by Rebecca Grey
“What are these?”
Ryker cupped her hand to her neck, looking away from me. “It’s part of what I need you to distract me from.”
An urgent, pressing fury built tightly in my chest. I smoothed my button-up shirt down, trying to rally my self-control. If Daethian did this to her, I was going to freeze his heart.
“So will you tell me the incentive now?” She twisted and looked up with me. Something like hope shined in her gaze.
She really wanted to be distracted. And maybe, so did I.
“If and when I make progress, you take an article of clothing off.”
Ryker smiled like she thought I was joking, then laughed with a small shake of her head. I could feel the slight chuckle vibrate through her arms where I held her. “You don’t think that’s too tempting? I won’t have sex with you, Dace. Not till I’m sure.”
“Not yet, you won't.” I kissed her forehead. “I won’t touch, only look. Unless...”
“I won’t change my mind.”
“Okay, okay. It’s just an option… that’s available. It’s literally always on the table, you just have to ask.” I winked and took a couple steps back. Simple chairs and decorative pillows filled the small living space. I turned, looking around for ideas of anything I could try and take with me that wouldn’t be so terrible if I ruined them. Happily, I grabbed one of the incredibly dusty novels, clearly only used as a prop, off the side of the desk and held it in my hands.
“What do I get out of it then?”
“Set your terms, Ryker.” I waved my hands in front of her.
Both hands planted on the curve of her hips. “Every successful turn, I pick a new, bigger object. Anytime you fail… you take off some clothes.”
“Oh, look at you.” I feigned surprise. “What a negotiator you’ve become.”
“Take it or leave it.”
The air felt thick. Tension, both good and probably at least a little bit bad, churned between us. Gods, I hoped I could pull this off. Even underneath the plain clothes she wore, I knew the figure of a woman was there.
“It’s a deal” I stretched a hand out. She took it firmly and shook on the bargain. Clearing my throat, I set the book back on the desk and lifted up a pen. “Better start small then.”
“That feels a little bit like cheating,” she said.
My laugh disappeared in the void of space as I vanished from in front of her and reappeared a foot behind her. She turned and watched as I held out the full pencil.
“Okay, then.” She slipped out of the boots she was wearing and kicked them over to my feet.
“That feels a little bit like cheating.”
“Hardly,” she snorted, as she snatched the pencil out of my hand and began walking around the room for another object. Her sock feet were quiet on the floor as she padded through the room. She disappeared into the bathroom and reemerged holding a wooden paddle-brush. “Now try this.”
“Easy enough,” I smirked.
“Don’t get too excited.” She pointed at her sock covered feet. “These are next.”
Huffing a growl, I took the brush. Magic tingled over my skin, swelling to consume the additional object it wasn’t used to. I kept her image in my mind's eye as I wasted no time manipulating my travel and returning a few feet from where I started. I held the brush up with a triumphant grin.
“Fuck yes! Take the socks off.” I danced.
“You don’t have a weird foot fetish, do you?”
“You think foot fetishes are weird?” My smile grew as she slipped one sock off and waited. “The other one, too. They are a pair.”
She rolled her eyes and pulled the other one off, tossing them over by her shoes. She pulled the brush from my grip as she passed, and moved toward the table. The book I held earlier sat crooked and half off the edge.
Air passed in a whoosh over her lips as she blew the dust off the cover. Particles of the powdered dirt misted into the air before her. “Now that you’ve had two freebies, let’s try this.”
“Done.” I took the book and stepped through the pockets of space that didn’t exist for other people and appeared in the desk chair. I opened the novel and flipped through it’s pages. Boring, blah blah blah, some fantasy tale filled with humans and violence.
“Have you been practicing without me?” Ryker almost looked offended at the idea. Her fingers skimmed over the edge of her shirt.
My eyes lingered on the skin above her pants, trailing over the dip of her tapered waist, and up to the nude colored bra as she lifted the shirt over her head. Her gaze narrowed.
“Is this prize enough for you?”
I blinked. Every time I saw her, her curves filled out even more. The more she trained, the more her muscles grew, the more nutrition was filling her body, the less ribs I could see and the greater her bust filled out. She was everything, and she was only half naked.
“You’re beautiful.” I smiled. Honestly, I could be content to look at her for the rest of the day.
Ryker brushed off the comment and looked around the room. I set the book down on the desk curious as to what she could find that was the next step up. She jerked to a stop as she looked around the dresser and pointed to the bed.
“Moving the bed is quite a big jump, don’t you think?” I laughed.
“Not the bed.” She bent down to her knees and reached under the bed. “This.” She dragged out a small chest from under the bed. She held up over her breasts, hiding the nearly naked bit of her as best she could.
That would be harder to move… but if I could do it, she would have to lose one more bit of clothing. I’d gladly take another chance at worshiping at every subtle curve of her body. Sighing loudly, dramatically, I walked across the room and took the chest. Not only was it large, it was quite heavy too. A testament to her growing strength.
“This could be tricky,” I mumbled. Then I looked at Ryker and the way she folded her hands over her chest. She might be feisty, she might have good banter, but she was not confident about her body. A shame considering she was so pretty. Maybe my prize for progression wouldn’t do her much good.
I gripped the edge of the chest and held it to my stomach. The familiar static-y magic feeling danced over my skin and I willed it over the box. The magic could have easily stretched I found, but I didn’t let it.
As I shaped back into reality next to her, I could hear part of the box clatter to the floor where I once was. Letters, weapons, and worthless knick knacks spilled out the side of the chest into a pile at my feet. I set it down with a fake frown.
My fingers reached for the button of my jacket. Ryker’s gaze snapped from the chest, to my face, to my hands. I lifted a single eyebrow as I shrugged the jacket off.
“Well, this won’t do me any good anyway,” I whispered and began unbuttoning my sheer shirt underneath. “Two for the price of one.”
With a laugh, I threw my shirt at Ryker. Her attention had begun sweeping over my body, greedily taking me in. She made it hard to contain myself. “Stop looking at me like that.”
“Isn’t that how you look at me though?” She took a slow step forward. Her hand lifted, calloused and scarred, she ran her fingers over my chest and the dip of my abs. “Your skin is flawless.”
She saw every nick of her skin as a blemish, where I saw it as just another piece of her. Another perfect piece. It made sense that she hated the markings, since she hadn’t asked to be punished with such severity. Despite the roughness of her hands, the feeling of them tracing over me was pure luxury.
With my hands, I ran my finger over every scar. As delicately as I could, I traced their lines on her torso and the top of her shoulders. Her mouth parted, her breathing quickening.
“Do you not think you are lovely?” I asked.
She smiled softly. “I’m not ugly, but I’m still not sure how I snagged the attention of someone as handsome as you.”
“Is it the scars you don’t like?”
“I hate them. They ruined my body.”
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The quiver in her voice made me squeeze my eyes shut for a moment. I wanted her hurt to be erased. Watching her, I lowered myself to a scar along her shoulder, the place where a whip had come too high, and pressed a kiss to it. “How can I convince you otherwise?”
I could feel the slightest tremble that traveled through her at the touch. I wanted to chase that excitement, I wanted to make her scream in pleasure. But not yet, I reminded myself. First, she needed to love herself like I loved her.
With the tip of my nose, I ran my face over her skin to another scar. “It would appear that every inch of you has been made for me. Like you were carved out of the likeness of a goddess.” I kissed the spot and took a deep breath of her warm scent.
“I don’t believe in the gods. Nymphs believe in Mother Nature,” she whispered and cupped my face as I leaned closer to hers.
“Maybe they both exist. Maybe neither. Or maybe they’ve chosen to combine their creations with the likes of us.”
Ryker’s teeth ran over her bottom lip, holding in the slight grin. I toyed with a curl near her face.
“I love the kinks of your hair. I love the fierceness and the vulnerability that somehow coincides in your evergreen eyes. Your lips,” I brushed my finger over her mouth. “They were made to fit mine, I believe it.”
“You’ve probably said that to a thousand girls,” Ryker said in a hushed tone, but her attention remained on my mouth.
“Never.” I lowered my face to hers. Our lips brushed so closely, her eyes fluttered shut.
“Kiss me,” she eventually said.
With her blessing, our lips fully met. There was a fierceness to the kiss, a desire that had to be met. Tentatively, her tongue traced along my bottom lip. But as my fingers drew circles over the jagged skin of her back, her arms wrapped around my neck, pulling me closer, each kiss grew more frantic.
Her heartbeat raced against my chest, every breath fanning over my face. The taste of her only made me want her more. Together we stumbled back toward the bed. Her body was pinned beneath mine as the mattress dipped with our weight and the soft blankets wrinkled.
I pulled my hands out from underneath her, stroking down her face, down her neck as our kisses grew and we swallowed each other. There was peace in this moment. Every worrisome thought melted away. Ryker’s body, typically so filled with tension, loosened as my fingers roamed her skin.
Slowly, I ran a line over the swell of her bust over the top of her bra. A small moan escaped her against my lips. I could smell her wetness in the air. The feeling of my own desire pressed between us. Slipping my hand over her bra, I could feel the point of her nipples under the fabric. I caught the peak of her bust in one hand, gently tugging before I took her whole breast with the fullness of my palm.
She moaned, grabbing my face and pulling me roughly against her. I lost the feeling of my own uniqueness and my own identity. It was no longer me, but we. We were a single entity that made the idea of what I was before her feel so foreign and wrong.
My hand caressed down her body. I cherished the thought of what it would be like to feel whatever slickness had formed between her legs. A literal, tangible, reaction to her desire. I drew a line over her bare skin above the waistline of her pants.
Ryker shuddered at the touch. I stopped, breaking the kiss, and panting.
“This is where I draw the line.” I rolled to the bed staring up at the ceiling as we listened to our heaving breaths next to each other.
“Thank you,” she finally said, turning to look at me. Her curls had fanned out around her and her full lips were red and practically swollen.
Closing my eyes, I reveled in the feeling that still swelled in my heart. With one hand, I reached for hers, the other tucked my erection away as best I could. I turned to her and held her gaze.
“It isn’t my job to convince you with lust to bed me. If you aren’t ready mentally, you aren’t ready at all.”
A smile grew over her lips. “How did you become so sweet, Dace?”
I laughed, because sweet… I was not. “I’ve waited a long time for you, Ryker Avery. I can wait as many more days as I need to for you.”
Rolling to my side, I took her hand and laced our fingers. “Whatever is enough for you is enough for me.”
The look she gave me, her large hope-filled eyes, her cheeks the slightest rosy red, and her mouth still pink from our kisses, burned into my memory in the very best of ways. One day she would love me too, I reminded myself.
Because sometimes the waiting hurt.
TWENTY-SIX
Milo
As the distance between me and Randsin undoubtedly grew greater, the roar of magic inside me became a throbbing ache instead of the fire-storm it had been. I didn’t bother to fight as the two winged males carried me off to a cell. Ungreased hinges screamed in protest as the door was shut and locked behind me.
Red looked startled when she saw me coming. Her hand wrapped around the bars nearest mine as she pressed herself forward. “What’s happening?”
Jerydin and the other man exchanged a look. “What are we supposed to do with her, Graceson?”
Graceson, as he was called, shrugged his shoulders and headed back up the stairs. Everything was left how it was as I had last seen it. All the blood splattered tools and the table with cuffs remained, no new occupant within them. My gaze traveled the cells I could see. Still empty.
As the men’s steps faded away from my hearing, I walked to the corner where Red’s hands could be seen. The metal bars were cold where I pressed my face to them.
“Damn it, Milo, if you don’t tell me what is happening I swear I’ll find a way out of the cage just to kill you myself.”
“Do it, it’s probably better than what they have in store for me,” I sighed, rubbing my temples and lowering my voice to a whisper. “He is here.”
“Who is here?” she snapped.
“Randsin, the man who stole from my queen. The entire reason I’m in this gods-forsaken realm. I tried to fight the urge as best I could, but it’s so damn painful. I told him to run and if my queen ever finds out that I’ve betrayed her like that, she’ll hang me.”
“What are they going to do with us?”
There was a growing fear in the tone of Red’s questions. Some sort of urgency built within her to find some way to survive, to get herself out of here. But I didn’t have any answers, and I didn’t know how I was going to survive. If they were smart, they would try to get information out of me and then they would kill me.
“I don’t know,” I managed.
Voices rose far past the stairwell. Two people argued as they walked down the hallway above us toward the stairs. Their words were muffled at the distance, until they reached the door.
“Well if the ruse is up, I’m setting her free,” a female voice said stubbornly.
“We don’t even know what’s happening, yet. Would you just listen for once?” Windre’s voice growled.
“Maybe next time,” she said with a snap as she took the final step. Her dark green eyes made contact with Red’s, her jaw falling slightly ajar. “Windre she looks awful,” the girl cried, a curly ponytail swung behind her as she ran toward the cell with her keys.
Windre stepped quietly down the last step, watching her. Every word she said left him flinching. He didn’t bother to give me any of his attention.
“I told you not to do this. I told you this was wrong.”
The woman's scent filled the air. Not fae, but nymph. She looked very free, and very much like she had some sort of control over Windre himself. It was becoming more and more apparent that Windre wasn’t who he said he was. But maybe that made him more empathetic, maybe I could plead my case.
“I’ll get you cleaned up,” she whispered as she held Red and guided her up the stairs, keys still in her hand. She narrowed her gaze on Windre. If looks could kill, he would be dead a million times over.
A new set of feet came down the stairs, stopping before the person could be seen.
Windre sighed and finally turned to face me. He didn’t look cruel anymore, he just looked tired. Behind him, Randsin stepped off the last step.
The bars of the cell rattled loudly as I pushed against them. Magical urges consumed me, burned inside my bloodstream, and forcefully moved my muscles against my will. I cried out in pain.
Randsin palmed the wall next to him. I could feel the magic running through from him and into me, some of it trickling away toward Windre. Windre crossed his arms, his long robe folding in front of him. Randsin had learned some new tricks since the last time I saw him and he lost his ability to speak.
“Why are you here, Milo?” His voice carried inside my head.
I tried to hold in the sob of pain, but it still managed to tumble from my lips as my whole body pressed against the metal trying to find some way to him. “You know why I’m here, Randsin. My queen wants the token back, and she’s using my blood oath to make sure that it happens.”
Windre’s eyebrows knitted, one hand rose to his chin with a finger over his lips. “This can’t be anything good.”
“No,” Randsin said to the both of us. “It brings back unpleasant memories.”
Heat seared up my spine. I gritted my teeth. “Please. Please leave, your presence is so painful.”
“You gave me the token to take from her. Now you want to take it back.”
“I don’t want to take it back,” I yelled. “She’s forcing me to. Can’t you see I’m not in control of my own fucking body?”
My muscles twitched. Every inch of my skin flushed every shade of red imaginable as I fought against the iron bars. I could withstand this pain, I tried to tell myself. I could do it as long as I knew the token remained out of my hands.
“Randsin, go, and I’ll talk to him.” Windre pointed back up the stairs.
Randsin’s lips twisted into a scowl, his eyes staying trained on me until his body was no longer in view behind the wall of the stairwell.
A couple more sobs shook me as the pain sat at the surface, still plaguing my brain and my muscles. He has gone. I told myself. He has gone. But it still took time for the blood oath to settle once more. As it did, I let go of the bars and sat down on the floor.