Battlefield Love

by Skyler Andra

  You’re being ridiculous, I tried to tell myself. You’re just horny and pent-up and lonely. It’s not as if you’ve had a lot of fun lately.

  That was the weird part. I didn’t exactly want to have fun with Rane. What I wanted was something more from him. Whatever that was, it freaked me out. I reasoned that I had been on my own for a long time, and my libido tried to coerce my common sense. Hell, being on the run probably made everything worse, really. Making my emotions go haywire over him. For the first time in a while, my adrenaline was really pumping, and that probably meant that the rest of me was getting in on the act.

  It’s just hormones. That’s all it is.

  Of course, that precise moment Rane appeared in the doorway to the bathroom, with the smaller towel draped around his hips. I almost thought that he showed off, parading around like that, providing me an excellent view of his more than impressive body. Everything that had been hinted at while he was dressed was now being shouted.

  Stupid, stupid hormones. I had to get control of this before it swallowed me whole. But part of me remained clear that she wanted to lose control. Wanted to share something with Rane. Wanted him.

  Chapter 9

  Rane wasn’t exactly cut the way that bodybuilders are, guys who have like a negative degree of body fat and who have dehydrate to make all of their muscles stand out in sharp relief. However, I could easily make out the muscles of his chest and his waist, and his legs were strong and somehow graceful at the same time.

  He something about the next town we stopped at, but he frowned when he realized that I wasn’t paying attention at all. “Locke? Locke, are you listening to me at all?”

  “Not really,” I admitted, still admiring him, losing all logical thought.

  There was something freeing about being truthful with Rane. We were nothing to one another. He had a job to do: get me across the country to Seattle to join the other avatars. Then he could be on his way. Back to being a loner again. Me, I had an objective: figure out what the hell was going on so that I could get my life back. Simple. There was no dance of “What movies do you like?” and “Do you hold political views that I would find repugnant?” Everything was comparatively easy, and suddenly I decided that I didn’t care about much else. Right then, I wanted easy, and Rane might just be the man to deliver.

  Every part of me wanted to know what a god tasted like. Felt like. Fucked like. Was an avatar any different to a normal male? Would an orgasm with one catapult me into the stars again like Rane had done when taking me to Ares. I sure hoped so. Minus the overbearing and terrifying elemental presence.

  Rane must have known that something was up when a cagey look overcame his face. But at the same time, he eyed my leg where it hung over the edge of the single bed, sending a tingle up my thigh.

  “Well, you should listen,” he said, unable to drag his eyes away from me. “I mean, we’re going to need clothes sooner rather than later.”

  There was something positively prim about the way he spoke, something terribly straitlaced, and that made me smile. Most women have at least entertained the idea of seducing the overly proper chivalrous guy. But I bet most of those women didn’t fulfill the fantasy with a guy who looked like sex on two legs the way that Rane did, so I consider myself lucky.

  “Later,” I said with a slight smile on my face.

  “What do you mean by that?”

  Stop playing coy, Rane, you know what I’m after.

  “I mean that later is when I want to worry about clothes.” Deliberately, as if I did this sort of thing every day, I let the towel drop to the bed.

  Rane’s eyes landed on me like a solid weight. Somehow, I sensed the way he drew in his breath, that he too felt the sudden fire that appeared between us. No, not appeared. Rose up. There had been something between us almost from the beginning, and now, I had given it permission to rise.

  A tiny part of me wondered if this was a mistake. The rest of me didn’t care, too busy reveling in that heat at my core, in the way that Rane stared at me as if I were a cold glass of water in the desert.

  “Are you making this happen?” he asked, rubbing his tight jaw.

  There was a strained note in Rane’s voice. He looked riveted to the spot, but he finally managed to bring his gaze up to mine.

  “What?” I asked. He thought I used my power on him again? I had no idea.

  He issued a soft growl before he was across the room and on top of me, pushing me back onto the bed with a hard hand on my shoulder. His speed and his roughness excited me, and I had a brief moment to worry about my own self-preservation instinct before something inside me spoke up.

  No. In this place, with this man, you’re the one in control. You and no one else.

  There was no reason in the world to believe the small voice in my head, but for some reason, I did.

  “Are you doing this?” Rane rasped. “Are you using your powers on me now?”

  His hand on my shoulder held me firmly, but there was no hurt in it. With the power welling inside of me, I could have moved a steel anchor as easily as I moved his grasp, but for some reason, I was entirely unconcerned with it.

  “Do you think I am?” I asked, my voice a challenge.

  “I…I don’t know.” He twisted his head as if trying to shake me out of his system.

  “Then you should get off of me,” I said coolly, even if I felt anything but. “If you think this is some kind of godly manipulation, some kind of avatar bullshit, you should get off of me. I don’t want you if it’s some kind of spell.”

  For a moment, I swore he wavered. Then almost simultaneously, we became aware of the fact that his towel had dropped when he’d crossed the room towards me. He had one knee on the bed next to my hip, and his cock, already half-hard, was pressed against my thigh.

  Without thinking about what I was doing, I rubbed my thigh up against his leg, and the heat of him made me purr a little. It was that small movement, that and that alone, that broke the last bit of doubt in Rane. Instead of pulling away from me, he leaned down to kiss me, and in that kiss, I read a kind of truth. Other men might have given themselves over to the fire that burned between us, might have added a kind of brutality and desperation to it. Not Rane.

  Instead when he leaned down to kiss me, there was something almost tremulously gentle in it. He only brushed his lips over mine at first, drawing tremors from my body. He did it over and over again until I chased his mouth with mine, reaching for something deeper.

  It was only then that he gave me the kiss that I had been craving, sweeping his tongue into my mouth and encouraging me to suck on it just a little. Something about that simple act sent a bolt of fire through me as I imagined my mouth on other places. Would he groan? Would he be utterly silent? In that moment, I would have given anything to know.

  “You’re so beautiful,” he growled, running a hand over my body from shoulder to hip. He came back again to cup my heavy breast. I whimpered a little at his touch, but there was something in me waiting, something that watched with hungry eyes.

  Some guys liked my curves a lot, but for some reason, I knew that wasn’t all there was for Rane. He saw all of me somehow, and in a way, it burned. It made me need him more, and that was a little frightening. I had only known him for a few days, and the idea of relying on him even more than I already terrified me.

  “You’re not so bad yourself,” I said lightly, reaching up to run a finger down his chest, over the light trail of hair leading to his lean belly and then below.

  He bent over me as I brushed gentle fingers along his shaft. Tremors made him shudder. His cock suited him, not overly long, but thick, and it sent a wave of heat through me as I circled it, sliding my curled hand around the base and up the shaft. Twice I did it before Rane pulled away, shaking his head.

  “What is it? Did you not like that?” I asked suddenly, and I could have cursed myself. I sounded like an idiot, some girl who was more worried about what she looked like than how much fun she could have.r />
  Instead of making fun of me, however, Rane shook his head. “No. It’s been a little while, so unless you want things to be over before they start, maybe let’s take it a little slower.”

  I started to say something, but stopped when Rane came to rest on his side next to me.

  “Come touch me,” I said softly, and with a soft groan, he did as I instructed.

  He pulled me close, his body against mine, so very different from mine and so very exciting. When I hooked one leg over his hip, it brought us even closer. He buried his hand in my hair, pulling just enough to make me gasp, to kiss my throat. I had never thought that my neck was particularly sensitive, but the way that Rane lip’s pressed to my pulse point, as if counting the beats of my heart, bought out shivers across my body.

  When his teeth nipped gently at the base of my throat, I whispered, “Oh that feels good.”

  He laughed a little. “Good. That’s very good.”

  But for some reason, it wasn’t enough. A strange feeling in the middle of my chest, demanding more.

  He rose over me then, working his way down my body, kissing and petting and lapping at me until I was squirming on the bed. More than once, his teeth grazed over my most sensitive spots, and it sent a shiver of delight through me.

  “You want to bite me,” I said suddenly, sitting up, and he drew back.

  From the red flush on his face to the slightly guilty look that crossed it, I knew he was right.

  “Don’t you?”

  I wanted him to do whatever he wanted to me. “Yes.”

  It didn’t surprise me that he was rock hard when he said it, and almost in a trance, I reached down between his legs to caress his cock again. It drew a deeper groan from him, longing and needy, and this time he didn’t say anything about what it might do to him.

  “How?” I asked.

  “What?” he asked breathlessly.

  “How do you want to bite me?” I asked him.

  He licked his lips, and suddenly there was something feral in his gaze. It struck me that the way he had been kissing me before, soft and restrained, respectful and arousing, had only been the tip of the iceberg when it came to what really made him tick.

  I had dealt with guys like him on the phone line before. They might be perfectly content with keeping things light and sweet, but there was a depth to them, something that would always be hungry, deeper and darker beneath the surface.

  “Rane,” I said, grabbing him by the face. “Tell me how.”

  Somewhere on the edge of my consciousness, I knew that it was more than just phone sex knowhow on my side. There was something like a lantern shining inside me, something that told me I was right.

  Rane dragged his front teeth across his top lip, and I swore I had never seen anything so oddly and innocently seductive. I wanted to kiss him like I wanted to breathe, but still I held myself back. I had never been all that good at delayed gratification, but the truth was that for this, for a chance at something real, I would wait a lot longer.

  “Not hard enough to make you bleed or bruise,” he muttered, almost apologetically. “I just want to hear you.”

  “Want to hear me?” I wasn’t sure what he meant. Hear the scraping of my skin. Hear me cry out in pleasure.

  “I want to know that you feel it.” He shuddered. “Want to feel you move underneath me. Want to hear you moan for me.”

  I swallowed and started to respond, but Rane was already shaking his head.

  “It’s not important,” he protested. “I don’t…It’s not a thing…”

  He went utterly silent when I reached over to place two fingertips over his mouth. In the dim light of the motel room lamps, his eyes were eaten up with black. His tongue came out to taste my fingertips, his teeth gently behind it, and I wanted them more.

  “I want you to do what you want,” I said, my words slow and deliberate. “I want you to bite me, just the way you said. Don’t break my skin. Don’t leave marks on me. If I don’t like it, I’ll tell you to stop. Understand?”

  “Yes.” He was beautiful when he wanted so much from me. I bet he was even sexier when he got what he wanted too.

  “Bite me,” I ordered. “Kiss me. Fuck me. Right now!”

  It was as if I had let him off of a chain. The moment the words were out of my mouth, he pounced on me, bearing me back down to the bed. If I had thought our kisses and touches were fiery before, they were drowned out by what came next. Pinned down, I was reminded of a wild animal crouching down over its prey. In the dim light, I saw his white teeth flash just once and then he nipped me on the shoulder. I gasped, but this gentle, just a pinch of teeth. It might have been sweet if that were all, but it wasn’t.

  Rane felt like a primal force the way he ran his hands over me, using every part of his body to touch me. He worked his way down my side again, and this time, he bit as well as kissed me. Some bites were little more than brushes of his teeth, and some of them were almost vicious, making me cry out in surprise. The pain disappeared in a moment, and it left an unyielding heat and desperation for more behind it. It was as if he were marking me, and right then, all that I wanted in the world was to be marked by this man.

  “Oh, it’s good, it’s so good,” I whimpered, and then he was down between my legs, pressing my thighs open with an almost brutal strength. I’d unleashed this beast, and I was so filled with passion that I didn’t have the space left to be afraid.

  Rane ran his tongue up my thigh, a long, wet lick that ended with a gentle bite just short of my hot flesh.

  “No, not there,” I gasped, but then I hesitated, unsure.

  Suddenly, all I could think about was his teeth on my skin there, and whether it would be pleasure and pain mixed or too much one or the other to bear.

  “I won’t,” he said roughly, but that was all the warning I got before he nuzzled between my legs. He swiped his tongue along my slit swiftly almost as if he were gauging my reaction, and then he pressed me open with his fingers.

  I hadn’t been aware of how hot and wet I was getting. Now I felt it as well smell it, even hear it as Rane’s mouth worked me over hard. Twice his teeth grazed against me, but it only brought on a rush of pleasure, hot and perfect. Almost before I knew it, I was tensing up deep in my core, my body shivering against the pleasure he was giving to me. It felt as if I were standing in a very high place and getting ready to topple over, and while I didn’t want this to end, very soon, I wasn’t going to have a choice.

  “Rane, Rane!”

  With a precision, he waited until the very last moment. Just as my body was on the edge of a trembling orgasm. When there was no way for me to go a moment further without shattering into a million pieces, he stopped.

  I shouted in dismay, staring down at him. “Are you freaking kidding me?”

  For a moment, I caught the glint of humor in his face, and then something far wilder replaced it.

  “Not without me,” he growled, crawling up over me, so hot and perfect stretched over me that I felt the need rise up in me again. As he reached down between our bodies to adjust himself, sanity asserted itself for just a moment.

  “Condom!” I managed to gasp. “Condom, in the drawer.”

  To my faint surprise, when he checked, there was in fact a condom in the drawer. Instead of putting it on, however, Rane handed it to me.

  “Put it on me,” he ordered, his voice low and desperate.

  For a moment, I wondered what it would be like to slip the unwrapped condom in my mouth, to slip it down his cock. Then I abruptly lost all my confidence in my ability to perform fun games like that one and fumbled it on to his pulsing cock, my hands shaking as I did so.

  Although it had been a while since I’d done this, I didn’t lose my cool entirely. I took my time with it, no matter how desperate I was for him, stroking the thin latex down his cock. The heat of him practically burned its way through the covering. With every movement I made, his body heaved and shuddered. He was on the brink, and every motion I made onl
y brought him closer to the edge. Obviously he hadn’t been lying when he said it had been a long time. But my mind couldn’t come to terms with someone as delicious as Rane not having sex or even being single for so long.

  I had just gotten the edge of the condom down to the thick base of his cock when he pushed me back on the bed.

  “Enough,” he snapped, and yes, there was something militant about his air of command.

  A grin took hold of me. He could order and command me all he liked, and it would never mean anything to me, not unless I wanted it to. I had just a moment to feel smug, when he pushed back down on the bed, moving with that same breathtaking swiftness.

  “I have waited too long for you,” he growled softly, and I only had a moment to think about what that meant before he knelt between my legs.

  I ached for him, I needed him, and in that moment, I would have denied him nothing. His mouth and hands had brought me to the point of climax, and right now, I needed him to take me the rest of the way.

  He caught my legs up underneath my knees, dragging me up to him at the same time that he thrust forwards. The hard tip of his cock against my opening, and then he was driving into me completely, joining us together in a moment. There was no way to say it besides that in that moment between Rane and I, it was perfect. I gasped at how he filled me up, and when I looked up at him, I saw him clearly. The soldier part of him that had fought for every moment of his life. That tender part of him as well, the one that always sought something to protect. Then he pulled almost all the way out of my body and plunged in again, and I forgot about thinking at all.

  Rane was strong enough to pull me around like a doll, and he bent and moved my body in the ways that gave us both the most pleasure. Fire rose in me again, and I tensed all over again, my body striving towards the peak that had been promised. Hard but steady thrusts drove me higher and higher, but I couldn’t quite seem to attain the peak. I gave out a frustrated cry, moaning and writhing, but again, he seemed to know exactly what it was I needed. Letting go of one of my legs, he reached down between our bodies. With the heel of his hand, he ground down against my clit, never stopping his rhythm.