Page 111 of Hopelessly Teavoted
“Now we toast and drink until it’s drained,” he said. His voice was straining, and his fingers were desperate to have her, his tongue to taste her.
“Prost,” she said, clinking the goblet against his and then tipping it back. He would give anything to be the thing her lips wrapped around like that.
He raised his own to his mouth, and the liquid tasted sweet and tart, like berries and lemon. Earthen and heady, with a sharp edge.
Slamming the goblet down on the table, he felt the warmth of the spell spreading through him, like tiny invisible fairy lights burst through his veins and wrapped his heart in the gilded glow of a late porch night full of fireflies and soft music.
“Az,” Vickie said, and he got up and crossed the distance between them. “What if it doesn’t work? What if Lex was lying and the spell doesn’t work?”
“He wasn’t, and it will,” he murmured, kneeling, and she dropped next to him so that they were both on their knees. “I’m more certain of you than I am of my own name. I’ve loved you since before I could remember, I love you now, and I’ll love you always. Our magics have always known, really.” Only inches lingered between them, and the corners of her beautiful mouth tugged upward. “And if by some off chance it doesn’t, I’ll die happy in your arms.”
Vickie swatted the shoulder of his sweater, but she was smiling widely now, nose scrunching into the freckles he loved so much.
“Can I kiss you now?” Azrael asked, wanting to hear the exquisite pleasure of her enthusiasm.
“Kiss me now and always,” she whispered.
Azrael raised his hands to Vickie’s face, his palms hovering a few inches away from each side, feeling the warmth of her.
Of just her, no damning fire.
Touching nothing else, his mouth grazed hers.
Her lips parted for him, soft and molten, and she sucked in a sharp breath.
He pulled back, closing his hands on her temples, and looked at her, drinking her in.
She exhaled, relief washing away into darker pink that pulled across her cheeks, spotting them with color.
The pad of his thumb traced her jaw, running over her bottom lip and then down her neck, farther, to her collarbone andthe top of her breast, over her T-shirt. He reached for her face again, brushing against the freckles. He’d count every one of them. Again.
“Kiss me. Now.” The repeated command was edged with sharp need, and, fuck, he couldn’t leave her hanging.
Their lips met, and Azrael couldn’t help himself. He pulled Vickie’s head toward him farther, crushing her moan between their mouths. Vickie threaded her hands in his hair and returned the sentiment. Tongues clashed, hungry, desperate, devouring. He bit at her bottom lip, and she moaned, words indecipherable but so, so sweet.
Moving lower, he pressed kisses along her neck, relishing more of those soft, explosive little gasps of longing as he reached her breasts, and she yanked up her shirt, over her head and off, to give him better access.
He slid his fingers down the sides of her bra, hooking them under the cups of it so that her breasts were free, nipples hardening even in the cozily warm air of the library. Unclasping it with a snap.
“It’s your turn,” she said, shrugging out of the bra. Pushing him and clawing his sweater off, and then the buckle of his belt and his zipper. “Let me taste how hard you are.”
“Fuck, well, I obviously want that, and we should definitely come back to it later, but there is no way I’d last long enough to do what I want with you now if you got these pretty lips”—he ran a finger against the bottom one—“around me.”
She flushed and nodded, but didn’t let go, pushing his pants down. He was helping her now, stumbling slightly, pushing her jeans down, and sucking in too sharp a breath. He felt naked in a way he hadn’t in years, like this meant something that all the other times had not.
“Do you have a condom?” she asked, splotches of desire coloring in the space between her freckles.
“I can get one. I’m also on birth control.” Witches, unlike humans, had options for such things. His mother had taughthim to make gender-neutral birth control pills when he was thirteen.
“I haven’t been with anyone else since Robbie, and I have a breakup ritual of an STI test.”
“Nothing more romantic than reproductive health care,” he murmured, tugging at her lip with his teeth and running a hand down her arm, relishing the goose bumps that raised in the wake of his fingers. “I am also good. I’ve been tested since my last partner. But, Vickie, if at any point you change your mind, about the condom, or any of it, just say so.”
“I won’t,” she said. “But noted. I trust you. Only if you want to, though.” The uncertainty in her eyes made Azrael want to murder this Robbie person if they ever met, but he let it go, promising himself that their love would not be the jealous sort.
“I want nothing more than that, sweetheart.” The word rolled off his tongue and rippled across her, a wave of a smile that told him he had found the sweet spot for what she would be to him. It was the modern version of Benedict’smy darling. Of Persephone’shandsome. A new sobriquet for a new generation of passionate, wildly-in-love Harts.
Vickie shuddered against him now.
