Page 117 of Threadbound

“I dinna mean to,” he confessed. “I just—”I need you.He didn’t know if Jamie had heard him again, but the swell of emotion was powerful, almost crippling.

Jamie studied him, his breath still fast. “Tell me what to do,” he said, softly.

Bran felt his chest crack open. “Anything,” he rasped. “Everything.”Please.

Jamie shifted his weight, leaning over on one elbow, his naked body brushing Bran’s side. The intensity had been broken by the magic of the bond, but Bran still felt desperate and raw. Uncertain whether this new twist would disrupt their fragile balance.

He sucked in a breath as Jamie slowly began to trace a finger down his torso, starting at the hollow at the base of his throat and working his way down, across the planes of Bran’s chest, the muscle of his abdomen, past his navel, then over to one hip and thigh. Breath quickened in his lungs, and he looked at Jamie, only to find the half-breed’s azure gaze studying him as though trying to memorize each curve of muscle and bone.

Then Jamie bent and kissed him again, slow and languid, and his roaming fingers found their way to the soft, most sensitive parts of his body, teasing, toying. Bran let out a small whimper, trying to turn into Jamie’s arms, and the hand stilled, pressing his hip down.

“Let me,” Jamie murmured against his lips, and Bran lay quiet, although his heart kept racing.

Jamie reached across him, pulling a bottle from a small set of drawers beside the bed. Bran waited, his body still even as his heart pounded and his breath came shallow into his lungs.

The sound of a cap tried to draw Bran’s attention, but then Jamie’s lips pressed against his temple, and Bran turned his face toward Jamie’s, seeking his mouth.

Jamie obliged, leaning down and melting into Bran’s lips and tongue. Bran felt drunk on breath that wasn’t his, lost in the taste and sensation of Jamie. And then he let out a soft moan, swallowed in their mouths, when Jamie’s finger slowly pressed into him, his hand coming up to clench in Jamie’s messy blond waves, refusing to let him break the kiss.

Please.

Trust me.

Bran didn’t let himself think about the fact that a thought that wasn’t his had just whispered through his mind. A thought that belonged to Jamie Weaver. He didn’t even know if Jamie knew that he’d done it.

Bran forced himself to relax, to give control of both body and mind to Jamie. To trust Jamie.

After all, Jamie had saved his life more than once without him even having to ask. Over his admittedly half-hearted objections. Jamie had taken care of him when he was unwilling to take care of himself.

Bran stopped fighting it. Stopped trying to make himself or Jamie into something they weren’t. Stopped trying to fit himself into the mold of the ideal son, the ideal warrior, the ideal lover. Stopped over-thinking and second-guessing.

Bran fell back onto the bed, and Jamie gently but firmly pressed a second finger into his body. Bran gave himself to the sensation, letting Jamie’s fingers fill him, stretch him, play the strings of his nerve endings until the notes sang through him.

Please. Bran wanted more. Needed more.

Jamie bent and kissed him again, and Bran ran his hands down Jamie’s neck, to his shoulders, his skin warm under Bran’s palms. Jamie shifted his weight—breaking their kiss—gently removing his fingers. Bran’s chest rose and fell with his rapid breaths as he watched Jamie pull a packet out of the drawer and open it, drawing out a rubber sheath that he unrolled over his erection before slicking it with the same silky liquid he’d put on his fingers.

Bran watched him, waiting, trusting.

Then Jamie kissed him again and slid one heavy thigh between Bran’s legs. Bran made room for Jamie to shift the rest of his body, allowing Jamie’s hips to press against his and swallowing Jamie’s soft moan. Jamie pulled away from the kiss, pushing himself back so that he could shift one of Bran’s legs to his shoulder.

Then Jamie softly pressed his lips to the inside of Bran’s knee, and Bran felt something untie itself in his chest at the tender expression on Jamie’s face and the gentleness of the kisses he feathered on Bran’s skin.

Please.

And then Jamie lined himself up and surged forward, Bran’s hands fisting in the blankets as Jamie pushed all the way into him, stretching him, filling him to a point that was almost—but not quite—pain. The sound he made was a half-strangled cry, his body immediately convulsing as the feeling of Jamie inside him pushed him over the edge and into ecstasy.

Jamie gasped as Bran’s body throbbed around him, pressing his forehead to Bran’s. His cock ached, but he didn’t want to push Bran farther than the fae could take—didn’t want to hurt him or even cause him discomfort. He moved to withdraw, then sucked in a breath as he felt hands—no, talons—close around his hips, holding him where he was.

It took him a moment to realize that the talons gripping his hipbones were Bran’s feet, not his hands—hands that slid up his arms even as the talons pulled his hips back, encouraging him to set a slow, gentle rhythm.

Jamie gasped, the feel of Bran’s still quivering body around him sending electricity through his nerves. He let the fae guide him, pulling out nearly all the way, feeling Bran’s muscle as it clenched around him, then pushing back in as Bran’s talons tightened on his hips, pulling until his pelvis met Bran’s.

Jamie thought he might have been drunk on Bran—on the feel of his hands, grasping Jamie’s arms. The sound of his soft moans and gasped breaths. The heat and pressure of his body. The flex and grip of his talons. Jamie dropped his forehead back to Bran’s, feeling the rush of breath across his cheeks as he thrust into the fae’s tight warmth, their hips rocking together.

Beneath him, Bran was pliant and soft, despite the angles and hard, wiry lines of his body. As he moved, Jamie could feel Bran’s breath, feel the shift and give of flesh and muscle like the rise and fall of the sea, liquid and languid. As though moving with and in Bran was something Jamie could drown in, if he let himself.

As they rocked against one another, the evidence of Bran’s desire reignited, the softness of his arousal filling once more, growing thick and hard even as his body seemed to draw Jamie in deeper, heat and friction causing the breath to rasp in his lungs. Jamie bent, pressing his lips to the side of Bran’s neck, and the fae turned his head to give Jamie more access, letting him suckle at sensitive skin, nip at Bran’s clavicle and breathe in the heady salt-and-earth scent of his skin.

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