Merran gave her a disgruntled look. She grinned and spread her hands, blinking at him innocently. “What? I thought you said there was no sexual interest between us, and that bed is huge.”
“I didn’t know you were quite that good an actress. You played it wonderfully today. Why did you end up rescuing me?”
“Think about it. It could be useful to have someone who is willing to play as a smokescreen.”
Merran frowned at her. “Smokescreen?”
“I’ll play your lover, redirect the media, build my career, and get some of your publicity and glamour to rub off on me. So to speak.” She gave him another heated look he didn’t know she had in her.
Merran sat up. “How far is this … smokescreen to spread?”
“As far as you like. You already know I’m willing,” Idara said, sprawling a little more indolently on the couch and spreading her legs wide.
Merran got to his feet and, turning his back on her, paced to the window. He stared out at the dark slopes lit only by the lights that lined the lifts. “I thought you wanted to be taught how to seduce someone. Seems to me you know quite enough already.”
“I haven’t had the experience I need.” He sensed her come up behind him. She didn’t quite touch him, but stood close enough that their auras brushed. He could, far too vividly, imagine her naked, and he felt his body react. Maybe it was the pretending they’d done, but he was suddenly interested. Very interested, no matter what he’d told her earlier in the car. “You can give me that experience.” Her fingers trailed through his aura as she brushed the thick sweater on his back.
Merran flipped the shutters closed and turned to face her. He lifted his hands to grab her wrists and push her back. The movement jiggled her body, and he realized she wasn’t wearing a bra. Trying to control his reaction, he had to close his eyes briefly. No matter what his head said, his body was certainly willing enough. He was suddenly glad his shielding was as solid as it was and his sweater hung long on him, since his jeans were abruptly very tight. Why had he never noticed how attractive Idara Tenricth actually was? She was almost as tall as he was, athletic, and surprisingly buxom for an Azellian woman. Tamara and her generous curves had changed his taste in women, he realized as he acknowledged that he wanted to run his fingers over the silk of Idara’s camisole and cup her breasts in his hands. “Ida,” he said, feeling and sounding strangled, “this is not a good idea. Alarin and I are on touchy enough ground as it is. I don’t know what he’d do if he knew …”
Idara laughed a light little tinkling sound. “We just played it up for the world, Merran. He already knows, believe me. How is this going to make things worse?”
Merran took a deep breath in and back out through his nose. He glared at her. “This way, I can tell him honestly that nothing happened, that we played it up for the cameras.”
Idara pulled the camisole off in one smooth gesture. Merran closed his eyes again, suppressing a groan. “Why does it matter what Alarin thinks?” she asked, stepping up against him, rubbing herself against his sweater. She lifted his sweater and pressed her warm hand against his stomach, tugging gently on the hair that dusted his mid-section. “He will probably be thrilled to know that I’ve really moved on.” Holding up his sweater, she lowered her mouth to nip lightly at his skin.
Merran shuddered at the touch of her lips against his abdomen. She glanced up at him, an expression on her face he’d never seen before, not even earlier that day. His empathic talent told him she wanted him, almost as badly as he wanted her, but it was the hint of mischief, of passion, that caught him. She kept her eyes locked with his, even as she carefully undid his jeans and shoved them and his underwear down off his hips. He closed his eyes and she moved down, teasing him, his body tightening pleasurably as she continued to actively arouse him.
He gave in, leaning down and pulling Idara up to kiss her ferociously, drawing her tightly against him, his mind shoving past her light shields to slide into that area of the brain that controls sexual desire. Idara made a sound at the back of her throat as he stimulated that area, sliding her hands to scratch across his bare skin. An involuntary groan crawled up his abdomen and into his throat. It had been a long time for him, and his body ached almost unbearably. He didn’t count his impetuous one-night-stand when possessed by the Dorbin, and neither did his body.
He let Idara up for air only long enough to strip off his clothes. She watched him, her dark eyes wide in arousal. He could feel her as she watched him undress, her eyes dilated in desire. She reached out to brush her fingers across his erection, and it responded, sensations skittering through his body and up his spine as she slipped her mind around his, sliding into a link without much effort. He used the access she allowed him to trigger a cascading series of orgasms, using his empathic channeling talent to rebound the sensations of her own climax back at her until she collapsed to the ground, pulling him down with her.
He landed on top of her. If he hadn’t been quite so sexually frustrated himself, he might have managed to avoid intercourse, but as intense as his participation in Tamara and Alarin’s sexual encounters had been, he missed the sensation of being inside a woman, and the afternoon Tamara had conceived—months ago—had been the last time he’d allowed himself to fully participate in a sexual encounter. Idara was warm and welcoming, her body and mind wide open. He took her invitation and let himself sink into her body, starting up a hard and fast rhythm he hadn’t let himself experience in a long time—certainly not with the very inexperienced Tamara. Idara matched him, meeting his rhythm with her own stimulation, using her psi to increase his arousal. He had only enough awareness outside of the spiraling pleasure to make sure his lower level shields were firmly in place—he could not have Idara wander his mind without barrier—then he let the pleasure spill up his entire body. When he came, it was explosive, as if he would scatter to the four winds.
Too relaxed to move once it was over, Idara stared up at him and smiled, a slow, sultry expression. “Damn. How did you do that?” She stretched, her body moving against his in a sensual dance that made him shiver. “That felt … amazing. I’ve never had anyone play inside my shields like that. Is it a Corina thing?” She shivered voluptuously and eyed him. “How long has it been since you’ve had decent sex anyway? You were … quite wound up.”
Merran rolled off of her and sat up, pulling his knees close. “Little tricks you pick up along the way.” He got to his feet and padded into the bedroom, slipping on one of the complimentary robes and bringing another one out for her.
Smiling, Idara took the robe he held out to her. She sat up and slipped it over her bare shoulders, her dark hair spilling over the white terrycloth fabric. “Those are some tricks.” She climbed to her feet with his help, not bothering to tie the robe closed. “I told you I needed more experience. I didn’t realize until just now how much more experience.”
Merran didn’t respond, walking on bare feet to the chair and dropping into it. His robe gapped, but he ignored it as he sank into the chair and crossed his arms over his chest.
“So tell me one thing. Two things actually. Do you want my help in misdirecting the media or not? And is that trick you did, playing inside my shields, a Corina thing, or can anyone do it?”
“No. It’s available to any of us. You just have to know where to look to set it off. The only thing I can do differently as a Corina is project your own excitement back at you.” Which he had done quite effectively. It had worked amazingly well, since surprisingly enough, Idara was quite passionate and very responsive. He wouldn’t have expected that of her. As long as he’d known her, she’d been rather remote and somewhat cold—he’d never gotten the impression that she and Alarin were particularly passionate as a couple. Before their connection had stopped, he’d ridden enough of Tamara’s lovemaking sessions with Alarin to know that lack of passion certainly wasn’t Alarin’s fault. After tonight, he realized it wasn’t Idara’s either. Even though there was nothing more than gentle caring betwee
n Idara and Merran, Idara was quite an enthusiastic and generous lover. “As for your other question, we can have a public relationship, but I do not want intimacy. I am not after a true lover.”
Idara smiled. “Of course not. Neither am I, for that matter.” She stretched her arms high above her head. Merran met her eyes steadily, not letting his gaze wander lower. “I’ll drag the cover sheet out here and give you the comforter. I’ll make do with the other sheet and the blanket.” She disappeared into the bedroom area and came back moments later with the sheet and comforter.
“That works,” Merran said, getting to his feet to spread the sheet on the couch. It wasn’t going to be a comfortable night, but it beat sleeping with Idara. Surging through her shields and into her body the way he had disturbed him. It made him remember the parts of his relationship with Tamara he missed, sometimes keenly, and he didn’t want anyone else getting as close as she had. “Goodnight,” he called as she disappeared into the bedroom again.
“Goodnight,” she replied, and he heard the bed squeak as she climbed into it. He sighed and tried to go to sleep himself. Sleep was long in coming, but he finally dropped off.
Merran jerked awake two hours later, his mind fully alert. What had woken him? He listened with his ears and heard nothing but silence. Casting out with his mind, he brushed across Idara’s sleeping form, acknowledging her shields, which flared slightly at his touch, then moved on wider, deeper, higher, and lower, still searching.
He found something, the faintest whisper of awareness, deep in his soul, too fragile and faint to access without some effort. He sat up on the couch, arranging himself into a meditative posture and breathed himself into loosening the ties that shackled his awareness, plunging deep into the river of his consciousness, into that area from which all being sprang.
Warmth spilled through his body, spreading out from his lower abdomen to his toes, up through his chest and out his head, pouring from his arms and fingers, sending a delicious tingle through every part of him and stirring long stagnant energies. With an almost audible snap, he slipped past a sense of self, past a sense of having a physical body, into the soothing rush of being that washed him away, cleansed his stresses, and dumped him, energized and energetic, back into his own body. With the edge of his hearing, in the deepest reaches of the ether, the aaryaSong gathered, swelling forward, and he could almost feel the anticipation of release, of spring, that was Azelle’s Festival.
He jerked out of his meditation so fast it made him dizzy. “Shit,” he swore succinctly. “Damn it, damn it, damn it! Ida!” he called, jumping off the couch. “Ida, get up!” He strode into the bedroom. “Ida, come on, wake up.” Idara lay sprawled on her stomach, diagonal across the bed, the blanket wrapped around her waist and her long dark hair spread across her bare shoulders like a cloak. Merran felt himself react and sternly pushed the feelings away. Now was not the time. He couldn’t afford to lose himself in Festival fervor. Not yet. They had to get back to the embassy.
“What’s wrong?” Idara mumbled, lifting her head and blinking at the brightness of the light pouring in from behind him. “What happened?” She turned and sat up, paying no attention to her nudity.
“Festival. It’s coming. The aarya are building the Song.”
Idara stared at him. “They told us we would hear it on Earth, but I didn’t believe them. We can really hear it that clearly?”
“As though we are on Azelle. Come on. Get up. We’ve got to race it back to the embassy. Even if I speed, it’s going to take us most of the time we have left to get there.”
“How do you know it’s happening?”
Merran lowered his shields and let her read the call he’d just begun to sense.
Idara’s eyes widened. She threw her long legs over the edge of the bed and stood up, reaching for her clothes. “They told us in orientation that humans don’t know about it. How have we managed to keep it from them?”
“By making sure none of us are caught outside the embassy. They know we gather in the embassy once or twice a year. Azelle’s year is shorter than Earth’s, so it’s usually more than once a year. But they don’t know why we gather. If I’d known it was going to be tonight, I would not have taken us this far away from Denver.” Merran turned on his heel and walked into the other room as his cell phone began to ring urgently, the tones of emergency shrilling through the room and interrupting him. “There it is.” He picked up the phone. “How long do we have?”
Ketiana’s voice was far more alert than he expected. “The Council just told me the aarya are giving us four hours to gather before they release the Song. I was on call tonight. How far away are you?”
“At this time of night? Three and a half hours, maybe less, if I speed. We’re up and getting ourselves ready. We’ll be there, Katie. Have you sent warning to the others in Denver?”
“They’re starting to gather already. Actually, we had a few show up at the door half an hour ago. The guards let them in. It’s cold here tonight, Mer. We’re going to have to open up all the rooms to fit everyone.”
“Do what you need to. We’ll be there shortly. See you soon.”
Understanding the urgency, Idara gathered her things together quickly as Merran ran through the online checkout process, then followed Merran out of the hotel. They said little as he raced back to Denver as fast as he could without endangering anyone on the way. There wasn’t much to say, except hope they made it back in time.
They did make it back, with only a few minutes to spare. Merran could already feel the aaryaSong swelling and getting louder in his head as he pulled the car into the parking lot at the embassy. He was hyper aware of Idara sitting in the car next to him, the warmth of her body and the play of her aura next to his.
“Cutting it close,” the guard on duty said as they got out of the car. “I’ll close and lock the gates behind you, Ambassador.”
“Thanks, Jerren,” Merran said. “Are we the last two, then?”
Jerren nodded. “Yes.”
“Then lock it down and get yourself back inside, too, before the aaryaSong gets any louder than it already is,” Merran said, noticing that the guard’s eyes had gone distant, just as the swell of the beautiful, compelling Song tugged at him, too. A wash of energy spilled through Merran, starting up a familiar tingle in his groin and spreading through the entirety of his body, triggering each of his chakras as it went. He pulled himself out of the alluring melody, making sure the guard followed him as he ushered Idara into the building.
The door had hardly slammed behind them before Merran was reaching for Idara. Pulling her into his arms, Festival fervor swept over him, the pulsing melody making every cell in his body vibrate in tune with its sensual beat. Idara responded and kissed Merran, pulling him into an intimate embrace that caused him to shudder against her. As the spiraling ecstasy claimed him, he surrendered memory and awareness to the pulsating, flowing river that linked him to all living beings on Azelle.
Tamara woke hours later, disoriented and confused. A warm arm draped itself over her stomach, just under her breasts; a hard body pressed up against her back. Thick carpeting cushioned her backside, soft enough to be bearable, but scratchy enough that she wasn’t totally comfortable. From the amount of skin contact, even with her eyes closed, she could tell she was naked, without any blankets covering her body. Because she didn’t sleep naked very often and preferred big loose nightshirts, especially since being pregnant, her current state of undress set off alarms in her head, and her eyes popped open. Alarin lay beside her, sprawled out on his back, looking totally relaxed and completely naked too. Tension crept into her as her brain struggled to process the input it was receiving. If Alarin was lying in front of her, who was draped around her back? She shifted again and tried to see behind her. As she moved, she realized that maybe it hadn’t been the best idea. The person who slept against her back stirred and pulled away as she moved her head, revealing that she, Alarin, and the unknown person behind her weren’t the only three in
the room. She recognized Rory and Damiar, and at least two more men and about four other women in the room, none of whom were any more dressed than she was. At least she recognized the outer portion of Merran’s office where Janille usually worked. She scrambled to sit up, panic overcoming any thoughts of staying quiet.
“Shhh, it’s all right,” someone whispered in her ear, and she recognized Merran’s voice. He slipped his arms around her, holding her still but not quite enwrapping her in a hug. It helped relax her, knowing that the man she’d woken up next to wasn’t a stranger. Despite the fact they’d had their moments and were no longer officially lovers, Merran was still a friend. “Let’s go into my office,” he breathed into her ear. “I have clothes there.”
Tamara got up carefully and stepped her way around the many still-comatose people, trying to fill in the oddly blank space in her memories as she went. She could conjure nothing but confused images—rather like her memories of Awakening, although there were no traces of pain. Instead of any recollections of discomfort, there was only the swelling, soaring Song, which soothed her even as she remembered it. She followed Merran into the office.
He closed the door quietly behind them and disappeared into the bathroom off his office area, coming out moments later with a dress shirt for her and wearing nothing but a pair of pants himself. His chest looked very much the way she remembered it—muscular and covered in a light dusting of dark hair. That hair had always felt silky against her chest and body, and she’d loved touching it, feeling the difference in texture between soft, warm skin over hard muscle and rough, silky hair. A vivid sensual memory abruptly spilled over her, a recollection of his body slipping against hers, of his warmth enclosing her, then the Song returned and washed away the memory.
“Where are my clothes?” she asked, blushing and looking away as he handed her the shirt. She slipped it on and buttoned up the front of it, careful to not look at him directly.
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