109. Mira
Chapter One Hundred Nine
Mira
H e’s here. How can he be here? At the one university that called to me. The one place I felt I needed to be, to escape my home.
Is it still home if it became my prison? Can a place truly be your home if your new stepmother has you incarcerated because she doesn’t favor you? Well, the truth is the bitch fears me, but either way, home is supposed to be a place of safety, and Pyrrhos is no longer that for me.
I’m not even sure how I escaped. I know I had help, but I have no idea who, what, or how. It’s something I still haven’t been able to visualize.
I pace my new room restlessly. It’s nice, but far too flammable for me to live in. I will need to make some modifications to make it less so. Obviously, this school has never housed a phoenix before, not that it would. Phoenixes are taught in Pyrrhos, and our ruler heavily influences our education.
I hadn’t even heard of Avalon University thanks to the closed border of our realm. In fact, from just the one class I have attended, I realize how na?ve?I?am.
Then I see him. My heart stopped at that moment. I always thought that was just an expression, but I swear to the eternal flame that my heart stopped dead. The phoenix inside me ruffled its feathers in joy, but he never messaged me. He forgot about me?.?.?. Or so I thought.
***
I had the wrong number.
I already know it’s him, and while I know I need to push back since he’s dating my roommate, I still save his number. It is pathetic, but I am desperate for the security of knowing I can reach him.
Mira
Rafe.
It’s a warning, but I already know it’s going to fall on deaf ears.
Rafe
You write your numbers weird.
I close my eyes and stop my pacing as I remember our nights together.
How sweet he was. How he purred as I caressed his horns.
My fire stoked for him, and it had been barely an ember without him.
It reignited when I locked eyes with him across the cafeteria, and then again when he touched me.
It burned so hot that I was afraid I wouldn’t be able to contain it.
Rafe
I broke up with Annabeth.
What does he think that changes? He can’t possibly think that after breaking up with my roommate, we can continue whatever we were doing in Paradis.
Mira
It doesn’t change anything, Rafe.
Rafe
I want you. That hasn’t changed.
I stare at his message, and I try to oust the flame the phoenix is leaving in its wake as it flies in loops of joy through my body.
Don’t reply. Don’t reply.
I resist, but the bubbles start to bob up and down again, and I realize I never actually looked away from the screen.
Rafe
I’m coming over.
Mira
No, don’t.
I’ve not heard Annabeth return, but if Rafe has broken up with her, she’ll no doubt come home in a flood of tears, her heart broken into pieces. I know what it feels like to lose him. I’ve been there. Though when I was heartbroken about Rafe, I was also in a fiery prison.
Rafe
Why?
Mira
Don’t come over.
This time, he doesn’t reply, and I stare at my phone, waiting for confirmation that he won’t come to the dorm. My stomach curdles when, less than ten minutes later, there is a small clink as something hits against my window. I look into the darkness of the evening to find Rafe staring up at me.
My phoenix preens for him, fluttering her wings against my skin as my whole body heats at the sight of him, but I also know deep down that he shouldn’t be here.
He waves his hand, gesturing for me to come down. When I shake my head, Rafe moves toward the building like he’s about to scale it.
“Flares!” I curse and open my window. “Rafe. What are you doing?” I whisper-shout down at him.
“Come down!” he calls, much louder than I did, not seeming to care who hears.
I shake my head again, and he shrugs and sinks his talons into the wall. Hissing, I slam the window as he starts to climb, but I barely manage to take a step back before he slides it open and climbs into my room.
“What are you doing here?” I ask, backing away from him.
Rafe lowers his head and prowls toward me, swiftly closing the distance between us. “Hi,” he says as my back hits the door. “I missed you.”
“ Rafe,” I warn, even as my body heats with his proximity, and by the way the demon flashes in his eyes, I know he can feel it .
He leans in and rubs his face along my neck, his body vibrating as he purrs softly.
I am so addicted to that sound, and it is so full of contentment that all I can do is give in to the pleasure of his touch and tilt my head for him.
Rafe moves in closer, fitting more of his muscled body against mine, and I reach for his horns, moaning softly.
Demons have always been well matched with phoenixes for intimacy, but I have never felt this with anyone before. When he was gone, I tried to tell myself that the pull I felt toward him was because Rafe is Fallen, but even then, I knew it was a lie.
Rafe kisses along my neck, and when he flicks his tongue against my hammering pulse, there is the most delicious coolness against my scorching skin.
I pull back, panting, and when Rafe looks down at me, his eyes are dark and stormy.
It looks like there is a cyclone brewing within them, and I am as weak to it now as I was the first night.
He leans in, and the world stops when his lips press against mine.
The kiss doesn’t start tentatively. It isn’t hesitant or exploratory, like that of two lovers parted for a long time.
It’s insistent. Urgent. The way it would be when two entities that require each other for survival are finally fused again, and I can’t help but kiss him back.
I move onto my tiptoes to reach him easier, using his horns to pull him closer and keep him right where I want him.
He presses his thumb against my chin, forcing my lips open to delve his tongue deeper into my mouth.
The kiss is consuming, wild, and needed.
His fangs clink against my teeth, and it drives me wild.
I still feel the phantom throb from the first place he bit me that night on the beach.
Urgently, I tug at his shirt, needing to feel more of him, needing to touch his bare skin.
He obeys by yanking it off, our lips only parted long enough for him to get it over his head, and then my hands are on him.
Demons are warm, but Fallen are even hotter.
Yet compared to the heat pumping through my veins, Rafe feels cool to the touch, and the relief it brings me is almost orgasmic.
But then her face flashes into my mind, and there is a moment of clarity.
“Wait,” I say, pulling back. “Annabeth?—”
Rafe leans in, kissing me again, cutting off my words.
He pulls me against him and starts backing toward the bed.
I pull off my shirt, and Rafe turns us, walking me back until I feel the mattress press against my knees.
He pushes me down and, fuck me, watching him tower over me is something I dreamed of countless nights while locked away.
I lie there, staring at him, so very grateful that he is here in truth, savoring the sight of his bronzed skin and the way his black horns curl back.
He is just so big, and his abs look like they have been carved by the devil himself, but it’s his eyes that truly ensnare me.
They show the power roiling within him, the storm of his power amped-up tenfold.
He looks at me with such hunger, such desire, and when he runs his tongue over his fangs, my core explodes in heat and need.
I’m not sure when I removed his belt or opened his jeans, but here he stands, the V of his obliques prominent and mouthwatering. I move back farther on the bed, and he climbs on, crawling up my body. I’m captivated by the way his muscles flex as he moves, somehow looking even bigger now.
He is fucking perfection . . .
“Mira,” he growls as he looms over me. He dips his head and kisses me so deeply that he steals the breath from my lungs.
I get lost in the taste of him, my hands sliding over the heavy muscles of his chest and shoulders.
When he finally breaks the kiss, all I can do is pant and moan for him.
He slides his lips down my neck, brushing his stubbled jaw against the delicate skin of my throat.
I whimper as his mouth moves lower, leaving a trail of cool kisses over my collarbones, his fangs scraping teasingly over each nipple.
I arch, gripping his horns and offering more of my breasts, but he continues his trek down my body.
He kisses every inch of me, my stomach muscles tightening beneath his tongue as he glides it over the flat surface.
“After Paradis, I looked up ways to please you more,” Rafe says, his voice heavy with desire.
I pant as I watch him, and he curls his fingers into the waistband of my skirt, yanking it down along with my panties in one fell swoop.
He bites my hip, making me lift my ass a little for him.
My head falls back against the pillow in pleasure, but I quickly look down at him again, not wanting to miss a moment of this.
He meets my gaze and shifts between my legs.
I could come just from the sight of him.
One of his dark curls falls tantalizingly over his forehead, and he looks like he wants to devour me.
His dark eyes are locked with mine as he leans in and licks my pussy from my entrance to my clit.
My eyes roll in pleasure, and Rafe moans.
“Fuck, Mira.” I look back down at him as he licks his lips.
“The sweetest, spiciest honey,” he says before taking another long lick, and this time his tongue lingers at the sensitive bud throbbing for his attention.
My body knows the pleasure this man can bring me, and I moan louder, my hands clawing at the sheets in anticipation.
Rafe looks up at me once more before he settles in to feast, and the pleasure is so fucking intense I think I’m going to self-combust. I am vaguely aware of the sound of the embers in my hair igniting, but at this moment, I don’t give a fuck if the whole campus is set alight.
Rafe is the center of everything right now, and as long as I have him, the realm can burn.
I know I am not going to last long, so I reach down and grab his horns, channeling my fire into him.
Rafe’s whole body trembles in shock, and the moan he releases borders on sinful.
Now that I am offloading some of my heat, I can see the way he is rubbing against the bed. He is desperate, and so am I.
His tongue continues to work on me, licking and sucking my slit, driving me to the edge and then pulling me away from it.
He brings me closer again, his tongue expertly brushing over me, and I can feel my orgasm so desperately close it’s almost painful.
I yank on his horns and hold his face there, begging him to keep doing exactly what he’s doing.
With a dark chuckle, he carefully nips at my clit with his fang, and fire explodes within me, my phoenix and I both screaming from the force of it.
The heat I funnel into his horns is enough that it would char a lesser demon, but he is not a lesser demon.
Rafe licks me again, gentler this time, but I’m not done. I yank on his horns, trying to pull him up my body, making him growl.
“Inside me,” I growl back. “Now, Rafe.”
Rafe’s eyes seem to darken even more, and in a flash, he moves up my body.
He shoves his dark jeans down just enough to free himself, and then he’s buried inside me.
The pain of it is so sweet as he stretches me.
I’ve not done this since I was last with him, and I need this, need him.
I thought about it every single night since I returned to Pyrrhos.
He doesn’t give me time to adjust, bucking into me hard and deep. I can feel the desperation in his frantic thrusts. He snarls and sinks his fangs into my shoulder, his cock swelling inside me.
I push more heat down his horns, the inferno inside me building again, and I know that even this conduit won’t be enough for this reunion.
“Rafe,” I moan. “Kiss me.”
Rafe pulls his fangs from my shoulder and slams his lips to mine, kissing me wildly and driving me even more insane for him.
An orange glow bursts from around me like a solar flare, and I know my red hair is now a mane of flames.
The bed creaks beneath us, the frame struggling with not only the ferocity with which I’m being fucked but also the heat emanating from me.
I bite his lower lip hard, moaning when I taste his spicy blood.
“Mira,” Rafe growls demonically. “My Mira.”
My toes curl with pleasure. “More . . .”
Rafe, always eager to give me what I need, gives me more, pistoning his hips into me.
Again, I find myself teetering at the edge of my orgasm, and with one more thrust, I fall.
I scream again, this time even louder. The destructive pleasure consumes everything, and there is no containing it.
Even my vision goes red and orange, and I know my phoenix is looking up at this beautiful demon that we are both obsessed with.
Rafe spills inside me, roaring so powerfully that the whole building shudders from it. His hips slow and he presses his forehead against mine. The bed creaks, and it collapses beneath us in a cloud of ash.
I moan. “Rafe?—”
“Mira?” I hear Annabeth’s small voice through the door as she knocks softly. Rafe and I both go completely still. “Are you in there?”
Rafe pulls back and glances over his shoulder at the still closed door, both of us holding our breaths and remaining completely silent.
“Mira?” She knocks again. “Rafe broke up with me.” She sniffles loudly.
Rafe winces, and I swallow the lump of guilt lodged in my throat.
Annabeth knocks again. “Mira? Can I come in?” She sobs softly. “I -really need a friend.”
Rafe stands and buttons his singed jeans, bending. He kisses me deeply before hurrying to the window.
I watch him, paralyzed with guilt. “Just a second, Anna. I’ll come through to your room,” I say, looking around at my disaster of a room.
I pull on shorts and a shirt before shaking the ash from my hair.
I glance out the window, watching Rafe run through the forest shirtless.
Once he’s out of sight, I leave my room, praying to all the gods to give me the strength to support Annabeth.
She isn’t my friend yet, but she has been kind enough to welcome me to the university when I didn’t know anyone.
As I knock and open her door, I make a vow that what happened between Rafe and me cannot happen again.