Page 17 of Judas

She gasped, pulling away immediately, “Sweet Jesus, Judas. I’m a mess. I’m so sorry!”

Judas raised an eyebrow, “A mess. Eliza, this is the most beautiful I have ever seen you.” He advanced toward her, “This is you. The real you, under all the pretense and manners. This is who you really are.”

Eliza looked toward the floor and shook her head, “Oh no. I am the put together version, I assure you. This is just me when I’m alone and don’t have anywhere to be.”

He closed the distance between them and slipped his arm around her waist, “Exactly. The real you. The rest is all smoke and mirrors. This is Eliza,” he wrapped his other arm around her as well and pulled her tight against him. “And I like it tremendously.”

Eliza sucked in a harsh breath as his lips met hers and his kiss made her weak in the knees. Her body melted into his as his hand tangled in her hair and pulled her head back to expose her throat. His lips claimed the soft skin along her jaw and Eliza moaned out in bliss. His touch drove her to the point of madness and for the first time in her life, it didn't scare her in the slightest. She craved it, instead. Begged it to take her over.

Clawing at his hard body, she tried to close any gap left between them. No amount of him was ever enough. He responded to her need and began to shed her clothing, one item at a time. He needed her against him with nothing to separate them. They needed the contact of nothing but skin to feel human again. They needed one another in a way neither of them expected, but it grew every day. It went beyond hunger.

With shaking hands, Eliza slid his shirt over his head and ran her hands greedily over his bronzed body. She untied the drawstring of his sweatpants letting them fall to the floor, freeing him to take her completely. Guiding him to the couch, she pushed his shoulder so he fell to the soft cushions below. He gazed up at her beauty and could almost see a glow around her. She was an absolute goddess standing over him and anythought of taking his time flew off somewhere into the ether. His hands reached for her as she glided her open thighs around him and sat herself in his lap, fully sheathing his length within her wet warmth. She cried out as she felt him fill her. He grabbed her thighs and pulled her even further onto him throwing his head back at the ecstasy of feeling her tight walls demanding his pleasure.

She began to grind her body against him, feeling the sweet friction of her pleasure center rubbing deliciously against him. He pulled her mouth to his exploring, probing with his tongue as she continued to ride him into oblivion. Sweat glistened on their skin and he tasted it as his lips ran down her throat and to her shoulder. Every so lightly, his teeth nipped her flesh as he tried to take her in as fully as possible. Eliza moaned his name quickening her pace, delighting in the pleasure and light sting of pain. She threw her head back as her body bounced along his shaft again and again until they both neared complete explosion. Their bodies were as one as they ascended to the peaks of pleasure and climax together. Panting and vibrating with orgasm, they clung to one another as if their lives depended on it.

An hour later, Eliza emerged from the bathroom, fully polished and dressed for the day, to see Judas standing at the full-length mirror in her bedroom tying his tie. Watching him like this felt intimate in a way she wasn’t familiar with. It felt like he belonged here, among her things, in her space. She fantasized about waking up with him here every morning but shook the nonsense from her head. How could she possibly be thinking of such things after knowing this man for such a short amount of time? How had he so quickly wound himself in her thoughts so fully?

He caught a glimpse of her in the mirror and turned. He had never, in all his many years, found himself so completelyabsorbed in thoughts of a woman. She had entirely bewitched him in ways he would never trade for anything in the world.

He extended a hand to her in invitation to stand by his side. She joined him and he pulled her in front of his body, wrapping his arms around her and resting his chin on her soft blonde hair. They gazed at their reflection in the mirror and seeing themselves together sent tingles of contentment through them both.

“Your hair is down today,” he pointed out.

Eliza leaned fulling into his body, “I’m feeling brave today.”

Judas smiled down at her, “I can’t imagine why.”

Turning to face him, she gazed up at him, “You make me feel… different. In a good way. You make me want to be… free.”

“You deserve to be free,” he replied with a kiss on her nose.

She closed her eyes and breathed him in, luxuriating in his magnificent scent. She murmured simply, “Thank you.”

His face is puzzled, looking down at her, “For what?”

“For reminding me that there are truly magical things to feel in this world,” she replied. Her words caught him off guard as he felt that she was the one with magic to offer. She giggled at his look of surprise before standing on tiptoes to kiss his nose just as he did hers.

Judas had heard others talk about the feeling of butterflies in the presence of others, but only Eliza had ever been able to give him that feeling.

Chapter ten

As Judas and Eliza pulled into the parking lot next to the courthouse, a dark cloud descending over their earlier lust induced joy. A large crowd had already begun to assemble on the surrounding sidewalk and around the raised platform on the lawn. Eliza let out a long sigh taking in the signs in the rally-goer's hands. Things likeDeport All Illegals,Build the Wall, andStop Immigration,Stop the Invasionprinted in red, white, and blue on homemade poster boards and custom printed banners. She didn’t want to be seen here, at all. She wanted to crawl into the floorboard of this car and not come out until Judas had returned her home safely.

Judas surveyed the crowd, as well, and was instantly on high alert. Crowds gathered for tenuous issues such as this could be volatile and it seemed wrong to bring Eliza right into the middle of such an event, but he also felt that his presence was exactly what these people needed to be exposed to here. He wanted them to have to look into the face of a man they claim to hate, while they screamed their taunts and threats.

Judas glanced toward Eliza in the passenger seat, “There's a lot of anger in that group.”

Eliza cringed in acknowledgment of the truth, “Yeah, this is not the sort of event I want my dad to be associated with. I definitely don’t want to be associated with it myself.”

“Well,” Judas said with a sigh, “He’s here already and waiting for us.”

Judas pointed out the window to her father, standing by his own vehicle waving wildly at them, two of his bodyguards flanked mere inches from his side. Eliza held the bridge of her nose with two fingers and closed her eyes. Seeing her father more excited than a toddler with a stolen bag of candy, was fundamentally in opposition to everything Eliza believed in and was, honestly, mind bending. The moral implications of standing behind this man that represented everything she wasn’t made Eliza feel as though her karma was going to take a serious hit after this.

She turned to Judas, placing a hand over his, "We shouldn't be here. Dad and the others can manage this one on their own if he really feels like this is where he needs to be. I can't take part in this and you shouldn't be expected to."

Judas nodded and placed a hand over hers, "Trust me when I say that this is not where I would ever want to spend my day but running is exactly what these kinds of people want. They see my skin and they want to intimidate me. I won't give them that. I've faced far more danger, I assure you. I will stand up there on that stage and let them see me doing my job in spite of their hate. They want to call themselves children of God while they hate me for being different, yet the man they call their savior looked like me. I won't give them the satisfaction. Let them look at my face while they spew their hate."

His words touched Eliza in a part of her soul that made her admiration for him bloom into a shining beacon. She smiled solemnly toward him, "Okay. Let's do this."

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