Page 26 of Crush

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But she wasn’t alone right now, was she? And with Teq, she could be this brave new interpretation of herself.

Before the strange certainty wavered, she stripped, her fingers hesitating only one briefest moment on the sides of her not-best panties, because she hadn’t been intending to do “more kisses” with her alien date. She hoped he didn’t notice her hands trembling as she flung them hastily away and stood before him, maybe not the bravest interpretation of herself, but certainly the most naked.

He stood silent and still except for his antennae, which blurred with vibration. “You are so delicate,” he rasped. “So soft. And my hands have been crushing for too long.” All four of his fists flexed and opened wide in the same helpless yearning seething in her.

His hesitation gave her back some courage, and she took the step forward that he’d retreated. “We go as far as we want, no farther,” she assured him. She held out her hands, suddenly wishing she had two more. “Soft maybe, but notthatdelicate. I think you could touch me as you did the rock, with curiosity and care.”

“Like a fortune found.” His lower hands reached out to clasp hers while his upper ones framed her face. “Another kiss, for curiosity and courage.”

Of course the melding of their mouths brought their bodies closer, the hard plane of him pressing into her tender flesh. Her breasts plumped against his bulging lower pecs, and his big thigh alien wedged between her legs in a way that made her moan.

“That is the sound of pleasure, yes?” His hands dropped from her face to her shoulders, steadying her when she swayed.

“Pleasure, yes,” she murmured, dazed. “So hard…”

“The sensation of your flesh pierces me,” he said in a wondering voice. “The points of your breasts and between your legs…” He let out a shuddering breath. “I feel them harden, tighten…”

Oh god, yes, her nipples ached, but he felt the throb of her clit too? Of course his kind had evolved in the darkness to feel the faintest vibrations. And what was happening between her legs was by no means faint. In fact it felt like an earthquake.

“Touch me,” she urged. “With all your hands.”

Chapter 9

From the time he’d been hatched, he’d worked as a crusher: oversized, always formidable, able to find the vulnerabilities in the stone, breaking it apart to take the ice and precious minerals.

Until he touched Adeline, he hadn’t realized he could use his hands for exploration, for delicate discovery.

For pleasure.

He traced the soft curves and enticing hollows of her naked body, his whole being enraptured.

“This is more than kissing,” she said in a voice even softer than her skin.

But he heard the warning it contained. He was the one who had said he could not allow anything more. “I don’t deserve more,” he reminded her—reminding himself.

Her smile was the softest and gentlest yet. And yet it held an edge as ravaging as a diamond drill bit and a power more stunning than a hydraulic blasting rig. “This isn’t about deserving,” she said. “Neither of us is a prize to be won. We’ve both lost too much, given up too much to believe that plunder doesn’t come with its own price. But this moment can be ours, if we both want it. No transaction, no compensation. Just us and whatever we want to feel.” She spread her fingers across his lower thorax, and although she had neither the reach nor the number of digits, somehow he felt the sensation spread all the way through him.

That should’ve been its own warning, a whisper of an unpayable cost. But in this moment, as she’d said, they could carve out a little space, not cold and dark and jagged, but as soft and sweet as they wanted—or maybe they wanted a little more than that.

Because when he closed his hands on her, adjusting his strength and caress to the feedback of her response, he thought a little rough around the edges was what she liked. He tuned his touches to her sighs and moans, his antennae quivering with wanting—needing—to know about her and her desires. It might be more than he deserved, more than he’d ever known was possible—but now feeling her was his everything.

“So soft,” he murmured, molding his hands around her breasts. “Except for these little pebbles.” He pinched them lightly, then a little harder when she arched up into the caress, demanding without words, only sensation. “And maybe not so sweet? You bite sometimes, yes?”

“Only if you stop…”

Like a hidden, deeper reflection of her breasts thrusting against him, he found the plump, plush flesh of her labia and the precious nugget of her clit. When he closed his fingers on that throbbing, her needy cry shivered through him, and he thought the echo would linger in his dreams.

With all his hands, he held her and stroked her and caressed her, and he might’ve been hatched as a crusher, but in this moment, he felt like a crystal carver, shaping her pleasure, polishing her breathy cries, desperate to unveil her final release, as promised in his diligent reading.

When the resonance of her breathy cries reached a certain pitch, somehow he knew. He tipped her onto her back in the deep cushions, already beaten and sweet-smelling from their play, and kissed his way one more time down her body.

“Teq…” she moaned, her fingers clenching with crusher strength on his shoulders.

He tossed her legs over the shoulders, jolting another breath from her, part surprise, part keening need.

“I would make you orgasm,” he told her.

“Yes, you will, you are.” Her fingers spasmed restlessly once more on his shoulders before reaching for his antennae. She hesitated. “May I…”