by Evie Kent
Apparently fantastic sex had consequences. Who knew?
By the time I hauled myself up the two steps from the calendar corridor to the main hall, tears streaked down my cheeks with no signs of stopping. I broke apart in the doorway, sniffling and shivering—sniveling, really, just an absolute disaster. But I’d never been in this much pain before…
And in the dim glow of the kitchen, the strings of lights over the couch shimmering faintly, I finally understood why.
I was purple, bruised from top to bottom. His fingerprints marred my arms, my chest, probably my neck. My thighs had taken the worst of it, black and blue and ugly, glaring even in the soft light. No wonder it hurt to move—to even breathe. A sob caught in my throat, and I shambled deeper into the hall, headed for the kitchen cabinets. I tried to hold it in—didn’t want to wake him, didn’t want to look at him right now after what he had done to me. Mind-blowing sex didn’t cancel out… this.
The exhaustion had worked its way into my bones by the time I reached the counter. Unable to raise my arm above my head to open the cabinet and grab a glass, I just folded over and cried into my hands. How long would it take to heal from this? Weeks. One night of incredible pleasure for weeks and weeks and weeks of agony.
Eventually, I managed to snag a glass, then dragged myself down the counter to the sink. Filled it, my arm shaking, barely able to withstand the weight of a cup of water. Only I couldn’t bring it to my lips—could barely stand.
So. Much. Pain.
And as I slumped onto the counter again, trying to even out my breathing—like fuck would I hyperventilate and pass out here—I wondered just where I would convalesce. Because we’d had sex. A lot of sex. And that was what Loki had wanted from the beginning—a good fuck. Would he send me back to those village psychos now? He’d never answered my question, never even hinted at a reply.
Would they stick me with that screaming old woman? The one who had looked like me in all the ways that counted—she must have been the last one. Loki’s former companion. Kidnapped and trafficked and fucked, then discarded.
My lower lip wobbled, and I pressed a hand to my eyes as the tears flowed harder, hot and wet, slicking over my palm.
“Nora?”
Oh fuck. Difficult as it was, I pushed up, leaned back on my elbows and swallowed the twinge of pain as they dug into the harsh countertop. Loki stood in the doorway, cast in an array of shadows and flattering light, naked and semi-erect, because of course he was ready to go again. I held out a hand when he stepped into the main hall, my lips trembling.
“Please go away,” I rasped, my throat thick yet sandpapery, every word a chore. “Please, I can’t take any more.”
My body might have been in shambles, but adrenaline spiked the second he crossed into the room. I couldn’t outrun him now, couldn’t dart around him and make a break for one of my usual hiding places. Stuck. Trapped. Fucked.
Loki approached me with a frown, his green eyes slowly roving my body. When I flinched back, hand still up and shaking, he slowed, his steps suddenly cautious, one at a time.
Like I was a frightened fawn he’d happened upon in the woods.
“Please, no—”
“I’m sorry.”
I blinked back at him, his words an outright shock. An apology? Really? I’d only heard it once before, and back then, I had taken him at his word. Here, it was hard not to, his expression unreadable, his brows knitted. The god closed in on me, then helped me straighten up with a hand on my elbow. I whimpered and jerked out of his grasp, the sudden movement hurting way more than his touch.
“In my enthusiasm… Sometimes I forget,” he murmured, mapping my bruises with one finger. It ghosted over my flesh, there but not—just enough to make the angry welts and splotches prickle preemptively. Loki shook his head, sighing. “The first time… I…”
Wow. This was an apology. I swallowed hard, fighting the urge to collapse onto the floor. My legs couldn’t take the weight of the rest of me anymore, my back muscles on fire. Even a shift in my stance brought on a world of hurt. Fat, heavy tears cut down my cheeks, dribbled off my chin, plopped on the ground.
Loki’s eyes finally flashed up to mine. “Sometimes I forget how fragile you are.”
“I’m not fragile,” I fired back. My voice might have cracked, every fiber inside blown to pieces, but I still had a backbone. I wasn’t fragile. I wasn’t made of glass. I was human—and he was a dick for forgetting that.
“No…” Loki’s smirk had an affectionate tinge to it, and he swiped my hand, holding it gently between us. “No, not fragile… You’re a firebird.”
He dropped to his knees so suddenly that a whoosh of cool air brushed my face, ruffled my hair. Zeroed in on the most painful part of me, the darkest bruises along my inner thighs, he curved his long fingers around the backs of my knees, and panic lanced through my chest like lightning.
“Don’t touch me—”
“Hush now.” No matter how soft and tender he said it, that was still a command—an order. As much as it pained me, I kneed him in the chest and tried to squirm around him, but Loki caught me—easily—and held me in place with nothing but his fingertips on my legs. Agony shot through every limb, and I clutched back at the counter with a sob, defeated once again.
Just as he had too many times before, Loki healed me with nothing but a caress. He worked slowly, meticulously moving across the landscape of my body with furrowed brows and a tight mouth. Starting with the worst of the bruises, he stroked the tender flesh—and the blood dissipated, like the trauma had never happened. Bit by bit, he fixed me from the bottom up, and by the time he had corrected my too-plump lower lip, I felt like a million bucks.
Like I’d slept for a week straight. Not hungry, not thirsty—satiated in every way. Alert. Aware. Mobile.
This man could save the world. With nothing more than a bit of godly influence, he gave those villagers long lives, healthy children, flourishing crops—wealth beyond measure. All in exchange for me. And with me, he had eliminated weeks of painful healing in minutes.
There was so much good he could do out there.
I mean, muted by that curse, he was operating on power save mode. If he was at one hundred percent, could he fix the human world with a snap of his fingers?
That was why I didn’t immediately sprint off as soon as I was well enough, didn’t cuss him out for hurting me, kick him and scream in his face before burrowing into the mountain for the rest of the night. I just stood there, whole and functional again, wondering what he could do in the grand scheme of things.
And then remembering that it didn’t matter. Saving the world—a pipe dream. He was trapped in here forever, me right along with him. No sense of putting on the rose-colored glasses yet.
My healed lower lip quivered at the thought.
“Do you feel better?” Loki asked, his fingers whispering along my jaw, down my throat. Eyes closed, I nodded.
“Yes.”
“Good.”
My eyes snapped open when his lips found the dip in my throat, his mouth slowly drifting down my body.
“Never again,” he whispered against my skin. Goose bumps prickled over my arms, my legs, my nipples pebbling under his attention. “I promise… Never again.”
“Loki, stop—” I trailed off in a moan when his tongue delved between my folds, flicking over my clit. Pleasure bloomed in my belly, warm and hazy—not like a fire this time, but like a sauna after a horrendous day of practice, every muscle instantly relaxing in the humidity. That was Loki for me: as soon as he licked me, kissed me, touched me, I was a fucking goner. Pathetic, to be so wrapped around a man’s finger, but there I was, thighs spreading enough for him to nudge between. He hoisted me onto his shoulders with a soft growl, the sound primal, possessive, sparking a sharper pleasure inside me, and I wove my fingers into his hair, hanging on for balance.
Loki was a lover unmatched, unparalleled by anyone I’d been with in the past. It was like he just… knew me, knew wh
at I wanted, what I needed. And right now, I needed tender and gentle—something more lovemaking than fucking. Fucking had been great, all nails and teeth and the frantic, violent collision of our bodies. But that was done for tonight; I couldn’t take any more of that.
He licked me tenderly but thoroughly, even his hands cradling my ass gentle. No more bruises. No more pain—not the physical kind, anyway.
In time, my hips started to rock against him, worked with him to bring me to the brink of oblivion. Eyes clenched shut, mouth open and needy little moans falling from my lips, I plunged into the black smiling again, my eighth climax in the last however many hours seeping like liquid gold.
He set me down when I stopped writhing against his mouth. Only then did I realize how tight I’d been twisting his hair, yanking at it in a daze, and I loosened my stiff fingers, then groped at the counter behind me for support.
Loki rose like a soaring tidal wave, tall as this mountain and grinning—and for once the twist of his mouth was neither patronizing nor assholeish. He was just a man, smirking at a woman who he’d made climax all over his face. I flushed painfully at the wetness around his mouth, which he wiped away in front of me like he wanted—maybe needed—me to watch. To see. To acknowledge.
Okay. So maybe a little assholeish.
But without an ounce of douchebaggery, he grabbed my glass, dumped the contents, refilled it, then handed it back to me when I found my footing again. Cold water. Just what I needed, my body glistening, the nape of my neck hot, my chest a furnace. I gulped down a mouthful, then stiffened when he took my hand. Loosely. Not urgently, not possessively. His fingers twined with mine as both of us watched them furl.
He stepped away, this god of unrelenting pleasure, and at first I didn’t follow. I held my ground, clutching my water in one hand, barely holding his in the other. Loki stopped. Waited. Glanced back at me with a neutral yet cozy look that made me weak in the knees and roused those stupid butterflies again. So, I took one step after him, then another, and another, until finally we padded out of the main hall together and into the bedroom. Unlike every other time I stumbled around in the dark, searching for the bed and hoping I wouldn’t stub my toe again, Loki walked me over to my side. He took my drink, tugged back the covers, helped me in, and tucked the blankets up to my shoulders.
“It’s here,” he murmured, his gravelly whisper followed by the clink of glass on stone. He guided my hand down to the cup and let go when my fingertips tapped the rim.
And then he was off, disappearing from my side and reappearing on his. The slightly too-hard mattress dipped when he climbed onto it, and for once, there was no leer, no little comment about the two of us in bed together. He climbed in and under, silent except for his occasional breath and the shuffling of his body beneath the blankets.
Space.
He was giving me space after—everything.
And as I lay there in the pitch-blackness, arm hanging over the bed, hand next to my glass, back to him, I realized…
I didn’t want space. I wanted a solid, masculine body big-spooning mine, just for tonight, for comfort and reassurance and a whole bunch of other bullshit reasons that I would scoff at in the morning.
But I forced myself to be still. Not to engage. Stay in one position. Don’t talk. Don’t roll over. Eventually, I drifted off all by myself.
Alone… and lonely.
17
Loki
A dozen blueberry pancakes. Three types of bacon—smoked, cured, and maple. Scrambled and poached eggs. Hollandaise sauce. Toasted cinnamon bread in the basket, coffee on the go, diced fruit, and a giant jug of mango juice.
The consort of a god deserved nothing but the best after a night of ravenous fucking.
Finally.
My firebird had been everything I’d hoped she would be and more. Passionate. Fiery. Most of all, she was herself. Not disconnected from the moment. Not meek or frightened. Willing. Beautiful. Well worth the wait.
And she deserved something special, something more than healed bruises and a burst of energy, the elimination of her hangover… Something better than the feast before me, even. What, precisely, I would gift her with was still percolating around my brain, but given enough time, it would make itself known.
Maybe a set of ballet shoes.
The thought made my lips twitch up. Yes. She would enjoy that, wouldn’t she?
If she ever dragged herself out of bed, of course. I had been rather loud during the preparation of breakfast, knocking pans and clacking silverware—because I refused to have today turn into one of those days where she slipped away and hid in the mountain. We had connected last night. We deserved some time together in peace, eating and talking and deciding where to take this next.
Preferably back to the bedroom, but I was open to suggestions.
When she appeared in the doorway, wearing her white gown because she had nothing else, I knew what to gift her with in the meantime: a new wardrobe. No longer the sacrificial lamb, she could have whatever she wanted. If she pointed it out to me in a book or magazine, I could even craft it from scratch; the villagers could fetch everything else—anything she desired, no matter the price.
I straightened up in her presence, reaching for the mango juice to pour her a fresh glass. Bright-eyed and pink-cheeked, Nora lingered in the doorway, staring at the spread with her arms crossed. Toes curled, too, like she didn’t want to set foot in the main hall.
“Good morning…” Let her be her usual fussy self. It hardly bothered me—not when I knew how to make her sing. I gestured to the plates and bowls and bread baskets. “Just a little something I whipped up.”
“Are you tipping me in breakfast food?” she asked, eyebrows rising when I snorted.
“After last night, I think you should be tipping me, but—”
“You need to chill,” Nora muttered as she cautiously sauntered into the space, headed for the table but not in a hurry. “You were fine. Adequate.”
She really was the loveliest distraction from the horrors inside my own head. Feisty and sarcastic, bold and brash—I wanted to keep her forever, if only her human life extended that long. Smirking, I popped my chin on my fist, elbow on the table, and let out a luxurious sigh.
“Only adequate? Well, I’ll have to try harder, then.” Her cheeks darkened when I looked her up and down, a sudden and powerful possessive ache in my chest that I hadn’t felt in centuries. “Any notes, firebird?”
Swooping her loose hair behind her ears, she climbed onto the bench across from me, settling into her usual place with a shrug. “I dunno… Don’t be so needy? Have some dignity, man.”
“You truly are the most ridiculous woman,” I remarked as she sampled her mango juice, the glass hiding a small, albeit telling smile. “We’ll produce a scale and you can rank me next time… Critique my form.”
Nora rolled her eyes and licked the juice remnants from her lips. I so wished I hadn’t healed them—wished I could see them all swollen and brutalized in the harsh light of day. In fact, nothing about her appearance suggested anything out of the ordinary had happened last night. Not a shred of evidence remained: no bruises, no handprints, no bags under her eyes from the lack of sleep. A rather selfish thread inside me demanded I leave her next time, ravish her thoroughly and heal her the following day, after I’d had the chance to take it all in.
But that would be rather cruel.
And I had promised—never again. I’d be gentler in the future, more cognizant of her human limitations, even when she looked so delectably divine.
The kettle shrieked suddenly, dragging me out of my stupor, my lazy perusal of her unblemished form. Nora shifted uncomfortably under my scrutiny, then let out a sharp breath when I stood to fetch the boiling water. After filling a mug for each of us, leaving her to flavor hers however she saw fit this morning, I was back at the table and loading up my plate, meat-heavy and indulgent from the start.
Yet Nora just sat there, both hands wrapped around her glass of
juice, her eyes unfocused as she stared at the pancakes. I allowed her a few long moments of that, then cleared my throat.
“Eat,” I prompted, nudging the pancake plate toward her. “You’ve earned it.”
“Gross,” she muttered with a shake of her head, then reached for the cinnamon-swirl toasted bread in its wicker basket. I had heard that response many times over since Nora had graced me with her surly presence—ugh, gross—but this time it lacked the usual snark. Strange. Given what had transpired last night, all of it, from the drunk declarations to the rough sex to the tender apologies after, I’d mentally prepared for a few different versions of Nora this morning. Shy. Quiet. Subdued. Angry. Relaxed. Who could predict anything with this creature?
But this was… unexpected. And yes, that was expected with her, only she seemed fine—just heavily distracted.
“What is it?”
She had the courage to look me in the eye without flinching, holding my gaze briefly before dropping it down to her plate. At no point did she go for the toast, and I rolled my eyes, because this was boring.
“Tell me, firebird.” I poked her shin under the table, which made her jump and flush pink again. “I promise my ego isn’t quite so fragile that any real concerns you have—”
“I’m thinking,” she said loudly, pointedly speaking over me and tapping her fingernail on the side of her glass, “about what’s going to happen when you don’t want to fuck me anymore.”
Frowning, I snatched a sliver of bacon, then crunched down on it. “Why?”
“Uh…” She looked up at me expectantly, like I should just know. When I stared back and shrugged, Nora scoffed. “Well, why not?”