Page 44 of Elixir of Strife
“Show me,” he whispered. “Show me how much you love it.”
He bit into my neck. I whined like an animal.
A few final slams of his hips rocked against me, shook me to my core, as if he knew that I was so close to coming. And I was, and I did, nearly screaming as I came on the dresser, in slashes across the mirror. I’d never shot so far, so hard. Max braced himself against me, arms embracing my ribs, burying himself, shooting thick, blazing ropes deep inside me.
“Fucking hell,” I muttered, aware that the wetness all over my skin was definitely sweat. Some of it was his sweat, too. “Best shower sex ever. Worst shower, though. We barely got clean at all.”
“Technically, the best part of it happened outside the shower.” Max pressed a burning kiss against the crook of my neck, wagging a finger in the mirror. “But we should go back in. You know. Do it right this time.”
I nodded, dragging my hand across my brow. “Just to be sure.”
“Just to be sure,” he echoed, a gleaming Grecian god in the mirror, my gorgeous Spanish bull.
I ground my hips back against him, only meaning to tease. He pulled back slightly, then rocked forward again, still hard inside me, still ready to go. He licked his lips, staring at my ass.
We never did make it back to the shower.
18
MAX
After a couple more rounds of incredibly filthy lovemaking, Leon and I finally did get cleaned up, then decided to head out for a nightcap. Over to Silk, for a change of scenery, the Jade Spider’s home bar. Part of it was to check on whether Dan D. Lyon had initiated his promised transfer, too.
Driving to the bar, I kept replaying how Leon had all but threatened to salt Daniel’s entire evil olive grove earlier that night. It took everything I had not to reach over and grope him in the passenger seat all over again. He sat there tapping his foot to something on the radio, hand in his chin as he gazed contentedly out of the window.
The boy truly had no idea how horned up he got me with that little display. Maybe I was in my naughty phase, in terms of both being bad myself and in seeing Leon misbehave himself. It felt like finally letting my hair down after keeping it gelled up for years. Decades.
“This is nice,” I mumbled.
“Hmm?” Leon said, turning toward me just as a splash of streetlight illuminated his face. It made his eyes sparkle. So pretty.
“It’s nothing,” I said, smiling to myself, bopping my head to the same music.
We arrived at a relatively quiet Silk, only a smattering of customers. The bouncer didn’t even give us the business, either, when they’d normally harass Leon for some ID. It was Haruko at the door, though, and she really was sweet on him, the most lenient of the bar’s lineup of nondescript and yet very dangerous women.
The most dangerous of them all, or so I had to assume, was sitting at a barstool.
Her legs crossed, exposed under the deep slit in her gown, the Jade Spider wore a rich crimsonqipao, the mandarin collar accentuating the slenderness of her neck. Golden dragons flew across the red sky of her dress, tracing elegant shapes with their serpentine bodies, claws reaching out as they chased after pearls. Real ones, in this case, stitched right onto the garment.
Vera turned to us, melodramatically sallow, lighting up at the sight of our faces as if only just surfacing from the pits of despair.
“Leonardo. Maximilian. Come and kiss your poor Auntie Vera.”
I rolled my eyes and smirked. Leon was already rubbing his cheek, smiling bashfully even though Vera hadn’t bussed him yet. I couldn’t tell if this “Aw, shucks” thing was just a performance or him actually being a bit embarrassed, but again, it was really doing it for me. Too cute. Very annoying.
We traded kisses with Vera, who had already produced her phone from somewhere on her person. “I know you’re only here about money, so you can forget about pretending otherwise. Such a sordid topic, but I hear it makes the world go round. Now, let’s see. Hmm. Why, that’s strange. Still no word from Daniel.”
“That’s right,” shouted a voice from behind us. “Still no word from Daniel, because these bastards stole the elixir right back from me.”
Vera clutched her chest. “Daniel! Don’t be so crude!”
I turned in shock. It was him, Dan D. Lyon, in the flesh. Next to him was Edel Wise, the hagriculturist, grinning her bright red grin. Always just happy to be included.
“Hey, man.” Leon stabbed his finger at the air. “We would never steal something back from a client. Why would we tarnish our reputation like that? People talk, and we’d totally love to have repeat customers. Not that we’d ever work for your sorry ass again.”
I glanced between the two of them, gaping as I reached for something else to add. But no, Leon had covered everything, and pretty succinctly, too. So I added the only thing I could.
“Yeah. What he said. We delivered your Aqueous Elixir fair and square. Why would we steal it back?”
