
He doesn’t stop me as I explore, committing the shape of him to memory: the way his chest is wider than mine, the flat plane of his stomach, the contours of his hips beneath the barely there blue fabric.
He hisses out a breath. My hands have drifted… quite low.
“Sorry.” I pull back.
“Don’t be,” he murmurs.
“Is this too much?” I ask, hopeful he’ll say no.
He exhales a breath, gathering my hands in his. “Yes.”
“Oh.” Disappointment prickles—and shame—until I see the raw desire on his face and the tautness in his neck and jaw.
“Only because once you start, Taera,” he rasps, “I’m not going to be able to stop.”
Understanding slams into me, and I swallow, my arousal coiling tighter.
“First…” His mouth curves.
The Nikolai behind me tightens his grip, whispering in my ear, “I want to taste you.”
“Oh.” But I barely have time to be flustered before the Nikolai in front of me claims my mouth in a fierce kiss. This time, there’s no mistaking his heavy erection against my stomach. I gasp into his mouth, and he growls, his tongue flicking out obscenely, parting my lips.
I’m trapped between him, as he grinds his arousal into me, moaning breathily.
“May I taste you?”
“Yes,” I say on his lips, and feel him smile. His kisses drift away from my mouth, leaving an immodest trail down my neck.