Page 118 of A Touch of Stars and Stones
thirty
. . .
Ever
Sitting in his lap, I feel lost in my mind, consumed and turned on beyond reason. Stars, I’m so close to rubbing myself all over him. But I hold back. Somehow.
Because my mind doesn’t have any blocks in place, everything I’ve ever thought or imagined rushes to mind, like a river raging after a storm, mixing with the images in Ten’s head.
Lords above, I am so screwed.
But there’s no pain. No fear. And that does something to me and gives me the confidence I need to let this play out, gather pace, and run away with us. I don’t want to wait. I don’t want to stop. I want Ten to do everything and anything to me if there is no pain.
It means that our future isn’t just visions of death and despair.
Through the fog of lust and desire, his words filter in.
Move.
He’s right. But it feels like I need something to physically remove me from my position, legs splayed over him.
“I’m not sure I can move,” I confess, opening my eyes to see him watching me far too intently, the faintest curve to the corner of his mouth.
“If I trusted myself, I’d happily lift you and carry you to that bed.” His voice is rough and deep and does nothing to settle my pounding heart.
My legs shake as I tense them and lean against one, pushing my weight onto my toes and balancing as I lift my other leg up and off Ten’s lap.
Did we really do that? Did I really do that?
This tension has been between us since the first time I laid eyes on him, all the glances, the touches, the words that promised something else… and after today and that vision into the future, I didn’t want to leave it up to chance.
If everything the Maker said was true, possibilities were something I would need to learn to contend with. She said I’d see all… well, all I wanted to see was Ten.
I stagger back a step or two, my eyes unable to leave Ten when he looks so good, sprawled in the chair, his grip locked around the back of the chair legs.
He said to wait for him to calm down, so I find the bed and lie back, willing my breathing to come under control. And I go to the place that Kyra had helped me find. Full of calm and stillness. It cools my burning skin and sates me enough to think clearly.
The night sky. Darkness. Snow flurries…
But my heart won’t stop thrumming, fluttering like a hummingbird and refusing to obey.
Seconds joined into minutes, and still, I refuse to rush Ten. If I reveal to him in any other way just how desperate I am, I might die.
Stars, this is really happening.
The bed dips, but I don’t turn to him.
“If you don’t want to do this, say now, and we can just lie here.” His voice is like a caress itself, smooth and velvety and makes me only want this more.
I don’t look at him, but I do listen to that growing need in the pit of my stomach, that want that’s driving me to distraction. My fingers hook into the waistband of my trousers, and I push them down my thighs. The jumper is long enough to cover me, and my underwear is still in place.
He is giving me every opportunity, every chance to stop. But that’s not what I want. It’s his turn to hand the control to me, and finding out we can be this intimate with limited contact makes my head rush with possibilities. The relief, a high in itself, that I’m gaining a slice of control over another aspect of my life, moving towards not being bound by the rules that have been thrust upon me here.
And this, with Ten, is me exercising every ounce of control I can wring from my body.
“I won’t touch you. You don’t have to look at me, but you do have to do everything I tell you. And you better fucking be on board with me watching you very, very closely, Little Siren.”
“Stars, I think I might combust from his words alone.”
