27. Lysandra
“I need to get you inside,” Puck says, but I barely hear him through the howling wind.
Leaving the inn was a mistake. I knew the challenge would lead me to the ocean, and I knew I couldn’t make the swim at night, but I figured I could hide in a cavern along the beach. That way, as soon as the sun rose, I’d have a huge lead on Puck.
I underestimated the wastelands.
The wind took my map in the first few minutes, and everything here looked the same. I could barely see the ground in front of me, let alone keep track of where I was going. The bitter cold made my eyes water and the tears froze on my lashes. Snow soaked into every article of clothing—it didn’t matter that Hades weatherproofed them; no magic stood up to the blizzard.
It was so, so cold.
I tripped over something—probably my own numb feet—and the weight of my pack forced me forward onto my face.
I was going to get up, I really was, but the snow was…warm. Deliciously warm. And I was so tired.
“You need to stay awake for me.” I vaguely register Puck’s hand on my cheek. It stings.
I’m awake. Im just gonna close my eyes for a second, I try to say.
Blink.
I’m upside down, my head bumping against something hard while an arm bands around my middle.
Blink.
I’m set down on a rough surface. I can’t see much of anything in the darkness, and all sounds are drowned out by the chattering of my teeth.
Blink.
“Where the hell is it?” Puck bellows, throwing things out of his pack. He’s abandoned his headlamp near me, and the light hurts my eyes.
Blink.
There’s a click and then fire in front of my face. “It’s a lighter,” Puck says, placing the little flame beside me. I know what a lighter is, I’m not an idiot. “Edina summoned it for me before we left.” Do they not have lighters in Faerie? I suppose they wouldn’t need them. I think I say as much, but Puck doesn’t respond.
Blink.
“We have no wood.” Puck sounds panicked. He’s spinning in circles, tearing his hat off and gripping the strands of his hair. “We have no wood.”
A hysterical laugh bubbles in my chest. We’re earth elementals, we can pull wood out of thin air. Most of the time. Not now. We don’t have magic now. I cackle, curved in on myself in the fetal position.
“Princess?”
My laughter mixes with the shivers and I can barely breathe. My tears become ones of desperation as the reality of the situation sets in. Our magic is suppressed, there’s no way to contact anyone from the competition, and we’re in the middle of the Winter Court wastelands. In a cave. In the dead of night.
I can’t believe I’m going to die in the fucking Winter Court.
“It’s okay.” Puck pulls me into his arms. “I’m not going to let us die here.”
That part I said aloud? Huh.
Blink.
“I need you to focus, Lysandra.” I like it when he uses my real name. He has a slight accent, and my name on his tongue is like a purr. “Do you have a blanket in your bag?”
My head bobs. He pulls away, and I whine at the loss of his warmth. He ignores my protests and digs around until he finds a blanket. “Holy fucking shit,” he mutters and pulls out my quiver, refilled with arrows.
“Wood!” I raise my hand in the air. Or I try to. Maybe I shake some more.
Puck’s fast, wrenching the iron tips off the arrows and stacking the wood until they make a teepee. As soon as he lights it, the arrows start to burn, but surprisingly, they don’t go up like kindling. It’s a slow, hot burn. The warmth feels amazing.
Blink.
“I need you to drink this.” Puck guides me to sit closer to the fire, but it’s hard to stay upright. My head is too heavy.
Later,I try to tell him. I’ll drink whatever he wants later.
He places a vial that smells of citrus against my mouth. His thumb gently brushes my lower lip, and I open for him, letting him place the vial between my lips and pour the liquid inside. He cups my head, tilting it back so the mixture flows down my throat.
Almost immediately, my body warms as magic courses through my blood. The healing tonic surges to my frozen fingers, my too-cold toes, and everywhere in between.
“You owe Larisa big time for giving you extra healing tonics,” he says.
My brain starts to clear from the fog and I connect the dots. Puck found me half dead in the snow and got me to safety. Puck built a fire and found another healing tonic in my bag.
Puck saved my life.
I don’t know how to process that.
We’re in a cave that, judging by the scent of magic in the air, has a protection spell to keep out the worst of the wind and the pack of wolves that roam the wastelands. The cave itself is made of a stone that’s such a dark gray it’s almost black, adding to the darkness that’s barely pierced by Puck’s headlamp and the fire burning in the center. Smoke billows toward the ceiling and slips through fissures in the rock that drip, the tiny droplets pinging against the stone and hissing in the fire.
With one lingering touch to my cheek, Puck stands and lays my blanket beside the fire in a spot that’s untouched by the dripping ceiling. I don’t move, watching as he digs in his pack and sets another blanket on top of the first.
He starts removing his clothes. His boots get kicked to the side; his socks get meticulously laid out beside the fire. I sit, completely mute as I watch him take off his jacket, shirt, and underclothes. His skin is pink from the cold, but I can see the freckles dotting his skin even through the low light of the headlamp and the fire. My eyes travel lower, following a bead of water down his abs to the V of his hips as he slides down his pants.
Oh, my goddess.
I saw his cock in the moonlight, but damn. It’s a work of freaking art. No wonder the sex was so good.
“Like what you see?” he says with a taunting, self-satisfied smile. Of course, now that I’m not dying, he’s back to his usual, insufferable self. It’s a welcome relief. I don’t know how to handle the version of Puck who was afraid for my life.
“I was just thinking it’s a little cold.” I pointedly glance at his dick and he growls at the insinuation. It’s a lie. Even cold and soft, he’s a good size.
“Glad to see you’re feeling better.” He throws a few more arrows onto the fire. “Your turn, princess.”
“For?”
“Take off your wet clothes.” I knew this was coming. I watched enough movies to know this is what we need to do to stay warm. Take off our wet clothes and huddle together for body heat—which works best when naked because of legitimate scientific reasons.
“Sounds like a bullshit way to get me naked,” I tease.
“Maybe.” Goddess, that smile. I totally get how he charmed innocent mortals back in the seventeenth century. That smile makes it almost impossible to say no. “Don’t make me come over there and do it myself.”
I roll my eyes but peel myself off the cave floor. That healing tonic is seriously a miracle, it even cured my sore muscles. I feel like I could run through the storm all the way to the ocean—but I get the feeling Puck won’t appreciate that joke, so I keep it to myself.
I start removing my sopping-wet clothing and Puck watches, attention-rapt as I take off my many layers until I’m completely bare. His eyes skate down my breasts, past my hardened nipples to the swell of my belly. I have a slight urge to cover my stretch marks, to turn in a way that will make my waist look smaller, to thrust my tits up higher rather than letting them hang heavy.
Until I notice, in the low light, that Puck’s pupils are blown. His breathing is heavy and his cock is hard. The fact that I have this kind of impact on him chases away my momentary insecurity. “Like what you see?” I echo.
He ignores the barb. “Come lie down,” he says thickly. He sits on the laid-out blanket and pats the spot next to him, closest to the fire.
I don’t know why I’m nervous. This male has been inside me, but for some reason, this seems different. It’s one thing to have a rough fuck against the wall. Being held in my sleep is much heavier.
When did things change? When did I become comfortable enough to sleep beside him? When did I stop thinking he’d kill me in my sleep?
He saved my life.
All of this is much too confusing. But standing in a cold cave in the middle of Winter Court isn’t the answer.
I slowly walk toward him and curl over on my side, facing the fire. Puck lays the blanket over us both, and then his warmth is at my back, one arm circling my waist and the other cradling my head so I’m lying on his arm instead of the hard rock floor. My body sags in relief, and I fight the urge to wriggle closer as we settle into our cocoon.
We’re quiet for a long time, the sounds of the storm and the pounding of our hearts the only soundtrack.
“Why did you follow me?” I ask softly, unable to keep the question inside any longer.
He’s silent for such a long time I think he may have fallen asleep. Then, he sighs so deeply it blows the wet hair from my neck. “Just because I want to win the trials, doesn’t mean I want you to die.”
“Heartwarming.”
“Did you expect me to say I’m madly in love with you?” he asks. “That the thought of losing you made me blind with panic?”
There’s a hint of something in his tone that doesn’t sit right. If Puck was anyone else, I would say those words were true…but that’s not possible, not for us. I’m his enemy.
“Your body sure likes me,” I say, steering us back into comfortable territory. I can handle a little sexual banter, or trying to one-up each other. I can’t deal with whatever subtext was in his rhetorical question.
I grind my ass against his cock—which is rock hard—and he groans.
“And yours isn’t reacting to me?” His hand drifts lower, away from the safety of my stomach.
“Don’t you fucking dare,” I say, even though my entire being is screaming fuck yes.
“I know you’ve been thinking about this all day.” His breath ghosts against my ear, and I stifle a whimper. “I bet you spent the entire day with your nipples hard.”
“It’s cold out.”
“You can rationalize it all you want, princess, but the fact is you want me.”
“I hate you.” The statement is so weak I don’t even believe myself.
“I think you like me.” He nips the juncture between my neck and shoulder. “But it doesn’t matter. You don’t have to like me to want me.”
His hand continues lower and lower, painting a line of fire down my abdomen. I bite my lip, not saying anything as he inches closer to my soaking wet pussy. “Do you want me?” Puck whispers. My pussy clenches around nothing, and I arch further into him.
“No.”
He chuckles darkly. “What’s your safe word, princess?” The hand holding my head moves to slide beneath me, brushing the underside of my breast.
“Red.
“Good girl.” His fingers are light as feathers over my skin, not quite touching…and certainly not touching me where I need him to. “Now, I’m going to ask you again. Do you want me?”
“Get fucked.”
“Good enough.” In one motion, one hand grabs my breast, squeezing and kneading, his fingers rolling over my nipple. The other hand finishes its slow descent and cups my pussy. My hips jerk forward, trying to get him to move more, but he stays there, tormenting my breasts while he holds me.
“I’ve been thinking about this all day.” His voice drops an octave and it rumbles through me. “You made it impossible not to stare at this magnificent ass in those tight leggings. Don’t even get me started on how perfect your tits looked in your camisole. If we hadn’t been attacked, I would have laid you out right there and fucked you in the dirt of the jungle like the filthy girl you are.” I’m thrashing against him, unable to see past the lust clouding my mind. “You knew exactly what you were doing to me. Didn’t you, you fucking tease?”
“Fuck you—” my swear turns into a wanton moan as he roughly pushes his fingers inside me. I’d be ashamed at how wet I am—how easily he slid inside—if he didn’t let out a rough grunt and rock his erection against my ass, seeking friction.
“That’s what I thought,” he says and starts pumping his fingers in and out. I don’t try to control the sounds I make as he whips me into a frenzy, the tension between us making this so much hotter. “That’s right, ride my fingers.” I do precisely that, bucking wildly into him. “Still claim you don’t want this?”
“I don’t,” I say, but my breaths are ragged and my voice guttural.
“Then, say your word,” he goads.
I bite the inside of my cheek hard enough to bleed. His fingers are magical and he’s hitting my G-spot as his thumb brushes against my clit. I’m not going to last much longer if he keeps this pace.
“This greedy little pussy wants to come for me.” I convulse around him. “Give in.”
“No.”
“You will, princess. You’re too close to stop now. Go on. Be a good little slut and come for me.” He roughly pinches my nipple and, impossibly, fucks me harder with his fingers.
Fuck, fuck, fuck.
Everything simultaneously tightens and relaxes as fireworks explode behind my eyes. “Yes,” Puck rasps as I flood his hand, and he keeps working me. “That’s my good girl.” I tumble straight into another orgasm.
In the throws of ecstasy, I reach for Puck’s cock, wrapping my hand around the hard length and pumping in time with his thrusts. “You gonna make me come now, princess?” he asks. He takes his fingers out of me and circles my sensitive clit, making me cry out and tighten my grip.
“We have no way to clean up,” he says, his words stuttering. “You wanna walk to the starting line tomorrow covered in my cum? In my scent?” He snarls, and his cock jerks in my hand as his own filthy words affect him.
“You’d love that,” I taunt. “You know what that would prove to everyone? That I’ve wrapped you around my finger. That you can’t keep your hands off me. That I’m all you fucking think about.”
With each sentence, I pump harder. The tip of his cock hits the soft flesh of my ass, leaving precum against my sensitive skin.
“Come with me,” he orders, but I’m too wrung out for another one.
“No,” I assert, and, as if my defiance turns him on, he comes all over me. The thick, sticky ropes splash against my back, coating my skin and marking me. His fingers slow as his breathing evens out and his head rests between my shoulder blades.
“By the goddess, Lysandra,” he murmurs. Hearing him satiated and praising my name does wonderfully awful things to my insides.
“There’s a handkerchief in my pack,” I say. He gets up and grabs it, pausing only to throw more wood on the fire. Then, he cleans me off in the same reverent way he did last night, before roughly squeezing my ass and making me yelp. With a laugh, he discards the handkerchief somewhere in the cave and settles behind me. My skin is flushed and warm as he nuzzles back into the crook of my neck.
“That’s one way to warm up,” he says against me, and I can’t help but laugh. Puck joins me, and slowly pulls me so I’m leaning back far enough to see the mischievous look in his eye.
“Thank you,” I murmur, and he arches an eyebrow. “Not for the orgasms…though, thank you for that too. Thank you for saving my life.”
He brushes my wet hair off my face and tucks it behind my ear. His fingers move down my cheek, to my neck, and lower, where they swirl around my nipple before landing on my stomach, and when his eyes lift, they linger on my lips.
“I still hate you,” I whisper.
He chuckles. “Liar.