Page 11 of Changeling
And he loved it. Because it was Sasha. Him and Sasha caught in this circuit that gave Sasha life and made Nathan quiver. God, yes, Nathan loved it. He loved…he…loved…
Nathan felt blinded as he came—paralyzed. The sensations were still running through him as Sasha built to his own end and finally came as well. Nathan was shaking when Sasha pulled out of him, pulled away, and grabbed the towel from the floor to wipe them both clean. Even the touch of the towel made Nathan shiver a little. He was still overly sensitized. He wondered howlong it would take for him to come down from whatever high this was.
“Just give it a few minutes,” Sasha said close beside Nathan’s ear. “I’m sure it’s a little jarring. I’ve never done that with anyone before. Was it too much? Was it okay?”
At first Nathan didn’t quite understand why Sasha sounded worried. Maybe Nathan would have liked a warning first, but he sure as hell wasn’t going to be upset with the incubus for giving him the most amazing sexual experience of his life—again.
“Too much?” Nathan questioned. “Well…I don’t think I can feel my feet, but…that was pretty fucking incredible. I think I might implode if you do that every time though. Just so you know.”
Sasha’s laughter responded, and Nathan started to come back to himself enough to feel the bed beneath him again and see that Sasha was lying next to him, propped up to look down at him with those vivid blue eyes.
“Feeling better, then, Nathan?” the incubus asked.
Nathan reached a hand up to grab the back of Sasha’s neck and pulled the incubus down into a slow kiss. “Definitely…better.”
Chapter 5
Nathanknewhehadn’tbeen sleeping for more than a few hours when he woke up, surrounded by darkness in the pitch black room, with a casual arm thrown across his waist. He grinned lazily at the thought of Sasha right there beside him. They hadn’t really shared a bed like this before; they hadn’t been able to with Gabriel’s appearance and then with Nathan’s recovery in the hospital—other than briefly sharing a bed in Nathan’s most recent nightmare, though he preferred to forget about that.
He wanted nothing more than to curl in against Sasha and go back into a dreamless sleep. But he couldn’t—his cheststung. Apparently the reopened wounds were still angry about being disturbed, and had woken Nathan up demanding more pain meds. His leg was faring only slightly better.
Sluggishly, Nathan rolled into a sitting position after slipping free of Sasha’s arm. The incubus groaned in protest but didn’t wake. Nathan recalled the layout of the room as best he couldso he wouldn’t knock anything over when he got up, trying to remember where his pain meds were. He’d had them all over the place, from his own bag, to the infirmary room, to the bar with Alex and Jim…
Jim. Jim had had the pills last, to better keep track of how many Nathan had left, in case they needed to stop for a refill soon. Normally, Nathan would go back to bed and leave it until morning rather than disturb his brother, but his chest was too sore to sleep comfortably.
Pulling on a pair of sleep pants from one of their bags—it might have been Sasha’s—Nathan stumbled out of the room into the dim light of the hallway. Jim’s door was closed but not locked, since the Gatehouse was a veritable fortress right now.
Slipping quietly into the room, Nathan quickly discovered that Jim was fast asleep, but he could see no sign of the pills. Nathan hated to wake his brother, but he figured he’d end up waking him anyway if he started rifling through his things. He snuck over to the bed, but as he approached, he saw that something was wrong. Jim looked like he was having some sort of allover spasm. Convulsing? Seizing? Nathan wasn’t sure, but the tremors were so subtle that, had he not been really looking, he might have missed them.
“Jim?” Nathan called softly, sitting on the edge of the bed and reaching for Jim’s shoulders to shake him.
Jim moved so fast, so suddenly, that Nathan cried out in alarm. Jim’s hands shot up to grab Nathan’s wrists tight enough that he cringed. Then Jim’s eyes were open, staring not at Nathan but straight up for a moment at something Nathan couldn’t see. Those damn slit eyes were back, amber-colored again like in the hospital—and in Nathan’s nightmares. Even the Gatehouse wasn’t enough to keep them at bay.
Nathan tried to tug his hands away but Jim’s grip was too tight, his face otherwise benign if not for the eyes. “Jim,” Nathan called again, hating how small his voice sounded. “Please.”
Jim blinked and his eyes were blue. His grip loosened on Nathan and he pulled back, blinking in confusion and staring at Nathan like he had just woken up and Nathan was to blame for waking him. “Nate? What is it?” he asked groggily. “Is everything okay?”
Nathan didn’t know how to respond. Had he imagined that? No, he couldn’t have. It was too vivid. He could feel bruises forming on his wrists.
“Nathan?” Jim prompted again, concerned now since Nathan was just staring at him.
“Nothing…” Nathan managed. “It’s nothing, just, uhh…came to grab my pain meds. Woke up a little sore and can’t get back to sleep.”
“Oh. Sure. They’re in the smaller front pocket of my bag. Is the pain really bad?” Jim looked Nathan over as if he must have a truly traumatized look on his face.
“Nah, just annoying,” Nathan said, forcing a smile as he stood from the bed and crouched down by Jim’s bag to retrieve the pills. He had water in the other room, and he really wanted to get out of there, but he still stepped back to the bed for a moment to look down at hisblue-eyed brother. “I’m good. You just…you go back to sleep, okay?”
“Nathan?” Jim still sounded worried and, when Nathan looked down at his free hand, he realized he had reached over and was smoothing Jim’s hair back from his face like a concerned mother.
“Uhh…” He instantly pulled his hand back. “Man, you…need a haircut so bad it’s embarrassing. You ever look at yourself in the mirror with that bedhead?”
Either Jim was just willing to let Nathan get away with that or he actually believed it, because he swatted Nathan’s hand away and resettled back into bed. “Asshole,” he grinned. “Get back to your incubus.” Jim promptly closed his eyes to go back to sleep.
Nathan might have stood there another minute or more but he didn’t want Jim to question him again. So he moved for the door, looked over his shoulder at Jim peaceful in the bed, and left the room. The hallway was quiet when Nathan stepped into it. He couldn’t move. Not yet. So he fell back against the door and closed his eyes. He wanted to tell himself that it hadn’t happened, but he knew better. Those eyes were burned into his memory.
Nathan stared down the hallway toward his and Sasha’s room. What if hewastaken by the dark fae? What if the mark killed him? What would happen to Jim and Sasha then? Nathan didn’t want to think of all the frightening possibilities. All of them led too closely to his nightmares.
And the worst of it was…Nathan had no idea how to make it better.
