Page 100 of Little Blue

He doesn’t reply, and I say nothing more. I just continue to stroke his length, learning the feel of him under my hands. The map of his body as my gaze drinks him in. I study every rippled scar and valley of muscle, the lines of ink that cling to his flesh like armour. I’ve seen him without his clothes before, but I’ve never really looked. Not like this. So brazenly obvious.

The images in the lines of ink aren’t easily understood. Layer after layer of images merge to paint a tragically beautiful image of—a fallen angel?—I think.

In the center of his chest, in the hollow between tight muscle, what first appears to be a river of raging water turns into, on longer inspection, a man stripped of clothes. His hands are clawing into his chest as though he’s searching for something that is missing, his head bowed into his chest. It’s from his eyes that the raging river begins. From his back, are massive black wings that stretch over Ilya’s pectorals and down into his torso, following the lines of his sharp abs into the jagged points of a hazy forest, in the valley of which the man/river flows. The wings of the fallen angel are ruffled, and on closer inspection, some wings appear to be needled trees in a dark forest. From the tattoo on his back stretches a taloned claw, the claw of a demon, and between two long digits, it plucks a feather from the wing of the fallen angel. Stars fall over the canvas of it all, creeping over the flesh of his neck, making the art feel, in a way, hopeless.

I don’t realize I’ve stopped stroking his length to trace the art that clings to his body until he catches my wrists in his hands. My eyes snap to his as thick fingers cuff the delicate circumference.

He's so much bigger than me. So much more powerful.

He really could break me, if he wanted to. I’d be hopeless to stop him from any harm he meant me.

“What are you doing, Irelynn?” That muscle in his jaw is jumping, still. It betrays the calm he’s trying to exude.

“Learning you.”

“Why?”

“Because I want to.” My head tips to the side when his grip around my wrist pulses. “Because you’re mine to learn.”

He stares at me for a long beat. It’s so hard, so pointed, it feels like a glare. Then his eyes shutter closed. Roughly, he asks, “Are you done learning?”

“No.”

His eyes open. Slowly, reluctantly, he releases my wrists. I step into him, feeling the tip of his erection pressing into my belly. My core throbs in painful awareness that I ignore as I lift my hands to the dip of his narrow waist, tickling my fingertips over his skin.

He hisses in a breath, but he doesn’t stop me as I explore him. I can feel the burn of his questioning gaze on my face, but I don’t give him my eyes. I trail my fingertips from his waist, over the ripple of his abs, the jagged rise of more than one scar, up the river man and over his broad shoulders. Every muscle coils tense under my touch, but I don’t stop as I loop my hands around his thick neck, rising onto my tiptoes. Leaning in, I press my lips to the warm flesh of his chest, where a river of water flows from the shower that hits his back, and over his shoulders.

I kiss him again, and again, and again. Up the valley between his pecks to the hollow of his throat, over the shadow of hair that dusts his neck, his chin, and finally to his lips.

At first, he doesn’t kiss me back. I don’t take offence. If he didn’t want me to kiss him, I wouldn’t be kissing him.

The man towers over me. Short of him bending down for me, or me climbing his body, I can’t just lean in and steal his mouth like he steals mine.

My kisses are slow and exploratory. At first, they’re soft and closed-mouthed. Between us, I can feel the eager jump of his hard cock against my belly, telling me that he’s enjoying this enough for me to want to continue. To deepen this kiss.

Parting my lips, I lick at his bottom lip before I attempt to suck it into my mouth.

It's the thing that does him in. One moment, he’s stone still. The next, his hands grip my waist, and he lifts me as easily as if I were a doll. My back connects with the tile of the wall and breath tumbles from my lungs as I struggle to keep my footing. His big body bends into mine, shoulders curving inward as though to cage me into the wall. As though his hands holding my waist in his iron grip aren’t doing exactly that already.

To my delight, Ilya is breathing just as hard as me. His chest rising and falling with violent breaths that whisper across my lips.

My eyes flash to his, seeing the swirl of dark shadows. This time, he growls low and dangerous. “What are you doing, Irelynn?”

“I told you.”

“I don’t believe you.”

I frown, aware of the way his eyes track the emotion as it passes over my face. “Why not?”

“Did you not just run from me? Did you not just try to escape into the winter forest, preferring death by hypothermia, to being mine?” There’s a rattle edging his voice that has awareness prickling my spine.

The man couldn’t be more off base. I almost want to laugh.

I think that would push him over the edge, though—and not the edge I want to push him over.

“I ran because I knew you’d chase me.” Those big hands around my waist pulse. “I knew you’d punish me—threaten me—and I wanted…”

When I say nothing more, he demands, “What did you want?”

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