Heat for Hephaestus

by Sotia Lazu

  “Oh, it’s going to be my pleasure.”

  My whole body shivers, my back bowing as he slides his fingers beneath the hem of my T-shirt and they make contact with my skin. He drags his palms up my sides, pushing the fabric higher to expose my belly and press his lips to it.

  I clench my abs instinctively, and dissolve into another fit of giggles when he blows a raspberry above my belly button. My laugh is cut short when he moves his hands higher, to cup my breasts.

  “These truly are magnificent.” Awe lines his tone, as his thumbs graze my nipples. “How do you make it through the day without constantly touching them?”

  I laugh, and they jiggle, and his grin is adorable and sneaky and so fucking sexy.

  “If you’re done admiring my breasts, can you please fuck me, already?” I hook one leg behind his ass and pull him closer.

  “I want to taste you first.” His tongue is on my clit, though he’s still hovering over me, caressing up and down my sides.

  I shiver and fist my hands in his T-shirt. “Next time. We’ve had two days of foreplay. In me. Now.”

  He frowns, and I feel him concentrate on my skirt.

  “I don’t—” think it’s a good idea to rip it.

  Too late, as the sound of denim ripping fills the room.

  My panties go the way of my skirt, and I couldn’t care less. Let him destroy my entire wardrobe, if his eyes glow with this intense hunger.

  I sit up and reach for his fly, but he’s faster, tearing it open and dragging his jeans down his thighs. His cock is just like in my imagination, which makes sense because it was probably not fantasy but memory providing the mental images I masturbated to last night. Hard, long, fucking thick and dripping precum, it bobs above my pussy.

  I wrap my fingers around it and rub it up and down my slit, coating it in my juices.

  Hephaestus groans. “Hold on. Need a condom.”

  Cazzo, I didn’t think of that sooner. But— “I’m on the pill. And with a totally clean bill of health. Got tested right before the trip. And I haven’t been with a man in a while.” I worry my lip. “You?”

  “I’m a god. Can’t contract or pass on any pathogens.” ” His smile is cocky for the first time since I met him, and it looks amazing on him. In the same cool tone I used, he says, “Besides, I haven’t been with a woman in a while. A long while.”

  Unbelievable, when you look like he does, but I do believe him. Relief loosens muscles I didn’t realize I clenched. I waggle my eyebrows. “Then what are you waiting for?”

  He pumps his hips just enough to tap at my entrance. “It’s going to be a tight fit. Are you sure you don’t need...?”

  I lie back down, holding him to me, and slide my ass off the edge of the desk, so the tip of his cock barely enters me. “I only need you,” I whisper in his mind.

  Chapter Twenty-one - Hephaestus

  LAURA CLAMPS AROUND me like a vice, and I grit my teeth so I don’t push all the way in. I want to take my time with her. Prepare her.

  She lets out a sound between a squeal and a moan, and pushes down against me, her heels digging into my ass. It’s tempting, to indulge her and pound her into my desk, but this is our first time together in this life, and I plan on making the most of it. Our first time should be memorable. Since we’re not in a secret garden or a five-star suite, I’m gonna make it special by rendering her unable to walk straight for a few days, and for that, I must take my time.

  I ghost my fingers along the smooth skin at her hipbones and flex my hips, entering her a mere centimeter deeper. When I search her face for signs of discomfort at my girth, her pupils are wide and ringed with the same silver I’ve seen in the eyes of all bonded Olympians and their soulmates.

  Chest rising and falling with short breaths, Laura smiles and licks her lips. “You’re so big,” she says.

  “Am I hurting you?”

  She shakes her head. “Are you kidding me? I hit the jackpot. I can take it all. Don’t hold back.”

  Gaia, I want to give her my all, but I’m not going to dig my fingers into her hips and pull her to me. Won’t impale her on my cock. Not yet. I think of burying my face in her pussy again. Sucking on her clit. Tapping it with my tongue.

  It’s more than a thought. I feel her clit between my lips. Taste her pussy, slick with the tangy, salty proof of her desire for me.

  Laura arches her back and shivers. “Love when you do that.”

  What my mind creates is real. As I told her, I am a god. And miraculously, what comes with that no longer scares me.

  “Fuck me.” She mouths the words, but in my head, they’re an impatient scream.

  I drive forward slowly, one centimeter at a time, despite her mewled demands for more. She’s liquid fire—flames, licking my shaft and balls, and it’s the most right anything has ever felt. When I’m about halfway in, I slam the rest of my length inside.

  “Yes.” She scratches at my forearms, her inner walls fluttering around me.

  Fuck, she’s tight. And scorching hot. And so wet. I circle my hips and thrust forward again, hard enough to lift her ass off the desk. I slide one hand up her belly, bunch her T-shirt in my fist, and order it to disappear.

  Her gasp when she’s left naked beneath me is nothing, compared to the moan my next thrust pulls from her throat.

  Let’s see if I can top that.

  I bend down to trap a nipple with my teeth, and tug lightly as my real, corporeal thumb finds its way to her clit. Her other breast must feel so lonely, so I do what I did earlier, and think of my mouth on that nipple too.

  Laura grabs my head with both hands, rolling her hips into my lunges, as I pick up the pace. I rub tight circles around her clit to the rhythm of my cock driving in and out of her body.

  Her panted breathing and small moans urge me on, until she gasps, “I’m so close.”

  I straighten and slip out of her, and her fury sparks in my chest.

  “What the fuck, Hephaestus?”

  In lieu of an answer, I bring her legs together and to one side and wedge my cock into her pussy again. The angle is different now, the pressure even greater, and I sense Laura’s pleasure building as her tight grip on my cock pulls me closer to the edge. I plant my palm on her thigh, to steady her, and up my tempo.

  “Smack my ass,” she orders.

  “At your command.” The sharp crack rends the air and echoes off the calls around us.

  “Again.”

  Her voice is choked, her eyes shut, as she throws her head from side to side.

  This slap lands lower, and when I drag my thumb between her ass cheeks, she bucks into me frantically.

  Might be a coincidence.

  I coat my thumb in her juices and press it into her asshole, and she tosses her head back so hard, it thuds against the desk.

  “Yes,” she hisses, even as her pleasure in my head gets tinted with shame.

  Of course. Good Catholic girls don’t enjoy anal.

  “I haven’t been a good Catholic girl in years,” she sends through our mental link.

  Good. I push my thumb in through the tight ring of muscle, and she lets out a keening wail, her body thrashing, limbs flopping, as she comes apart beneath me.

  Her pussy clenches around me, trying to hold me in place as I withdraw, but I want to have all of her. I pump my finger in her second hole, and when I feel her relax and come down from her orgasm, pull out and line up my cock with her asshole.

  “You sure you still want all of me?” I ask.

  Laura bites down on her lower lip hard enough to leave marks. Eyes wide as saucers, she meets my gaze and nods.

  I push forward carefully, stopping every so often to allow her to adjust to my size. She’s completely still, eyes still closed and face slack, her mouth forming an O that curves up at the sides.

  Her feelings seep through our bond, and I know this is bliss. Her body is spent and content, and her soul is complete. Her lips tingle, her toes curl, her arms feel as heavy as if they were made
of lead. I know, because I feel what she does. When I am finally fully seated in her and start rocking against her gently, her spiking pleasure compounds mine. I take her, sliding deep into her body again and again, gorging on this double pleasure, until I spill inside her, gripping her thigh as if to hold on to life itself.

  I stretch over her body, to find her lips and pour everything into my kiss. Gratitude that she saved me from myself. Excitement, over what lies ahead for us. Love, for who she used to be, who she is, and what I have yet to discover.

  Her laugh is pure joy. “You broke me. That means you bought me, huh?” she rasps. In my head, she whispers, “Yours.”

  “Yours,” I echo. For fucking eternity.

  Chapter Twenty-two - Laura

  I SWEAR, I JUST BLINKED, and I’m in Hephaestus’ bed, sticky and smelling of sex, and feeling something I have no name for.

  It spreads in my chest and soothes dark corners in me I didn’t remember existed.

  Hold on—that’s not my feeling. It’s his, and he finds it completely foreign.

  I start to turn toward him, and he plasters himself to my back and wraps his arms around me. “I think I’m calm,” he whispers in my ear. Or my mind. “Didn’t know what it was, not to be worried about all the things that could go wrong any given moment.”

  I caress his knuckles. “I’m sorry you didn’t get to experience it before.” Even as I say it, I know that neither did I. I wasn’t myself fully till I was with him.

  He rolls onto his back, and I turn so I’m tucked against his side. I splay my fingers on his muscular stomach.

  “If I say I love you, will you run away?” he asks.

  Any other time, any other man, I would. “Already looking for ways to get rid of me?”

  He chuckles, and my head bounces, and my heart leaps with wonder. “You’re pretty much stuck with me, Laura.”

  I scratch his stomach, and he snatches my hand. Tangles our fingers together.

  “Ticklish?” I ask. There’s so much to know about this huge, gorgeous, sexy, fiery god.

  He doesn’t respond. Is he asleep?

  I look up, to see him staring at our fingers. “What?” I probe through our link, but his side of the connection is shut.

  He lets go of my hand and wriggles his fingers. “These aren’t the hands of a god. Not the hands of a man who deserves you.”

  What is he—? “You mean these?” I run my finger along one of the dark lines of grease etched into his skin. “I don’t mind these.”

  “I do.” He snaps his hand away from mine, and half sits up, jostling me. “I know they’re not dirt—grease tends to stain—but I see you, so perfect, and—”

  “Shut up.” Yup, I just said that to a god. If the bond is complete, I’m a goddess now too, so I get to speak to him anyway I please. Not that my mortality stopped me before.

  He gives me an incredulous look, and I take advantage of his shock, to grasp his index finger. “All these show is that you work with your hands. They have no reflection whatsoever on your value. That said...” I squeeze and focus on his skin. On the flecks of color forming the line. On removing every single one. He removed the front stitching of my skirt. If I’ve... ascended, I should be able to—

  “Ha!” I bring his finger closer to his face triumphantly. “See? Anything can be fixed.”

  His smile is sad and awed at the same time. “I guess you’re right. I just wish all fixes were this quick.”

  He’s not talking about us, anymore. He’s dropped his defenses, allowing me to see what brings down his mood. His parents are gone.

  “Cazzo. I’m so sorry, amore mio. You were dealing with this, and I was all, Fuck me. Fuck me now.” Ugh. I feel like a stronzo again. An asshole, thinking only of myself.

  He pulls me on top of him. “You didn’t exactly twist my arm; I needed it as much as you did. Besides, it’s a matter of time until Hades ascends and I can see them again.”

  He doesn’t sound as excited as the prospect should make him. “Isn’t that a good thing?” I ask.

  His shrug moves the entire bed. “I want to see them. To show them I’m happy. In love. But...”

  “But?” I cup his face. “Talk to me.”

  He presses a kiss to the inside of my palm. “Their memories of me were taken after they left me. Will they know me now?”

  He sounds so fragile. Lost. “Even if they don’t remember who you are, they’ll recognize you as theirs. I didn’t know you, but I knew you. Ugh, I’m saying this wrong. My whole life, something was missing. I thought it was acceptance—by my Papa, my friends, men... Now I know it was you. They’ll feel the same.”

  A weight lifts off him, and it’s like the sun’s first caress on a summer morning. “I’ll go find them, then. But only if you’re with me. And in the meantime, I discovered a long-lost brother who never faded away, and a new... sister in law who acts as if she hates his guts.” His touch raises goosebumps down my spine, scattering my thoughts, before he adds. “Figuring out their relationship should keep me occupied.”

  I bite his neck with a little growl. “Aren’t I enough to keep you occupied?”

  His chuckle makes my insides liquefy with desire. “Of course. We have to talk about where we’ll live—”

  “Greece is fine by me,” I offer.

  “—so your career is unaffected.”

  “Teach me that blinking thing, and location is a state of mind.” I’ll still have to time things right, so it at least seems like I’m in the right continent for a shoot, but such details are unimportant. What matters is that I’m with him.

  Hephaestus caresses down my sides, until his large palms close over my buttocks. “And I have a mystery for you to put your brilliant mind to—if bonding keeps gods from dying in this life, why did those of us who found our true loves during our original lifetime fade away?”

  I open my mouth to ask for more information, but his hard cock twitches between us.

  “Later,” he says. “We’ll figure all this out much, much later.”

  A naughty smirk blossoms on his lips when I welcome him back into my body, where I plan on keeping him for as long as Olympically possible.

  Epilogue - Hephaestus

  LAURA IS ASLEEP IN my arms.

  Laura Fuoco Rossi is asleep in my fucking arms. After we made love until we couldn’t move a muscle. She’s all I’ve ever wanted but never dared believe possible.

  “One of us. One of us.” The voice chanting in my head is Ares’. “Finally, he sees the light.”

  I get out of bed, swallowing a possessive roar. “What do you want?” Is he close? Did he see my soulmate naked?

  “Relax. I’m at home, with the guys.” His smirk is audible in his voice. He may be less of an asshole these days, but he’s not entirely reformed. “We sensed your immortal signature, and Sei thought we should give you a couple hours. I told them you haven’t gotten laid in so long, we might as well give you six. Your time is up now. Join us? We need to talk about the latest addition to our family, before we go to C with that information.”

  We do need to talk, but— “Laura is asleep. I don’t want her to wake up and not find me here.” Though with the bond, she’ll know where I am at any given moment.

  Ares doesn’t snort. Doesn’t call me pussy-whipped. Doesn’t joke about how I wore her out. “I get it. It’s okay. We’ll rearrange for tomorrow. Around seven?” Ares is so weird, now that he’s happy. He entertains, for fuck’s sake, and there are canapés, because now that Tilje knows what they are, she wants them with every meal.

  “Sure,” I say. This is who we are now. We make arrangements, and our family meetings are over food, not alcohol.

  “Now go back to your woman, and know I’ll think less of you if she can walk straight tomorrow.”

  “You fucking assho—”

  Ares is gone.

  And I’m grinning from ear to ear, as I snuggle into bed, next to my woman. In the morning, I’ll make her breakfast, and then maybe we can work
on one of my cars. Or we’ll stay in bed till we’re supposed to meet my brothers. Whatever we do, though, it’ll be me and her.

  Together.

  The End

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