Chapter 25
Thealina
My mouth is so dry it’s like musty, dusty carpet coats my gums. Dried crusty fluid scratches the corners of my eyes, and my body screams at me to move. To stretch. To get some damn blood circulating my ass.
It’s quiet. And as the thought enters my mind, my stomach makes a gods-awful sound. Like a demon in my belly, screeching for sustenance.
“Lina,” Rafe whispers, his fingers ghosting over my cheek, and as I look up at him, I realise I’m still bundled in his arms, naked, with his legs wrapped around me. “Take us home,” he says, lifting his marked palm in front of me to take. “You’re ready now.”
The threads of my constellation reaches out, sensing his. It’s infused with enough Taka for one more trip, but what if I get this wrong too. I guess if I do, we’ll just need to form another plan. It’ll be fine, I’m sure.
But ‘what if’s’ plague me.
I was never scared of my ability; until I used it.
Birds outside scatter, the foundations rumble beneath us, and Rafe swallows.
“We need to go now.” He strokes my cheek again, although he doesn’t say it in any other way than with calm and love, his eyes tell a different story. The story from last night. Of the Chief Defender’s ability to break the world. The destruction currently making its way to this very outbuilding.
Another shudder ripples, causing Rafe to tighten his grip on me.
Ok, yes, time to go.
Pushing my pain from last night to the back of my mind, I slam my palm into his and shift my body to straddle him, swinging my free arm around his neck, holding on with a death grip.
He slings an arm around my waist, his face settling into the crook of my neck.
I ignore the flutter erupting low down in my stomach—and other places—when he pulls me into him, squeezing my breasts against his chest and my bum grazes his thick appendage.
Adrenaline scurries through my veins, time shifts just as the stone surrounding us crumbles.
I squeeze my eyes shut, my body tensing and mine and Rafe’s grip tightens like a snake constricting our bodies.
Home. Think of home. Feel home.
Rafe’s cabin. Wooden walls and floor. Rustic. Cosy. The shallow bowl filled with Taka and pearls. The fire in the hearth, crackling away as lamb and rosemary stew bubbles. His bed in the corner with the multicoloured stitched blanket laying haphazardly. The blanket he used to once wrap around me.
Home.
Rafe.
Rafe’s arms. Powerful legs. Broad chest. Chiselled abs. Plush ass. Thick… chocolate coloured hair. Strong jaw. Dark eyes. Large hands.
Hands that stroked me all night until I fell asleep.
Hands that wrapped around me as I fell into an oblivion of rage.
His lips. Pink and plump, and capable of devouring me whole… and sucking out the poison that spread through my veins last night.
Lips I want to kiss again.
Lips I want to help me forget who I was before I barged into his life.
“Breathe…” His command smashes through mist, pulling me to the present. “Breathe, Lina. It’s ok.”
Is it?
“You did it.”
You said that last time, Numbnuts.
If my butt was numb, surely his testicles were too with sitting on the floor all night with my weight leaning on him until dusk broke for dawn. He can’t hear me; the linking serum long worn off but hopefully he can sense…
“Correctly, this time.”
Intuitive, I’ll give him that.
I release a shuddering breath, taking in the details of the cabin just as we left it. I really did do it this time!
I still hold him in a death grip. I’m not ready to let him go and sever this connection, skin on skin, and I don’t exactly know why.
You know why, the little voice in my head pipes up. Yeah, maybe I do know why. But maybe I’m not ready to confront it yet. Confront the reality of Rafe potentially being a man I could rely on. Someone who makes me feel safe. Loved and cherished.
And heard.
Respected. Empowered.
Someone who would touch me in a way I’d forget my name. Someone who makes love to me like they do in the books. Someone who doesn’t think I only belong on my back, on my knees or in the damn kitchen.
Someone who could help me figure out what it is I want in this life.
Could he be that man?
The right people don’t run when you break. They sit beside your mess and remind you of your strength. He did that.
What am I talking about… how could I be so foolish. I don’t need a man to give me any of that when I can give it to myself.
Though when I pull back and Rafe looks at me, panting, his eyes tell me he very well could be that man.
I once wished the love and connection I read in my books could find me… what if it has?
It’s scary. But also, exhilarating.
He traces all my facial features, like he’s committing me to memory. They drift from my eyes to my mouth and his lips part. Last time we were so close like this I kissed him. Being overwhelmed with a flurry of emotions had me lunging for his mouth. But that was before I heard those damning words.
Yet, in this intimate position, straddling him on the floor before the fireplace in his cabin, that feeling of need, of want, of desire, of longing to be so utterly consumed by him runs deep in my bones.
It’s heavy in my gut, in my blood, in my soul.
Even more so after the memory of him when we were younger awoke after decades, setting off blazing sparks for a man I had forgotten in time.
His panting chest scrapes against my nipples; they harden.
Something he notices, though he doesn’t look, but the tic in his jaw tells me everything.
He wants me just as bad. He’s contemplating it.
But it’s clear to see he’s waiting for my next move.
It’s been so long since anything like this stirred inside me. So long since I felt that pulse of heat between my legs; since I felt myself grow wet.
My ragged breaths blow across his face, his lips part even more, like he’s getting ready to devour me.
I want that. It’s shameful, I know, but I want that so bad.
Something to help me forget, something just for me.
But I’d be using his body, just to enjoy a small moment of ecstasy, I’d be using him.
Because what man would want a woman with no tongue.
A married woman with no tongue.
I blink.
I blink again, shaking my head, shaking out the crazy lust running rampant through my brain.
Lust. It’s just lust. Limerence, maybe.
I need to get off him, so I shift, but not before his grip tightens and he pulls me against him, searching my eyes. For what I don’t know.
This can’t happen. But would it hurt if it did? Deliciously so.
His hair is soft in my fingers as I fiddle with the back of it.
I’ve already kissed him. Already know what his lips feel like, and how his mouth tastes.
Already know what his gasps sound like when I ran my fingers through his hair and arched myself into him.
I already know what his cock feels like against my skin.
This wouldn’t be like all the other times. The times where I could only lay there wishing the minutes away. No, this wouldn’t be like that. Rafe would see me fulfilled. He’d be attentive, gentle, and encouraging. He’d bring me out of my head where all I see, hear and smell is him.
His pupils dilate—he’s thinking of it too.
His hardening cock twitches beneath, it lays less than an inch away from my pussy. One little move and we’d be touching each other. That’s how simple this could be—one little rock of the hips.
He swallows when it twitches again.
Married.
Married.
Whore.
Whore.
Whore.
I catch a breath, willing those words out of my brain. Rafe’s hand darts up, cradling my face, his thumb brushing against the apples of my cheeks.
“You are so damn beautiful, Lina.”
I’ve been called beautiful before, but never like that. Never so raw and guttural, like if he didn’t say those words he’d combust into stardust.
I try to catch another breath, all the air in my lungs escaping.
Am I doing this? Am I really doing this?
I squeeze my eyes shut, cheeks flushing. His forehead rests against mine.
“It’s ok. You’re ok. Breathe.”
He shifts, and before I know it, we’re no longer on the floor, we’re walking through his cabin with my legs wrapped around him, body supported by his arm around my waist, the other still cradling my cheek and I still keep my eyes closed.
I’m so used to being set up upon I can’t find it in me to initiate anything. But I don’t have to. Rafe makes the choice for me, settling me on the end of the bed and drapes the knitted blanket around me.
“Food is what we need. And lots of it,” he chuckles.
Yes! Food. Absolutely.
He trots to the kitchen as I catch my breath, pulling plates and cutlery, before setting the table. Next, he pulls out a steel pan, lights the stove and cracks in several eggs and chopped ham. He cuts up an onion and some spring greens before shovelling it in.
It’s a beautiful sight watching a man cook and know what he’s doing.
A kettle is filled with water, and a coffee brewing pot prepared. He potters around like a little domesticated wench, naked, all while I stay perched at the end of his bed, watching how unashamed he is.
It’s too hard to contain my blossoming smile, it grows and grows and grows until all my teeth are showing.
The image of Rafe, naked, cooking food for me, only serves to increase the hot ache between my legs.
The intensity of my body’s reaction to him sometimes scares me.
He is so incredibly handsome. So strong looking.
So… unbashful. And the dimple on his butt cheek only makes me smile wider.
Seeing as he clearly has no care in the world being nude, I take that as consent to ogle.
Everything about him screams lover, protector. Nurturer.
Safety.
The defining lines in his powerful thighs, the veins running down his arms, the abundance of tattoos covering the wide expanse of his back and down both arms, the way they seep onto his chest but leave his stomach bare, though a section of black runes lay on his ribs.
He even has stretchmarks. I wonder what his view of stretch marks are and if they’re a contradicting view like my husband’s. I wonder if he’s noticed the few I have on my hips and bum. Or even the ones on the inside of my calves.
A whistled tune rings in the air as he fills up our cups with coffee, his bum jiggling to the rhythm and I let a breathy chuckle slip. The smell of caffeine hits my nose, and I watch how he makes both our cups extra sweet and extra creamy—just how we like it.
I scoff, thinking about the memory he pulled from me last night.
Alarithia. Free-spirited Thea. Squabbling over sweet coffee and strawberry tarts I’d bought from a food shack in my town; he thought it looked soggy and sour and judged my culinary tastes along with my over-use of sugar.
I made a bet with him, that he’d like it so much, he’d become addicted and would have to buy me another dozen to take home.
He said if he didn’t then I had to agree to go out with him for a picnic the following day.
Back then I thought, whichever way this went, I’d still win. Either a week’s supply of strawberry tarts, or a picnic with a man as handsome as him, even though his hair was a lot longer back then.
He ate the tart, and like I knew he would, he loved it. He tried not to, maybe he really wanted that picnic with me, but he couldn’t stop his eyes rolling once the strawberry syrup invaded his mouth.
I still agreed to the picnic, but he didn’t show. And I couldn’t stick around, I was leaving the following day for Valandor, to start my training as a monarchy maid.
Only those handpicked by the King’s equerry himself attend. And although a mundane job of being the help, I do love it dearly.
Besides, at the age of eighteen, I didn’t have many other options.
I was only in Valandor for a short period before I met my husband.
“Lina, you hungry?”
Scrambled eggs and fried ham make my stomach yell. I pad over to where Rafe’s laid out a spread. My stomach yells some more. Fruits, breads, seasoned butter, even small round sandwich biscuits with white icing and a round, jellied sweetie placed on top.
It’s glorious, and I can’t help but smile at Rafe. Full toothed. It pulls out one of his own. An absolute blinder of a smile that makes me giggle, blush and promptly avert my gaze after hearing my own sounds.
“I love that sound, do it again.”
My head snaps up, that blinding smile still plastered on his face.
He really didn’t mind my bumbling sounds…
My train of thought drifts down the hard panes of his stomach, stopping at his naval, knowing what’s below, the dusting of dark pubic hair being the start.
Thinking about his nakedness and all this food probably isn’t the most hygienic, but I’m starving, so all respectable thoughts go out the window.
“Everything ok?”
I glance at Rafe, then nod to his bobbing cock. He narrows his brows and glances down, resting his hands on his hips, almost like he’s scolding his dick.
“Sorry,” he whispers, moving to cup himself. “After the last few days, being nude is like second nature I guess.”
His cheeks flush crimson, and I bite my lip to stifle a grin.
He leaves a wind in his wake, riffling through the rickety trunk at the bottom of his bed before he hops around putting a pair of white undershorts on.
He stalks back to me, eyes full of mirth before he lifts his arms and shoves my head through a white tunic he swiped up from the couch.
The giggle spills from me again the more I become a tangled mess as he directs my arms out of the blanket and into clothes smelling of spicy orange.
Those flutters return.
Lust and limerence, Thea. Lust and limerence.