Page 19 of Crave
“What will you do from up there, Kinsley?”
As she stared down at him, her smile faded into something else, both more intent and more uncertain. “You’d just give me that? When you barely know me?”
He spread all four hands. “Haven’t I already? And I know that you are bare. Do we need more for now?”
Chapter 7
Did she need more? Kinsley bit her lip, tasting something cool and sharp, like mineral water. The lingering flavor of Sil’s mouth.
She’d always wanted more, even as it eluded her, like a hunger she could never assuage. But she wanted this now, and that could be enough, couldn’t it?
When Sil had rolled, she’d sprawled atop him, too surprised by his graceful strength to strike a distractingly sexy pose as she usually did. Now, gathering her scrambled thoughts, she drew up her knees alongside his hips, both hands curling around behind his neck so she could hold him for another kiss, angling between his imposing tusks.
She wanted that moment to gather herself too, but instead, she got lost in the sensations: his mouth wide and generous under hers, those tusks glinting in her peripheral view, his hands… Oh, those hands of his, holding her, stroking her, protecting her from the walls around them.
Wait, she didn’t want to be held and protected; no one could rely on someone else—no matter how many hands they had—to carry them. But the stroking…
Tracing one hand up the side of his face, she delicately feathered one antenna. She’d overheard Adeline mentioning to June that the orcs’ antennae were sensitive, erotically so. And from the way Sil shuddered, apparently it was true.
He let out a rough breath, breaking their kiss as he wrapped his fingers around her wrist. “Kinsley, wait. Since you didn’t complete the IDA initiation, you don’t have the necessary inoculations and implants recommended for intimate contact.”
Impatience ratcheted through her. As if she’d leave those things to chance. “I have the Earth versions. I’d never risk having a kid I didn’t want.” She swallowed back more angry words; this wasn’t the time or place or mood for such a discussion. She angled her hips more aggressively into his. “You can trust me on that.”
“I do,” he said softly. “Everyone on theDeepWanderreceives appropriate health updates, and of course I could not pass you my seed-token without preparation and your approval. So you can trust me too.”
Though Kinsley was behind on the IDA readings since she’d never really intended to become an orc wife-mate, she’d heard enough from the other hopeful Earther brides to learn that the orcs suspended their fertility until they bonded with their special somebodies at which point they would produce their seed-token like a pre-baby shower gift. Not that such consensual conscientiousness had helped his people, considering the orcs hadn’t been able to find enough dates or mates among their own kind.
And as much as she didn’t want to continue the discussion of their birth control options, even less did she want to contemplate trusting each other. They were just having sex, dammit!
She didn’t want to picture how Sil would look, solemnly down on one knee in front of his chosen wife-mate with the gift of the future in one of his four hands. How he would sound when he sang to his offspring in theDeepWandercreche, which had been empty for a generation. The way he would cradle his dependents in every arm and never let them down…
As if she had to steal him away from that amorphous, anonymous future, Kinsley kissed him again with a ferocity that sucked a groan from him.
Trust him—or, more to the point, have him trust her? No. She couldn’t do that. Fuck him? Yeah. That was what she wanted, what they both wanted.
She reached down between them to unhook his kilt, splaying it open so Sil lay naked beneath her. The light of his eyes wasn’t enough to let her see more than shadows and deeper shadows, but she’d always had clever fingers. Also, he helped with one hand, still protecting the back of her head from the bunk above when she fumbled off her cami and panties.
Midnight blue and deepest bronze, his tough hide had a subtle texture, making her skin tingle as she rubbed herself against him, until she felt as if she were glowing with an electrical newness. His approving growl filled her with a different kind of excitement.
Just sex, she told herself harshly. For fun, for curiosity—and okay, maybe just a bit to believe that someone cared, just for a little while, just long enough to get through another night.
“You are precisely as I imagined,” he said. “But even more so.”
What the hell did that mean? “You were imagining me? With me on top?”
“Ah, maybe not quite like this. But from the moment you stepped through theDeepWanderhatch, I wondered…”
She stared down at him. “Wondered what?”
“As we came to know each other—orcs and Earthers—how we would change. Beyond adding more corridor lighting or updating our translators. Would we become truer, like your hair?” He wrapped a fading red-dyed lock around one finger, winding his way up to a gentle tug. “What else would we discover?”
“Under the covers? Underneath my clothes?” She dredged up a leer, but the tension on her hair brought her even closer to him until her bare breasts brushed his torso. At the contact, the friction lightninged through her tight nipples, igniting a hot ache in her core.
“That too. I’d already seen diagrams of Earther females, but I wanted to know how you’d feel, how I’d feel with you.”
She’d always been a selfish lover. She’d told herself it was only fair, considering the orgasm gap between Earth’s cishet men and women. Also, what did it matter when she’d likely never see her partners again? But now, to know that she was responsible for representing all Earth hookups… No pressure or anything.
“So feel me.” She could tough this out, pretend she was fine with his experimentation and judgment, whatever that might be.
