Final Debt

by Pepper Winters

  I shivered as his husky voice layered the air.

  Ever so gently, with his eyes full of love, he dried me off from the top of my head to my toes. Once I was dry, I took the towel and repaid him. It took me a little longer and more awkward not having full use of two arms, but by the time I tugged his cock in the towel, he didn’t care about a few remaining droplets on his shoulders.

  Guiding me by the wrist, he stalked to the head of the bed and ripped back the sheets. Swooping me off my feet, he placed me gently on the mattress and tucked me tight. Moving to the other side of the bed, he climbed in and immediately grabbed me, spooning my back against his warm chest.

  A huge sigh escaped him. For a moment, we just were. Just lived and relaxed and hovered in the anticipation of sex while soothed by the happiness of connection.

  His cock remained hard, wedged against my lower back. His feet stroked mine, twitching like the tail of a predator.

  “I don’t know who I am anymore.”

  “I do. You’re mine. You’re Kite.”

  “I’ll never be able to tell you what happened tonight.”

  “I know. I don’t expect you to.”

  His arm squeezed my middle, and I arched into his erection.

  Breathing faster, he turned me to face him, pressing his nose against mine.

  His eyes delved past my soul into the epicentre of who I was. He sought answers to his fearful questions. He hunted for any lie that I didn’t love him as much as I said I did. That I regretted any inch of what’d happened.

  I wasn’t afraid.

  He would find no such farce or hidden secret.

  Only once he’d searched every facet did he relax a little. Only once he fully accepted I loved him with no lie tainting the truth did he touch me. Truly believe me.

  “I’ve done so much to you. I’ve hurt you so terribly.” His hand cupped my cheek. “I don’t deserve you or your forgiveness, but I give you my vow, Nila. I will never hurt you again. I will never put you in harmful circumstances. I will never ask more of you than you can give. I need you to be strong for me. Like I told you the night after the Third Debt, loving a creature like me is hard work. I’ll drain you of every reserve. I’ll feed off your love. I’ll crave everything you can because you save me from life itself. But I vow that whatever I take from you, I’ll give back a hundred-fold. I entrust my heart, my wealth, my very fucking soul to you forever.”

  His voice dwindled, fading to an almost-whisper. “I will never be able to discuss what I did, and I will never do anything like it again. I can’t promise I won’t have bad days. I can’t assure you I won’t need space or time if emotions get too strong to bear. But I will promise I will never love anyone as much as I love you.”

  His gaze entrapped me. “Can you live with that? Can you be so fucking selfless to take me at my worst, my best, my messed-up self and stand by me even when I break?”

  I swallowed tears, pressing my cheek deeper into his hold. “I can.”

  He didn’t speak, letting me gather my thoughts because I had more to say…I just didn’t have the words in which to say it. “You’ll never be on your own, Jethro. You never have to fear I won’t understand or I’ll push you away. You’ll never have to run because I suddenly stopped loving you. I accept your promises and give you my own.

  “I promise that no matter what happens in the future, we will work it out. I vow that no matter how life goes, I’ll be by your side. I’ll always love you because I’ve seen the worst of you and I’ve seen the best, and I know just how lucky I am to have met my perfect match.”

  The room seemed to solidify and melt as he surrendered. “I fucking adore you. I’d lay down my life—”

  My good hand shot up, my fingers pressing against his lips. “No more talk of dying. Not now.” My eyes drifted to his mouth; my fingertips warming as the pinkness of his tongue licked me gently.

  The air between us changed.

  Rapturous ecstasy replaced my blood as Jethro gathered me closer. My hand fell from his lips as his head tilted toward mine. His body heated, scalding me, drugging me with unspoken words and fleeting fondles.

  I needed him.

  He needed me.

  We needed each other to wipe away a lifetime of conditioning and destinies. This was our new destiny. Right here. And no one—not debts, family, or contracts—could take that away from us.

  His eyes flashed gold-bronze with brutal intention as his head bowed the final distance. His lips caressed mine before his tongue fluttered over my bottom lip. “Nila…”

  My muscles turned limp, reacting to the desire in his voice.

  I kissed him back.

  Our lips danced, turning primal, taking, giving, wet, consuming. He sucked on my tongue, gruff sounds of lust and possession vibrating in his chest.

  He tugged my hair, forcing my head back. With my neck exposed, he kissed his way down my chin and throat, over my collar, to my breasts. He never let go of my hair as his mouth settled over my nipple.

  I cried out as he pulled hard and deep, tugging on the invisible cord between breast and core. My womb clenched, wetness wept, and I opened my legs with blatant invitation.

  Rolling me onto my back, he slipped his hard body over mine. His hips fit perfectly between my open thighs, and he sighed heavily as his cock nudged erotically against my delicate flesh.

  Securing my head with fistfuls of my hair, he kissed me deeply, his flavour making me drunk. Satisfaction, relief, desperation—they all had a flavour. Musky, smoky, sweet. He gave me everything. His fear. His happiness. His regret. His hope.

  The kiss was a kaleidoscope of tastes, weaving us closer together.

  “Thank you,” he murmured, kissing my cheekbones and eyelashes. “Thank you so much.”

  I struggled to understand as his hands trailed down my belly. “For what?”

  His mouth never left my skin. “For trusting me, even when I gave you no reason to do so. For giving me everything, even while I took more than I deserved.”

  My eyes remained closed, my body hovering in his masterful spell. My voice was the softest melody. “You can feel that?”

  He nodded, his hair tickling my ribcage. “I feel everything when I’m with you, Nila.”

  I gasped as he captured my nipple again. His teeth threatened, slicing deliciously around the sensitive skin.

  I turned rigid in his arms. More. Bite me. Mark me.

  My fingertip tattoos burned with his initials. I wanted more. I’d paid the debts and survived the final one. I wanted the marks to prove it was him who saved me. He who decimated the contracts and war.

  “I’m so fucking grateful for you.” His slow smile was pure truth. “So awed you’ve fallen for me.” He worshipped me, submitting to me in the most endearing male way. “You kill me every day because I can’t believe how lucky I am.”

  “Stop. You don’t need to—”

  He kissed me again. “But I do. I need to make you see it isn’t empty words or shallow promises. It’s the honest to God truth.”

  My heart skipped. He’d given me so much, and he didn’t even know.

  The mattress cushioned me as his bulk pressed me deeper into the covers. His sculpted arms trembled as he stroked me. His fever still glowed in his skin, and injury slowed his movements, but he never stopped. Never gave any reason not to take me.

  For once, I’d like to make love without fear or regret. I wanted to surround ourselves in happiness and pleasure and shut out the world.

  I ran my hands over his chest.

  He quivered, his muscles hot and tight beneath my touch.

  “I need you, Kite.” I pressed my lips into the hollow of his throat. “I need you so much.”

  “And you have me. Now and forever.” His voice slipped from gruff to husky. He slid higher over me, dropping his head, his teeth biting my shoulder. Gathering me closer, he aligned our hips, pressing his full length against me.

  Being in his arms was divine. A timeless world within a broken one.
Untangling my arms from around his, I swept back salt and pepper hair, staring into his eyes. “You’re beautiful.”

  He sucked in a breath.

  “Beautiful inside and out.”

  “You don’t know how long I’ve wanted to feel worthy of that. To like myself. To be able to live with what I am.”

  “You don’t have to live with yourself anymore. You live with me. Let me love you enough for both of us.”

  His arms flexed, squeezing me so damn hard. “Fuck, Nila.” Rolling me onto his front with a fluid show of masculine power, he hugged me as if he wanted to shatter every bone in my body. Then, as if the glued contact of our skin and overwhelming tenderness of the moment was too much, he rolled me again, pressing my shoulders onto the mattress.

  He hovered over me, eyes heavy with lust, his jaw shadowed with sexy stubble. The attraction between us throbbed to unbearable levels.

  We’d lived through more than anyone would in their lifetime. And despite all the wrongs we’d endured, the delicious provocative taste of danger still lurked around us.

  Jethro was dangerous. He would always be dangerous—not because of his lineage or wealth but because of what he was. However, he was also the gentlest person I’d ever met, building walls and mechanisms in order to live in a world of overstimulation and noise.

  He was also the strongest person I’d ever known. If I dealt with physical imbalances upsetting me daily, I couldn’t image the strength it took to stay true to yourself even when there were so many avenues in which to disappear.

  His hands gripped my hips. His mouth parted, pressing against mine. Tilting his head, he deepened the kiss, sending me spiralling in his arms. His lips were soft but demanding. His tongue silky but possessing. There was no escape from such control.

  I sensed him everywhere, all around me, inside me. His flaws. His triumphs. But most of all his selfless love. He loved me enough to do what he did to his father. Enough to follow me around the world. And enough to put an end to the six-hundred-year-old feud between Weavers and Hawks.

  I skated my hands over his taut spine, tracing his hips to grab his cock. The heat of him was still damp from our shower.

  “Ask me again. Now that it’s all over.”

  Jethro frowned, his pulse thundering. “Ask you—”

  Then understanding filled his gaze. He kissed me sultry and sweet. “Nila ‘Threads’ Weaver…will you marry me?”

  The intensity in his voice burst my heart.

  I nodded. “Yes. A thousand times yes.”

  “Everything you feel for me, Nila. It’s so intense. Too intense. I need you to never take that away from me. I don’t think I’d survive if you did.”

  “I promise.”

  A lazy smile—the first I’d seen in weeks—stole his lips. “I’m going to make you keep that promise.”

  The melancholy disappeared as the dawn switched brighter into daylight. “Oh? How so?”

  His hand slipped down my body, moving between my legs. “By claiming you every day for the rest of our lives.” His gaze hooded as he stroked my clit with sensuous fingers. Everything about him was wicked and wild and so shamelessly real. “Help me, Nila. Help me show you how much I love you.”

  I didn’t need instructions.

  Opening my legs, I let his touch drop downward, stroking my entrance, slowly inserting a finger.

  My hand stroked him in return, rippling over the velvety stone of his erection.

  My back bowed as his thumb pleasured my clit, effortlessly playing me into a ballad of pleasure.

  I cried out as his one finger turned to two. The pressure became indescribably decadent.

  With his free hand, he caught my hips, holding me as I rocked on his hand. “God, you’re beautiful.” His voice was desperate, his fingers fucking me almost leisurely but completely possessively.

  Uncurling my fingers from around his cock, he pressed his erection against my thigh. “Feel me. Feel how much I want you—not just now, but for the rest of our lives.”

  My hands flew downward again, recapturing him, working him faster, harder.

  He groaned, driving his fingers inside me, matching my vicious beat.

  A ripple of bliss caught me; I moaned as his thumb continued strumming. “Jethro…”

  He stopped. “Don’t come. I don’t want you to come. Not yet.” His teeth caught my ear as his harsh breath sent delightful goosebumps over my skin. “Not until I’m inside you and claiming your body as well as your heart.” His voice held a warning, growling with bite.

  “Jethro…take me, please.”

  His lips fell into a stunning smile. His fingers withdrew, and he smeared my wetness around my throat where the diamond collar rested. A slight shadow clouded his eyes. “You’ll wear this for the rest of your life.”

  “I know.”

  “I’ll try to find a way to take it off.”

  I shook my head. “No, I like it.” Holding up my hands, I showed him my tattooed fingertips. “Just like I like these. Our beginning didn’t start the way a romance should, but I wouldn’t part with any memento. Including the Weaver Wailer.”

  His forehead furrowed. “Let’s not call it that. It needs a new name.” His hips rocked, joining his puzzle piece with mine. His face darkened as the tip of his cock found my entrance. Without looking away, he sank inside me, impaling me slowly. His jaw clenched as my body welcomed him.

  The slowness and friction of his penetration drove me mad.

  I gasped as he pushed past the barrier of comfort, sinking his entire length inside me. Only once he sheathed completely and could speak through echoing pleasure did he whisper, “How about Hawk Redeemer?”

  My core clenched around him. “I like it.”

  “Me too.” The rasp of his voice drugged me as he rocked once, twice.

  “Oh...” My eyes shot closed; all I focused on was where we joined. I’d never grow tired of sleeping with this man. Never cease loving him.

  “Fuck, I love when you think those thoughts.” His eyes gleamed with awe. “They’re so strong and pure—it feels as though I’m reading your mind and not just your emotions.”

  “I have nothing to hide from you.” My head fell back as he thrust into me again, driving deeper, changing the angle of his direction. My body accepted him in one smooth glide.

  We fit together so well. We always would.

  “Shit, Nila.” His head fell forward. “You’re so tight, so amazing, so fucking precious.”

  Words abandoned me as I accepted his every thrust. His cock throbbed inside, so hard and thick.

  Jethro kissed me. Hard and fast. His lips trailing to my ear. “I want you forever and always. Like this. No lies. No falsehoods. Nothing between us but honesty.”

  “Nothing.” I wriggled beneath him, craving more. “I promise.”

  The delirium he caused in my blood sent my thoughts scattering. I needed to come. I needed to shatter and be reborn from everything that’d happened.

  “I don’t think I can wait,” Jethro growled, rocking his cock so the base of him rubbed against my clit. I gasped as yet more blood incinerated.

  “Then don’t.” Holding onto his nape with my good hand, I begged. “Please…give me what you want. I need it, too.”

  Heat misted across my skin as he thrust harder, fucking me, adoring me, driving me up the cliff of ecstasy. Heat flushed until it was an inferno, turning me sick with sex-fever, demanding medicine in the form of an orgasm.

  “God, yes. More. Please.”

  Jethro slammed his fists into my pillow, using the bed as an anchor as he rode me. His cock drove in and out.

  I accepted every punishment, cresting higher and higher, wrapping my legs around his hips, begging, loving, soaring faster and faster toward a release.

  His forehead met mine, warmth enveloped us and his pace turned frantic.

  I couldn’t…I couldn’t handle it any longer.

  Ecstasy turned to euphoria. Tingles shot from my toes, crackling through my l
egs, detonating in my core.

  Explosion and bands of bliss.

  I came. “Yes. Yes. God, yes.”

  My pussy fisted him, clutching desperately with waves of pleasure.

  Jethro cursed, but he didn't come. He hovered above me, giving me a gift, all the while watching me come apart. It made my release so singular and special—turning our moment into something so intimately vulnerable.

  Only once I’d wrung myself dry did he fist the pillow and wedge his face into my throat. His guttural groan as he came undone sent another flash of intoxication through my system.

  “Fuck, I love you.” His growl dripped pure sexuality and unrestrained reverence.

  His orgasm quaked his body, wringing him dry as he spurted inside me. I hugged him, letting him splash with his release.

  We stayed clinging together long after his hips stopped twitching. Our heartbeats thundering to the same beat.

  Slowly, he raised himself on his elbows and cupped my head in his hands. The intimacy between us caused sudden tears to spring to my eyes.

  “You’re everything I’ve ever needed, Nila.” His voice was hoarse and deep. “Through every day, every text message, every awful debt, I gave you my heart.” He nudged my nose with his. “And now, you own all of it.”

  My nipples tingled against his chest as my uninjured arm wrapped around his muscular waist. There was no space between us. His heart pattered against mine and I never wanted him to leave. My pussy quivered with aftershocks of our orgasm—milking Jethro’s erection still inside me.

  He chuckled, causing his cock to jerk. “Eager for another round, Ms. Weaver?”

  I gasped, shivering with a mixture of happiness and distress at my last name. “Always.”

  Tilting his head, he breathed, “Kiss me, Needle.”

  My heart leapt into my mouth as I kissed him with everything I had left. Our lips met hot and wet, the crackling lust of sex mixing with the erotic promise of more.

  My fingers disappeared into his hair, holding him like he held me. Our hearts once again spoke silently as his kiss turned demanding and infinite. His cock thickened inside me as his tongue drove in and out, fucking my mouth just like he’d fucked my body.