“I’m sorry,” I say, waving a hand so her phone appears, whole again, in her palm. “But don’t ever show me anything like that ever again.” I stand, pushing myself off the bed. “I’m going to be sick. That wasn’t bonding. That was—” I barely make it to the sink before I’m puking, all the wine from before rushing out, making me vaguely aware that I’m humiliating myself in front of my mate.
“Are you all right? Oh my God, Lorien, that wasn’t even hardcore stuff.”
I swallow. “Never. I will never see anything like that again.” I look up at her. “The only woman I want to see is my dream mate. Everyone else is disgusting to my eyes. And what those two were doing…” Despair floods my heart. “It has nothing to do with love.”
“Lorien,” she says, gently taking a cloth and soaking it in warm water before dabbing it over my pale face and helping me to the bed again. “That’s super sweet and super innocent. And just not how my world works.”
My heart hurts. “I just hate it. Please don’t ever show me again.”
“It’s just weird is all,” she says, sounding genuinely astounded. “Most men are upfront about using porn, and most women are looked at as crazy if they don’t like it.”
I swallow. “I don’t care what human men want. I don’t care that they’re feeding on garbage except that I don’t understand why.” I look at her. “You said they usually misbehave while drunk too. What do they do?”
“I mean, alcohol just makes men… more themselves.”
“In this case, not a good thing,” I say drily.
Tess sits in the chair again, watching me ease myself back down in the bed.
“Well, what a night. I’ve made a mess for my mate, made a fool of myself, and gotten so disgusted by human males that I can’t think straight.” I give her a wry smile. “Am I sexy right now, soul bond?”
She smiles softly. “Honestly, kinda.”
I push up on my hands immediately, shocked. “But I just—”
“I know,” she says. “But it’s like I’m finally understanding you. Everything you said at the start, it sounded like so much bullshit. Like something from a dream, a childhood fantasy. It didn’t seem like you could belong in the real world with your talk of love and devotion.” She puts a hand over her mouth, turning to the side, blushing awkwardly. “But you know, watching you throw up at porn, it’s really hard to question who you are.”
I grin at her. “Then I’m glad I could assist.”
“Oh, gross. Look, I’m gonna get you a toothbrush and some mouthwash, and then we’re going to bed.”
“Together?” I ask hopefully.
For a moment, I think she’s going to chide me, but then she wraps her arms around herself and lets out a sigh. “Yeah. If that’s all right.” She looks to the side again. “After what happened today, I don’t really feel like being alone either.” Her eyes meet mine, brave but tentative, and I feel something warm deep inside.
Our bond is finally starting, and it took something so odd to kick it off.
But I’m glad I was there for her. I’m glad I decided from the start to be honest with her.
And I’m glad that I finally get to spend the night next to her even if I can’t yet be in her arms.
12
Tess
Seeing beautiful, typically composed Lorien run for the sink was shocking.
But even more shocking was how well he pulled himself together, used everything I gave him, and then let me get in bed before he turned out the lights and got in with me.
It’s the fairy-tale picture of a couple, the ideal image I had when I was young, when I thought my prince would come. When I thought of domesticity as bliss.
I like my life now. I like being independent, and I rarely think about love.
But to be honest, seeing Lorien echo my disgust with porn, which few people seem to share with me, conjures something warm deep inside.
He’s now quietly snoring next to me, smelling of wine and sugar cookies and mouthwash, his dark-blue hair spread over his pillow, his face in gorgeous repose in the dark.
He’s so beautiful.
Could he really be someone who could be with me and not hurt me? But how could I not hurt him?
He doesn’t understand sex without bonding. He thinks sex out of context is harmful.
But what will he think about what happened to me? If I’m this soul bond he’s been dreaming of, maybe he imagines me to be pure…
But somehow I don’t think so.
I turn on my side to face him, studying the graceful lines of his profile. The straight line of his nose, the stubborn forward thrust of his chin.
I want to touch him. It hits me like a meteor in the dark, like my inhibitions have fallen away and left me with only stark want for him shining through me like an unwanted stream of moonlight into the dark room.
I reach up and brush his hair back, and the feel of his skin sends an almost electric sensation through me.
Is this what the rumored “connection” feels like?
Lots of people have mentioned that once they have feelings for someone, the touch is more sensitive, stronger.
Does this mean I have feelings for Lorien?
I think of his beautiful, stubborn face and the way he has shown up in my dreams and my life insistently and consistently since I met him.
So yes, it would be electric since I have at least something for him. Fondness. Appreciation maybe.
For him and his fierce inability to accept the things around me that I’ve been fighting against for so long.
My friends understand, and they all fight back in their own ways. They have gone up against human cruelty as much as they could in this world.
I’ve taken a more direct approach than most.
There are good people here, and if he stays long enough, Lorien will see that.
But I can’t help thinking about what he said. That in the dream world they’ve eliminated nightmares, or the men I constantly have to go after.
Maybe it might not be such a terrible place to go to after all.
If there’s no porn there, if men aren’t trying to trick or use women there, if there isn’t harassment there because people like Lorien don’t allow it…
“All right, fae warrior,” I say softly, running a hand along his cheek. “Just go ahead and take me back to your world.”
His eyes fly open, and I can tell by the heat, the awareness in them, that in just a few hours of sleep, he has already sobered up. “Seriously?”
I laugh, sitting up and pulling away from him, sure that my face is flaming bright red. “No, but I was thinking it must be a nice place. Free of troubles.”
He pushes up on one elbow, showing off a hint of sexy chest and hard, muscled forearm and bicep. “Not completely free, but we keep away the nightmares.”
I laugh. “Nightmares are all I have.”
He sits up, brushing a lock of my hair back, looking into my eyes meaningfully. “I can give you sweet dreams if you’ll only let me.”
“I can’t,” I say, pulling away. “My dreams are just how my life is. I’m fine, but—”
“But?”
My cheeks burn as I force myself to face him. “I do think I’m starting to feel something for you.”
His grin is immediate, spreading over his face like sunlight. “Really? Soul bond—” He lunges forward, and I stick a hand out.
“Not so fast,” I say even though his chest is hot against my hand and just that small touch is making my heart beat rapidly. “This is just physical. I just want to see… what it would be like with you.”
He nods eagerly. “It would be my honor to—”
“Don’t make it weird,” I beg. “It’s not some honor. It’s not some ‘bonding.’ I just want to feel pleasure with you. Want to see if it could be good. You know, with a man who hasn’t watched so much porn he thinks coming on a woman’s face counts as foreplay.”
Lorien swallows, and I can tell it’s taking great effort to push
back his anger at what I just said to focus on us alone. “All right, then. Just pleasure. Though, I warn you that sex is always bonding. That’s why I wish humans were more careful. We can’t share ourselves like that, be vulnerable like that, without getting close to another person. And with a bad person, it leaves wounds.”
I shake my head, not wanting to hear that. “Nothing about bad people. Nothing about rants.” I move closer to him on the bed, still kneeling. “I don’t want to think anymore.” I push his hair back. “I don’t want to know about where you came from or why this place sucks.” I bring my lips close to his. “I just want to know what you feel like.” I breathe out against his lips, so ready to feel the softness there I could die. “Though, I warn you. I’m not pure. I don’t know what you guys expect from your soul bonds—”
He shakes his head. “We expect nothing from queens. Your life didn’t belong to me before I came to you. All I want is what you bring to me now. Exactly who you are, exactly as you are right now. I don’t know what you mean by pure—”
“I’m not going to talk about it because we said we wouldn’t. But here, women aren’t pure if… if…“ I look at his beautiful face shaded with moonlight and realize I don’t want to see his features twist again in anger. Not now.
Even if it’s making me fall for him just knowing that these things can make him angry when it seems like no one else is angry at all.
“I don’t want pure,” he says, reaching his hand up to gently cup my neck, supporting me and bringing his lips in until he’s feather close. “I want you. I don’t want you with any description or any expectation. I love you, and I want you, and I want to further my bond with you because I’ll never want anyone else.”
Then our lips meet, and it’s better than it’s ever been before. Shocks shoot down to my toes, filling me with something hot and fierce.
I open my lips in shock, and his gently caress mine, tracing the shape of them as if he wants to slowly learn every part of me. I gasp at the intense sensation as he finishes his exploration and then his other arm wraps around my waist and pulls me in, his tongue swiping out to deepen the kiss.
I didn’t know it was possible to kiss like this, like he’s connecting us by the soul, reading each of my tiniest movements, hanging on the smallest intake of breath. My hands are on his chest, moving over the silky, heated skin there as his tongue swirls through my mouth, finding every sensitive spot.
“Lorien,” I murmur, lost, against his lips as my core goes silky and wet. Heat is burning through me like wildfire and only from his kiss on my lips. I’m going to be lost when he moves on to the rest of me.
“Tess. My love,” he whispers. “Let me show you exactly how long I’ve yearned for you.” As he does, he sits up higher on the bed, meeting me face to face. The hand cupping the back of my neck holds me tenderly as his lips crash over mine with more energy than ever before.
And I’m lost. Lost in the sensation of his lips firmly pressing against mine and how every corner of my body feels warm and buzzing and alive in ways I’d never quite imagined were possible.
A quiet moan of pleasure catches in my throat as my lips part, beckoning for him. He hesitates the barest of moments, holding our kiss a little longer until I feel his tongue slip into my mouth with deft confidence.
I want to kiss him back, but I’m overwhelmed by the way he seems to know exactly what to do and where and how. So I give in to the sensation of his tongue sliding over mine, twisting in a sensual dance that’s making me ache for Lorien more with each kiss.
Both my hands are on his chest now, and I’m not entirely sure when that happened. But I can’t care because the feel of his sculpted, powerful muscles relaxing and firming beneath my fingertips only contrasts the unbelievable way his kissing is making me melt from the inside out.
My heart’s starting to pound. My chest is getting tight, my body eager as he slowly plunders every corner of my mouth. And when I feel like there isn’t anywhere he hasn’t stroked or teased, he goes a little faster and deeper until I’m making muffled sounds against him over and over because I just can’t hold it all in.
Even sitting up is getting difficult. And just as I’m about to either fall forward onto him or backward off the edge of the bed where I’ve been sitting, his arm gently turns us over so I’m lying on my back.
Which puts Lorien above me, practically naked and surrounding me everywhere.
But I feel safe. I feel want and need and so many things that have to be explored this very second, or I might really just die from pent-up arousal right here and now.
Just the way his multicolored irises—blue and purple with a touch of green and red in the center—swirl like little galaxies as his heated gaze roves down me is enough to make my body tense with anticipation. Anticipation for what, I’m not even entirely sure. But with Lorien, I have to believe there’s perhaps a little magic in the air by how each moment hovers over me like a shooting star caught midflight in the sky.
“I would have waited a million years more just for this moment with you, Tess.” One of his hands is planted firmly on the bed at my side while the other one cups the side of my face, fingers entwining with my hair and running along my scalp, which is oddly sensitive to the light touch. I can’t help but close my eyes to the sensation as his words seem to fill my small room. “And now, no more waiting for either of us.”
I don’t even need to look up to feel him come near me as he leans down to kiss my cheek, then moves to my ear. His breath is hot on my skin, his mouth insistent as he licks and flicks and sucks on each inch of skin that’s burning at his touch. And when I lean into the source of pleasure that is his mouth, unable to help myself from trying to get more, he delivers more, kissing me harder where I like it and moving past the spots that aren’t as sensitive to find new ones in his relentless exploration of my body.
“So beautiful. So beautiful I could die of wonder just being here with you,” he says. He kisses down my neck, and his hand trails down the opposite side from his mouth, fingers stroking down my skin and doubling the feel of him.
I’m already aching for him. And though part of me just wants to get to the moment where this wonderful, painstaking lovemaking can release, the other part of me wants to keep drowning in this deluge. To hold my breath until I can’t hold it any longer.
Lorien sucks the tender skin at the base of my neck, then moves to my shoulder. I pull my oversized sleep shirt lower, giving him better access, which he freely takes.
The things he can do with his mouth. The things I wish he would do with his mouth…
“May I remove this, my queen?” he asks, forcing me to open my eyes and look up at him. Even with only the light from the bathroom casting a yellow hue over the bedroom, I can see the fire in his gaze. See how much he wants me even as I feel one hand at the hem of my shirt patiently, not moving it a single centimeter until I’ve given him the go-ahead.
It only makes me that much more attracted to him even if it means stopping to give permission.
“Yes. Just don’t call me queen. Tess is fine.”
“Of course, my q—” He stops himself. “Of course, Tess.” Then Lorien smiles hungrily as he slowly pulls my shirt up a bit, and both his hands slide over my belly and up my sides.
The touch is electric, and my whole body bucks against him. I can feel the shape of his quads trapping me beneath him along with something firm and thick against me that makes my mouth water. I can’t help but look to see the thick bulge pressing against his underwear, but Lorien doesn’t seem to notice at all as my shirt is coming higher and higher until he slips it over my shoulders and I’m just in my sleep bra and the yoga pants I put on earlier.
For a minute, he kisses over my belly, and his hands hold the sides of my hips, keeping me steady while he blazes a trail of fire wherever he goes. By the time he’s hovering over my breasts, I’m about ready to tear my own clothes off.
“And this as well?” He hooks a finger along one strap, and the ai
r is so thick with want it’s nearly suffocating.
“Yes. Yes, yes, and yes.” I’m practically begging, and I want him so badly I feel like I could pass out from burning for him. “I’ll tell you if I want you to stop.”
“You promise?” There’s a seriousness in his expression that says he doesn’t take this lightly. “I need to give you what you want, and to do that, we need to communicate.”
As much as I hate any slowdown to what he’s doing, I have to admit he’s got a point.
So instead of trying to figure out exactly how to get my point across, I push myself up with one elbow and use my other hand to pull him toward me.
He’s still above me, though I can’t quite make it all the way. But he leans forward until my lips meet his, and the contact of our mouths is like taking a hit of the most sensual, most erotic drug I could have ever tasted. And after several long moments while we clash and kiss, I pull back, breathless and panting and desperate.
“Then I’ll say this now.” Our lips are a hair’s breadth apart and swollen from kissing. “Keep going unless I tell you to stop.”
“Of course.” He smiles against me for a moment, then, with a hand on my back, lays me back down onto the bed.
With a snap of his fingers, I feel my bra strap loosen, and he’s taking it off over my shoulders without any hesitation. The cool air rushes over my aching nipples, but they’re given no time to acclimate because his hands find my chest immediately, cupping and caressing my skin.
He’s not holding back now, not waiting for anything but the racing of my heart to set the pace of this heady, erotic dance. His thumbs brush over the firm tips of my nipples, and jolts of pleasure shoot up my legs and down my back.
He leans lower, bringing his mouth to one nipple, and there’s something particularly beautiful about the way his long hair spills onto my exposed chest, brushing over it as his gaze remains focused and intense. I wish I could take a screenshot of the moment, his broad shoulders and powerful arms leaning over me, focused on me like I’m the center of his universe.
Sweet Dreams Page 10