Page 50 of Bright Soul

He didn’t reply. Now that he’d gotten the perfect angle, he slowed, sawing against that bundle of nerves. Fingertips traced my face, the curve of my jaw. This was lovemaking, sure as anything. He’d not declared his love as directly as I had, but I felt it. Every tender touch and meeting of our hips said it.

He truly was mine. But I was also his, at his mercy completely.

How well he treated me, though. I came apart in his arms, seeing stars as my eyes shut tight. He stilled, then withdrew, leaving me clenching on air with a whine of denial. Even the pressure of his tail and hands vanished.

“Come back. Please,” I said. It would ruin the moment, to get off without him experiencing the same.

I could hear the rasping way he drew in breath. He wasn’t far, but he was perhaps on the knifepoint of his restraint.

“You are too tempting, bright soul. I cannot keep my fangs from your neck if we continue,” he answered after a few moments.

I wiggled my hips to tempt him anyway, and a growl drifted from the darkness. “Take me on my hands and knees, then. No need for fangs anywhere near my neck,” I reasoned.

For the space of two heartbeats, I didn’t think he would come back. But then his hands grasped my hips, and I had the sensation of turning over. He pressed his length between my lower lips, rubbing up and down and catching my clit against one of those amazing nubs. “I don’t know how much more I’ll be able to hold back,” he whispered.

I arched my hips up. “Go ahead,” I coaxed. “I want you to fuck me now.”

He made a sound like a snarling animal and slammed home within me again. The driving power of his thrusts would’ve shoved me into the bed but I didn’t even know if we were on it anymore—the cushion of shadows underneath me had firmed up and kept me in the right position.

I had the biggest grin, exhilarated to feel him let loose on me. He released with a shadowborn’s howl, holding my hips flush with his as he pulsed within me.

“Oh, I should’ve told you,” I said as soon as he let me go and I fell into a boneless heap back onto the soft bedsheets. His magic was receding, and I spotted the half-lidded glow of his yellow eyes as he stretched out next to me.

He stroked his fingers through my hair, idly working free a tangle. “Is something the matter?” he asked.

“I’m on the pill now, so we should be safe, but next time, you should probably wear a condom.”

He started to laugh. Deep, carefree rolls of his chest. “We’re from different species. There won’t be any babies,” he promised.

“Says the man who was made humanlike on his way to Earth,” I protested playfully. When he put it that way, I did feel silly.

His mirth drifted to quiet, and he didn’t reply. Moments later, he was snoring.

21

CRESS

There was a timeless bubble around Phaeron and me. I slept a bit, then drifted in and out for a while. Eventually, I couldn’t sleep any more, but I lay still for him. I enjoyed being in his arms, warm, safe, and glad he hadn’t seemed to stir this whole time. He’d needed this so badly.

With the lights off and his eyes closed, the only light in the room was a bedside clock and a smoke alarm on the ceiling that flashed occasionally. I wouldn’t have noticed it if this wasn’t an underground room coated with eddies of shadowy mist that occasionally rolled off of Phaeron’s skin, swirling with his deep, slow breaths.

The unrestrained shadow magic was just one more quirk to love about him, and I was smitten. I drank in his presence even though I could barely see him—his night air scent, the press of his muscles against my curves, and the possessive way his tail had coiled around my legs.

We’d fit so well together last night, and I was deliciously sore, sure to feel the evidence of his claim when I did eventually getup. My body’s needs would be the only thing that’d drive me out of his arms before he woke. At least, I thought that until Braza’s presence brushed my mind.

“Sorry to interject. I was not able to stall any longer,”she said apologetically.

“Is something happening?”I asked. When I stirred, Phaeron gripped me to his chest tighter in his sleep.

“You could say that. There is another newcomer to the pocket dimension, and he has demanded to see Phaeron. Ben’s memories show that he is Auric et Vess, an old friend. You remember him?”

“I think so,”I replied. That sounded like the name of the Vrassorm man who’d had the idea to take the survivors of the Age of Decay off Soiluire for good.“But is he still a friend?”

“If he is not, he is an enemy of our enemy. The effect is the same.”

Before I could ask how she could be so sure, someone pounded on the door. Phaeron woke with a growl and raised his voice in the direction of the insistent knocking. “Go away!”

“No can do, Big P.” It was Ben. “Can I come in?”

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