Page 71 of Beautiful Beast

I liked this. Loved that I could make some of the most powerful creatures in our world groan with need only because of my body. Loved that this felt natural and not awkward. After those first moments, it was like a veil had been lifted, and it no longer seemed strange to be naked. We all had bodies, different though they were, and it felt more awkward to be ashamed of it.

Running my hands over his shoulders, I savored the different kinds of heat. The heat of the water and the heat of his body, the heat of his lips and tongue on my skin, dragging up my neck until he could truly kiss me.

His hand gripped my hair and held me still while he plundered my mouth until we were both breathless.

“You still didn’t tell me what was funny.”

“Nothing is funny,” he murmured against my lips. “I just can’t wait to show you every kind of heat imaginable.”

He was hard, trapped between our bodies. “We could start right now.”

“We could,” he agreed. “But I think a bed would be a better place for that.”

Sirrus snatched me away, pulling me towards the cooler pools first. “Are you clean enough?”

“Does it matter if we’re going back to bed?”

His purr rumbled against my back. “I like this side of you.”

I smiled even though he was behind me and couldn’t see it. “Which side?”

“The side that doesn’t care about human rules and asks for what she wants.”

Turning in his arms, I let him grab a small cloth and scrub my skin, even diving beneath the water to get my legs where sand and salt had stuck. “There are no sides,” I told him when he surface. “I’m just me.”

Varí had stopped playing in the water and was settling on the large stone railing in the sun, splaying out his wings to catch the rays. He was a pale gray at the moment, the sun turning his small body to molten silver. Had his coin been visible, they would have been quite the pair.

Zovai stood at the edge of the pool with a thin towel for me, wrapping it around my body. It clung to my damp skin, leaving nothing to the imagination. Not that they needed to imagine anything anymore. “He’s not wrong, Lena. We see you fight your shyness.”

“It’s not my shyness. It’s trained reactions from having to hide who I really am. But you don’t care, and though I can’t stop the reactions, I want to leave them behind.”

He grinned, looking at my face with something like awe and terror at once. “You’re really not going back, are you?”

“I’m really not going back.”

Grabbing my hips, he lifted me up so my knees rested at his waist and began to carry me back to his bedroom. “We might have to fight over who takes you first.”

A flash of nerves pulsed through me. I wanted it with them, but every account I’d heard told me it hurt for a while in the beginning. Granted, none of those accounts told me about the pleasure you could find in sex, so maybe they were wrong. But I was still nervous.

They were centuries old, and I had no experience. I wanted to be good at it for them. With them. And I had no idea what I was doing.

Following behind, Endre caught my expression. “What’s going through your head, Princess?”

“I—”

A pounding came from the direction of the main rooms, and a sound like a door opening. “My lords.” The voice was young and panicked. “My lords?”

Slapping footsteps, and suddenly Zovai turned, pressing me against the wall and hiding me from the young male dragon who ran in, panting. He froze when he saw the state of the dragons, and me, though he could only see my face.

“What is it?” Sirrus growled. “The enchantment shouldn’t have let you through.”

The young male bowed. “It is urgent, my lords. Idroal has a message, and they say it will not wait. The sender will not release them until it has been delivered.”

Endre cursed under his breath. “We will come. Leave us.”

He seemed relieved to be released from this duty, practically sprinting back the way he came with a final glance at me. Zovai leaned his forehead against mine. “The only dragons who can hold Idroal like that are?—”

“The Elders?” I guessed.

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