by Elise Jae
“That’s different.”
The words are sharp. Short. Like a slap, delivered with a white hot sting.
Because Drift isn’t the child of a murderer. He doesn’t have a family history of genocide. Drift doesn’t have the genetic markers for something horrific.
And Drift doesn’t trust that I won’t snap…. That any children I might have would….
A small hand on my back brings me back to the present, Wren steps beside me, and I wrap my arm around her shoulder, pulling her close, happy she didn’t have to understand any of that, even if she feels what I’m feeling right now.
“Wren—”
I don’t get to finish.
Because Wren knows more than I thought she heard. Something that has a flicker of dread in Drift’s eyes.
“I know exactly who you are,Drift. And I don’t care.”
From behind me, I hear Kimba strangle back a laugh.
Wren doesn’t seem to notice. “Thank you for proving exactly what kind of asshole you are. Now, Kimba let me know you two have a meeting on the other side of the Caldera that can’t be missed. You should go.”
Drift blinks at her and then me.
“And,” she adds. “You shouldn’t bother coming back until you’ve done some self reflection and can join us as a considerate house guest.”
That sparks something in Drift and I almost step between them as he says, “You don’t know what has happened. What could happen.”
“Maybe not. But you’re shit at playing harbinger. So go away.”
For a moment, Drift hesitates, and I think, maybe… maybe things are going to go wrong.
Behind me, Kimba clears her throat. “We really do have to leave.”
When Drift looks at Kimba, he deflates and I wonder what passes through their bond.
I follow everyone to the door as Wren herds Drift and Kimba walks with her, chuckling. Whatever Drift is trying to say to Wren, she’s not listening, that, or, whatever it is isn’t worth the dignity of her attention.
By the time, I reach the door, Drift just looks bewildered as he helps his mate into her coat.
Kimba gives me the widest smile, but she doesn’t say a word as she heads out into the flurries that have crept into the garage and signal the potential for an oncoming storm.
Wren stands at the door a little longer than we need to and I can feel her trying to calm herself down, but she’s not gotten rid of all of her irritation by the time she pushes it closed.
“What the actual hell was that?” She crosses her arms over her chest and for a moment, I’m distracted by the way it pushes her breasts up.
“He thinks my... family history is reason enough to keep me from continuing the line.”
“Continuing…. What the hell did your family do?”
I don’t even think about lying to her. That would be like lying to myself. A futile gesture in any instance, But…. “You’ve been here long enough. What stories did you hear about the Brotherhood?”
Wren blinks as if she’s sorting through everything she knows, looking for the answer. “You were all orphans, stolen by a madman who performed cruel experiments on you. He died and you were moved here to protect the rest of the world from the monsters that came in the night to eat your women and children.”
“That’s close enough. The problem, as Drift sees it… is that we weren’t all orphans. Strictly speaking.” I watch her eyes even though I know I’ll feel it if this information changes how she feels. “That madman was my father.”
Confusion traces across her face for a moment and she slides her hand down my arm to my wrist. “Wait, I’m confused. That man did horrible things to all of you and Drift is worried about you?”
“It’s part of the reason I was placed here. This outpost is the closest to Drift’s. I think—I’ve thought—that he might have placed me here so it would be easier to come kill me if he needed to.”
Something colder than the ice outside cuts through our bond, and her hand tightens on my wrist.
“He’ll have to come through me if he wants to try.”
And I think… she might be the only person on the planet who could stop him.
Four
WREN
I don’t want to feel this particular sensation right now. I don’t want to have to open the old wounds left behind by a man who clearly doesn’t deserve the honor of being called a father.
And with Drift gone, I don’t have to.
Sliding my hands up his arms, I step into Fault and press myself completely against him.
I like feeling him.
I like feeling him feel me. And that feedback loop is so sexy.
There’s so much of him, so little of me.
“Fault?”
He hums, a sound I’ve come to equate with “yes” from any of them.
“Why are we still wearing clothes?”
He looks down, as if he’s only just realizing it’s a problem. “Well, we did have company.”
“Why don’t you show me where you’d like to fuck me first?”
He laughs. An effervescence flutters over my skin.
His hands loop down over my waist and he holds me tightly to him. “How about right here?”
We’re still in the entryway, and he doesn’t have a rug.
“Maybe something a little softer.” I tap his chest. “Between you and the tile, I’ll probably be crushed.”
“Bed or couch?” He asks, lifting me against him and pressing his lips to the hollow at the base of my throat. “I can’t think of any other soft surfaces right now?”
“Hmmm… would you like to move this to our bed?”
I like the tightening sensation that comes with the word “our.” He likes it as much as I do. This strange sense of ‘rightness’ that comes with simply becoming one.
I wrap my legs around his waist and hold tight as he walks toward the dark doorway of an open hatch that I noticed before—and the stairs it holds.
But before he starts down them, he makes a strange noise and I feel something that might be embarrassment simmer at the base of my skull.
“Maybe the couch would be better.”
His grip loosens and I slide down his body to the floor. “What is it?”
He drops his forehead to mine, laughing with a flutter of self depreciation. “I wish I’d cleaned.”
“It’s fine,” I lean forward until I’m pressed against him, front to front. “Neither of us expected this.”
“I don’t ever have anyone over.”
“Ever?”
“Just Drift and maybe Kimba if she tags along. And they’ve never come past the living room.”
“Sounds lonely.” I feel him agree with me, “But you don’t have to be alone anymore.”
“From tonight onward,” he brushes my hair back. “I’m yours.”
I can’t stop myself from grinning, and the prickle of joy echoes through me, from him.
“Well then. It’s time for you to take me to bed. Because I’m yours now too. And if you signed Mary’s paperwork, then you’ve legally agreed to keep me happy.” I take his hand and start down the stairs, even though I have no idea where I’m going.
“I didn’t read the fine print.”
“Well, I did, so you can ask me any time you want.”
Humming, a smile on his lips, he slips his hand beneath my shirt, fingers playing across the skin of my back. “I’ll defer to your expertise. Just let me know if there’s something you need. Anything. Just ask and it will be yours.”
When we reach the bottom of the steps, he picks me up again, carrying me in typical bride-over-the-threshold style through into a room that is… a little messy, but I don’t know how I’d notice when the only things that capture my attention are the view (and only for a split second) and then, his bed.
It’s enormous… and I would guess, based on how tall he is, that it was specially made for him. I can’t wait to be the one to truly help him break it in.
“You can gi
ve me the tour tomorrow. Right now. All I want is you.”
I raise my hand, let him sweep my shirt over my head. I take the opportunity to reach my hand beneath his and press it up as well, while he’s distracted throwing my shirt into the pile of his own.
I love the feeling of his skin on mine, the warmth. He’s a different kind of addiction. One I didn’t expect.
“Fault?” He’s touching me everywhere. His fingers have covered every part of me. His lips and teeth and tongue are working their way to exploring every inch of my neck and breasts. “What would you have done if you’d picked me up from the port with the others?”
“I have no idea. I wasn’t supposed to have you. You’re my miracle.”
“I’m sure you would have gotten my pants off a lot faster than this.”
I hadn’t bothered to put any underwear on when I changed from the club dress. I hadn’t counted on having visitors when we got home.
Then, my whole plan had simply to get here and get him back inside of me. I’d dressed for ease of removal.
He’s still wearing his pants and boots and everything else he put on below the waist and it’s just too much clothing.
Which is why—as soon as he slips my ankles free of my pant legs—I pull back, sliding onto the bed that was once his and is now ours… and watch.
I love being naked. I love how his eyes skate over my body. Love knowing that he knows it.
His hands are strong and he works open his belt with a methodical control that makes me squirm at the ideas of the ways I’d ask him to use those fingers.
“If you don’t keep those thoughts to yourself, I’m not going to get very far out of these pants….”
“You have a practice load, remember?”
He shoots me a glance, but the only heat behind it is the kind I crave from him.
When he kneels on the bed, I nearly roll into him, his weight depresses the mattress so deeply.
But he doesn’t cover my body with his yet.
Those strong hands skim over me, erupting waves of gooseflesh and tightening my nipples to hard buds.
“How am I supposed to even begin to fuck you right… when I want to do everything all at once.”
I hum, pretending to think, even though my mind is so far from rational right now. “Grow a second cock?”
He chuckles, breath and lips ghosting over my skin a moment before his tongue follows the same line.
“I don't think any of us wound up with that kind of a mutation.”
“And I don’t need to go looking to find out.”
I don’t even think he says the word, but “Good” ghosts across my synapses.
The way he uses his tongue makes my toes curl.
“Fault?”
He murmurs against me.
“I need the woman’s name.”
He freezes, hands tight on my hips, confusion filtering through our bond. “Why?”
“Because I want to send her a thank you gift.”
He laughs against me, the brief burst of air passing over me before he buries his face between my legs again.
My hips move almost without my consent, and I’m fucking myself with this tongue.
He only lets me move so far. Only lets me take so much control.
And when he pulls back, I sob—the sound as unfamiliar to me as the dark caldera outside the window.
His hand is a cuff around my ankle and he pulls me forward so sharply, I let go of a shriek as I fall flat on my back.
“Just remember Wren, if you tease me for too long, I might just give you everything you ask me for.”
And he gives me exactly what I want, by pressing his enormous cock into me, one agonizing inch at a time.
“It’s hard,” Fault pauses to catch his breath and I chuckle.
“Yes it is.”
“Believing you’re real. They’ve always told us our physiology and yours works… startlingly well together, but having you like this, inside my head….
“Do you hate it?”
“No.” He shakes his head and meets my eyes with something flinty in his as he pushes that final inch into me, making me moan so loudly I forget the sliver of uncertainty that had tried to burrow its way into my heart.
Fully seated within me, it feels like he’s somehow bigger than last time. Maybe it’s just my fanciful imagination.
Slow strokes. That’s how he fills me. Languorous thrusts of his hips. Loving me like I’m something precious. And I let him. Let him do what he needs, knowing I have a lifetime to give and take more.
Steadily, our pleasure notches higher and higher until I can’t stand it anymore and then...I feel his orgasm about to break and that sensation… it pushes me over the edge. I cry out a moment before he curses.
Holding himself above me, all of his muscles tensed, I shiver as I feel him twitch inside me, his come spilling into me again.
“This is perfect, Wren. You’re perfect. And I don’t know how perfection is possible.”
He’s stilled, and I know he’s trying to be gentle with me. He should know he doesn’t need to.
But I’m willing to savor it. To savor the feel of him. It’s pure warmth and joy and… something I don’t even dare reach for yet.
That’s why I cut it short. I need to pull back from that… for now.
“You don’t need to be gentle with me, Fault. If I don’t like something, you’ll know it instantly.”
“I know… and what I’m feeling from you right now…..” He shivers and I feel the full shudder of his body. “You trust me far more than you should.”
“Maybe… but you forget, I feel you too. I know what’s inside your soul, Fault. And there’s nothing you would do to my body that we won’t both, thoroughly enjoy.”
He chuckles into my shoulder. “Why do I get the feeling you won’t be truly happy until I fuck you so hard you can’t walk.”
“I mean… that sounds wonderful, albeit completely impractical.”
He pulls me against him, his cock still impossibly hard. “The things you want me to do to you… I’m scared I’ll hurt you.”
“You won’t.” I trace my fingers along the ridge below his eye. “You’ll give me exactly what I want, because you’re mine and I’m yours.”
He pulls back, just enough that he can drive into me with a hard thrust. “I’ll give you anything you want, Wren. All you have to do is ask.”
And then, he’s truly fucking me. Each thrust met by my own. I’m tempted to ask him to turn me over… but I can’t. I can’t do anything but fall victim to the pleasure.
His grip on my shoulder is brutal, but the pleasure he drives into me—like each stroke of his cock pushes it deeper inside of me—is pure divinity.
My hold is just as tight as I drag his face down to mine.
We reach that peak quicker this time. The rough coupling something we both want, despite his fears.
He pours into me, his come is heat and desire coiling through me. I grip his face tighter, not wanting him to have any chance to pull away. I drink in the sounds he makes.
We’re both breathing hard, and he shifts, falling to his side, and dragging me with him.
Neither of us wants to break the physical joining, but I can’t keep him inside of me forever.
“Stay put.” I lean into him, using all of my weight to hold myself against his kiss. And then, I slide from him, from his bed, and into the bathroom—the only other door in the space.
Low lights flick on and I pause just long enough to let my eyes adjust before I find the commode.
He was worried about the mess he lives in, but it’s not bad.
My bathroom has looked worse after a busy week’s neglect, and I didn’t see anything in the bedroom that made me immediately think “slob”, so…
The only thing I’m getting through the link is that delicious sated exhaustion.
He might be in the other room, but it feels like I’m still wrapped up in him. And that’s exactly where I want to be.
He gathers me close, lips against my forehead, warmth along the length of me.
He strokes his fingers over my back. “Do you think it will get easier?”
“What do you mean?”
“Do you think it’ll get easier? Being with you, and managing to not rip your clothes off every ten minutes?”
I laugh against his chest, kissing the scarred skin there. “God, I hope not.”
“It’s distracting.”
But he doesn’t mean it.
“I’m okay to try to work it out of our system. How would you feel about not leaving this bed for the next week—except for bathroom breaks and the inevitable need for food and water.”
“Lots of water.” He chuckles, and it’s a sleepy sound. “We’ll sleep tonight, and make that decision in the morning.”
“If I wake you up in the middle of the night, does that mean we have to restart the countdown?”
He makes a sleepy sound. “It’s already in the middle of the night. But if the mood takes you when the sun is up…..”
FAULT
I don’t know how long we slept before I woke to her, half asleep but on top of me. She didn’t need to be fully awake to guide my cock into her. This drowsy lovemaking is completely different from the other interactions we’ve had, and I savor it as she holds herself up off my chest, fingers digging into muscles. I don’t move as she swivels her hips. Soft sounds fall from her lips and make me want…. So much more than I could ever have asked for.
Even the cry as she comes, dragging me over the edge with her is soft and sweet and wholly not made for a man like me.
Her chest rises and falls in a rhythmic motion as her eyes flutter fully open. “Hi.”
I can’t stop the chuckle that comes at such a simple greeting.
“Hi.” I say back as if I’m not painfully hard, buried inside of her.
As if we haven't had more sex in the last twelve hours than I’ve had in two months.
She’s going to be sore if we keep up this pace.
“We should go back to sleep, sweetling.”