Zuri let out a long breath and rested her hand over Ero's on her stomach.
"I've been thinking about that, too," she admitted.
Ero grinned and rolled over onto her, capturing her mouth with his and exploring her with his tongue. He pressed into her, hoping that he would be able to memorize the feeling of every inch of her body beneath him when he was away and lonely for her.
"Let's get started now," he growled into her ear and Zuri laughed.
Ero felt her hands pushing on his shoulders and he complied with the pressure, letting her ease her back onto his side on the bed.
"Hold on there," she said, rolling out from under the blankets, "Let me give you this first."
Ero groaned in protest as she got out of bed, but let himself enjoy watching her naked form wiggling its way across the room to the desk against the wall. He let out a grunt of appreciation when she bent over to look in the drawer and Zuri glanced over her shoulder at him. She smiled before straightening and making her way back over to the bed so that she could hand him what looked like a large book.
"What's this?"
"It's a field journal. I brought it with me from the university and I want you to bring it with you on your trip. I planned on recording all of my observations about the Denynso in it so that I could present them to the university board when I went back. "
"We're just like big giant specimens to you, aren't we?" Ero teased.
"Yes. You're my favorite, though."
Zuri leaned over and kissed him. Ero tossed the journal over to the bedside table. He was happy that he would have it with him when he left the compound and needed to feel her with him, but in that moment she was there, close enough for him to touch and kiss, and he was going to take absolute advantage of it.
Chapter Three
Eden ran her hand down the back of Pyra's head, stroking the long white hair that he usually wore in the customary Mohawk of the Denynso men but was now laying soft. His breath tickled on her bare skin as he whispered to her belly, but it was so sweet that she didn't want to giggle and stop him before he was finished. He was explaining to their baby why he had to leave and that he was going to get back as soon as he could.
"I just want you to be safe," he whispered, running his hand along the side of her belly as he spoke, "and that means I have to go out there and find out if there are any scary things that I will have to fight off for you. I don't want you to worry about me. You just stay in there and concentrate on getting all big and strong. I'll be just fine and when you're ready, you'll come out and we'll run and play and I'll teach you how to climb a tree."
Eden laughed then and her enormous mate looked up at her.
"What?"
"I don't think that climbing a tree is something that will happen directly after birth." She stopped, realizing that there were still many things that no one knew about her pregnancy or the baby that she was carrying, "Right? I mean, this will be a baby, right? Like a small baby. Not a toddler that will be able to get up and walk around right after birth?"
Pyra returned her laugh and stroked her belly again.
"I don't think so, Babe. I, for one, have never actually seen one, but I'm fairly certain that Denynso babies are small and baby-like. I don't think walking around is a thing for a couple of years, but that doesn’t mean that I can't start planning now."
He leaned down and kissed the swell of her belly, closing his eyes briefly. Eden could feel his hand pressing more firmly into her skin as if he were trying to get close enough to the baby to touch it even through her body.
"You can plan anything you want. He's going to be yours."
Pyra sat up sharply and looked directly into her face.
"He?" he asked.
Eden immediately regretted what she had said. She had been so careful not to say that, but now there was no way that she could just scoop the words out of the air and put them back into her mouth. He had already heard them.
"I don't know for sure," Eden said cautiously, drawing out each of her words as carefully as she could to make sure that Pyra heard her and understood what she was saying. She didn't want him to get his hopes up when she wasn't entirely sure that she believed it herself, "The midwives don't have any way of knowing what the baby is."
"Then why did you say 'he'?"
Eden sighed. She wasn't sure how her mate was going to respond to her little experiment with Loralia a few days before. It wasn't the custom of the Denynso to try to find out what a baby was before it was born, but when the strange and mysterious creature who had come from the mirrored realm beneath the compound told her that she could tell her what her baby was going to be, Eden's curiosity had simply been too much for her and she couldn't say no.
"When the girls and I went over to Bannack's house the other night to meet with Loralia, she was telling us about her kind. She was fascinated by my belly and she asked if I knew if the baby was a boy or a girl. I told her that the midwives didn't have any way of finding that out, but I mentioned that if I was going through my pregnancy on Earth, my doctors would be able to tell me what it was."
"They could?" he asked, seeming both fascinated and a bit upset that this was not something that was available on his planet.
"Yes. So she told me that she would be able to tell me."
Eden thought about the gorgeous and completely unexpected woman that was Loralia. The very last of her kind, she had been living in the hidden realm under the compound her entire life, but had been alone for many years. When the young, impulsive warrior Bannack brought her up into the compound it had been the first time that she had ever been above the surface of the ground. Though she hadn't had the opportunity to spend much time with her, Eden had felt a connection with this misunderstood creature, and was thrilled that she and Bannack were now mated.
Pyra had been staring at her expectantly, but Eden was still unsure whether she wanted to tell him what Loralia had said.
"And?" Pyra said, widening his eyes like he was trying to encourage her forward, "What exactly did she say?"
He looked so excited that Eden couldn't help but smile.
"She put her mirror against my belly and told me that the baby is a boy."
Pyra looked delighted and he bounded to the head of the bed to gather Eden in a tight hug.
"A boy? Really?"
"Yes. She said he will be a strong warrior just like you."
"I'm so excited," he said, rubbing her belly again, "I mean, I would have loved a daughter, too, but having a son…"
His voice trailed off as if the emotion he was feeling was just too much to try to condense into words. Eden felt a surge of pride at that moment that was difficult to explain. She loved that she was carrying her mate's baby, and that she had the privilege of being the mother to the first of the new generation of Denynso, but watching Pyra at that moment as he slithered back down the bed and rested his mouth to her belly again, it all felt even more meaningful. Giving Pyra a son felt like the most important, precious, and valuable thing that she had ever done, and she felt so blessed to be able to do it, even if she was still somewhat fearful of the unknown about her pregnancy.
"My son," Pyra whispered against her skin, "My boy. Your Papa loves you, little one."
Eden reached carefully under her pillow, trying not to disturb Pyra as he continued to whisper to the baby, and took out the braided ribbon chain she had been keeping there. On it was a pendant cast from iron that looked like a hand cradling a heart in its palm. A smaller heart in the center of the larger heart featured an inlay of copper so that it stood out against the other pieces.
"I want you to bring this with you," she said to Pyra and he sat up, looking from her face to the pendant in her hand, "I designed it a couple of weeks after I found out I was pregnant. Jem," she paused and choked back the painful emotion that suddenly tightened in her throat at the mention of the warrior who had died in the recent battle with the Klimnu, "crafted it for me."
&
nbsp; A brilliant blacksmith, Jem had taken her vision for the pendant that would represent Pyra holding her and their baby and crafted it into something so beautiful it had taken her breath away when she saw it. She had intended to give it to Pyra when the baby was born, but now that he was leaving with the other warriors, she wanted him to take it with him so that he could have them close to him even while he was far away.
Pyra took the pendant from her hand and ran his massive fingers along the design.
"Thank you," he said softly, "I can't tell you how much I am going to miss you. I feel like I'm not going to be able to breathe without you."
"I'm going to miss you, too," Eden said, "I can't bear the thought of sleeping in this big bed without you. I'm going to be alone more nights with you gone on this journey than I was when I first got here before we bonded."
The mention of their first bonding brought a flash of heat to her cheeks. That had been such a tumultuous, emotional time, but as Pyra lifted up to lie down beside her and pull Eden in against her so that he could cradle her in his arms, she knew that she would never trade a single second of it.
Chapter Four
Leia's hand clutched at the sheets beside her, her knuckles clenching so hard into the fabric that they whitened as she pulled it away from the mattress. Her eyes closed as her head dropped back against the pillow and her back arched up off of the bed. Gyyx flattened one massive hand into the middle of her chest and pressed her back down, holding her against the mattress with just enough pressure that she could feel his dominance. This sent even more of a shiver of excitement and arousal through her and she couldn't hold back the cry of pleasure as her mate flicked his tongue through her hot, wet folds again.
Gyyx had spread her thighs against the bed and pushed them up so that she was fully open to him, making her totally vulnerable to his touch. He pushed them up a little higher now, using the very tip of his tongue to concentrate fast, intense strokes directly on the pearl of hypersensitive flesh just at her peak. The sensation rolled through her like thunder, sending nearly overwhelming ripples of pleasure all the way along her body. Leia writhed against the bed, but Gyyx was far larger and far stronger than she was, and the pressure of his hands ensured that she would stay exactly where he wanted her for as long as he wanted her to stay there.
Of course, there was nowhere else that she would want to be in that moment. She reveled in being at her mate's mercy and in the way that he could so masterfully manipulate her body to create feelings within her that she had never experienced before.
Just as Leia felt like she was going to lose all control, Gyyx pulled his tongue away from her body and pressed a series of soft kisses along the inside of her thigh. He was allowing her to cool, to come down from the spiraling heights of pleasure he was sending her into so that he could just bring her right back there again. It was delicious, delirious torture.
She felt him guide her legs down and his hand slide from her chest down to one of her hands so that he could ease her up to a sitting position. As he did this, Gyyx came around to her side, changing positions with her so that he lay with his head on the pillow and guided her to kneel in between his slightly spread legs. Leia bit down on her bottom lip as the position brought her right into view of his powerful erection. Her mouth watered as she looked at it and she couldn't resist running her tongue from its base to the tip. There was already a crystalline drop of fluid collected there and she licked it up, allowing the tip of her tongue to dip inside just briefly.
Gripping the base of his cock in one hand, Leia traced the edge of the crown with her tongue, pausing for a moment to concentrate her licks on the bundle of nerves on the underside of the head just as he had concentrated on her. As Gyyx began to groan beneath her, Leia started to stroke with the hand that was holding him, gliding her palm and fingers along his hard, thick length as she continued to memorize his ridges and veins with the tip of her tongue. The taste of his body made her shiver, making her want him even more.
Suddenly Gyyx sat up and grabbed Leia by her upper arms, turning her and laying her down on her stomach so that she faced the foot of the bed. He climbed over her, balancing on his hands and the balls of his feet so that he didn't press too much of his tremendous body down on her tiny frame, and she felt his erection gliding along her thighs as he rolled his hips to stroke against her without entering her. Leia whimpered and lifted her hips, displaying herself to encourage him to fulfill the ache within her that he had created with the skilled ministrations of his tongue.
Gyyx complied suddenly, pushing deeply inside her in one hard thrust that elicited a scream of pleasure from deep in Leia's chest. The warrior growled and lay forward so that Leia could feel his body full enveloping hers. It was a primal, comforting feeling that encouraged her to lift her hips and grind them into him. His hands came up under her, cupping at the front of her throat in another show of dominance that made Leia feel so close to the edge that two more hard thrusts sent her body shuddering through an intense orgasm that left her gasping for breath.
Her climax did nothing to slow Gyyx. Instead, he tightened his grip around her throat so that her back arched slightly and pulled up onto his knees for better leverage so that he could slam in her with such speed and depth that each stroke was almost painful. That fine line between pain and pleasure, however, is what drove Leia crazy and she let the sounds pour out of her, panting, gasping, and crying out as she gave her body over to Gyyx in the hopes that he would still be able to feel her when he was gone.
Suddenly she felt his entire body tense and heard him let out a strangled moan as his cock pulsed wildly within her. He stayed buried deeply inside her as the tremors continued to flow through him, spilling hot streams that she could feel filling her. Finally he lowered his hands from her throat to her chest and carefully rolled them over to their sides, remaining inside her as he curled around her.
Even though she would have liked him to, Gyyx never let himself collapse down on top of Leia. She was so small and delicate-looking, particularly compared to him, that he was always convinced he would crush her if he let himself rest on top of her completely. Instead, he curved around her, cradling her body close to his so that she was surrounded by his warmth and the intoxicating smell of his skin.
His lips touched her neck and traveled up, following the curve of her jaw until he reached her ear.
"I love you," he breathed, pulling her a little closer to his chest and stomach.
"I love you, too," she said back, kissing the arm that was draped tightly around her.
Leia couldn't help but smile as she allowed herself to drift away on the waves of pleasure still rolling through her. It had taken so much to convince Gyyx that he was not going to break her if he made love to her the way that she wanted him to, but now that they had bonded, he had stepped into the dominant, aggressive role that drove her wild and brought out every primal instinct within her. She loved his strength and his power, and the way he knew how to use them to give her such incredible pleasure. She felt fully and completely safe with him, which made it even better when he exerted himself so strongly.
When their bodies had relaxed and cooled, she carefully extracted herself from his arms and walked over to the large black artist's bag she had propped against the wall. Reaching inside the main pocket, she withdrew what looked like a small scroll. She brought it over to the bed and climbed under the covers to meet his body where he had also cuddled down into the bed.
"This is for you to bring with you so that you can look at it and think of me whenever you're lonely."
Gyyx took the scroll from her and unrolled it carefully. She heard him let out a sigh as he saw the picture.
"This is beautiful, Leia," he said, turning to kiss her tenderly, "Thank you."
"I wanted to frame it for you, but then I figured that you probably weren't going to have the space in your bag to bring along a framed picture, and even if you did, you weren't really going to be able to find a pla
ce to hang it while you were traveling around." She looked down at the picture and reached over to run her fingers along the pencil and acrylic sketch. "This is the sunrise that I saw the first morning that I knew you. I remember it being the most beautiful sunrise I had ever seen, and I know that that’s because it was the first one I had ever seen now that I knew you existed in the world."
Gyyx tucked his hand around her face and stared into her eyes. She saw intense emotion there, and she knew that he was worried about her. Them coming together was a difficult and nearly tragic experience that neither of them liked to talk about very much, but both knew was something that was lingering right around them. They had found each other only because the Klimnu had high-jacked the university shuttle she had ridden from Earth, kidnapped her, and help her captive, torturing and tormenting her, for 57 days in a dark, dank prison on the other side of the compound, in one of the areas so close to the edge of their territory that many barely considered it the compound and others would never even venture. This is what compelled him more than anything to join up with the other warriors in order to go out onto the planet and find out what other creatures Uoria might harbor.
Loved by a Bear (Legends of Black Salmon Falls Book 1) Page 56