by Presley Hall
Her voice trails off, but I know exactly what she means.
“I can’t either,” I tell her, and then my body is stretched over hers, my hand buried in her hair as I brace myself on the pillow and kiss her hard.
I can’t wait any longer.
I can’t bear to be without you.
I can’t deny this, no matter how hard I try.
Those are all the things I could say, and all things that she already knows, because they’re the same words that hover on her lips. The same words that I kiss away, my tongue sliding over the soft curve of her bottom lip, tasting her mouth, tangling with her tongue.
I undo the cord that holds her dress together at the top, feeling the fabric loosen under my touch. Unlike the dress last night, she’s wearing nothing underneath it, in the Kalixian manner. Her nipple stiffens through the thin material, pressing against my palm.
We both groan as my hand slips inside her dress, the firm curve of her breast fitting into my palm as if it were meant to do so, as if she was made for me.
Maybe she was.
She had to cross a galaxy to get here, to be on this ship, in this bed, in my arms. And I’ve never been so grateful for anything in all my life.
As I squeeze her breast gently, reveling in the sensation of it filling my palm, I feel her hands at my hips, tugging at the leather ties that hold my loincloth on. The second they’re loose, I reach down and tear the piece of leather away from my body, throwing it aside before reaching for the sash at the waist of her dress, nearly frantic in my need to have her naked. If it wasn’t the only piece of clothing she has on the ship, I’d be tempted to rip it off her. As it is, it takes an immense amount of control to undo the knot, sliding it free at last and pushing the fabric aside.
She looks so beautiful, lying there. My first and only time with a female, the clock was ticking—I didn’t have time to take in the sight of her. And besides, she looked nothing like Lucy. My desire is raging far more now than it was then, but I want to take this slow, to savor it.
I want to devour every inch of her with my eyes before I take her with my hands and mouth and cock. I want to remember everything.
She watches me as my gaze slides over her perfect, rounded breasts, to the curve of her waist, the slope of her hips, and her flat stomach. I slide my fingertips over her, from the space between her breasts all the way down over her stomach and across her hipbones, and I hear her gasp.
“I want to taste you again,” I tell her, my voice hoarse with desire, and she whimpers, her blue eyes wide as she looks up at me.
“Please,” she whispers, and my cock throbs.
I hadn’t thought I could hold back long enough to put my mouth on her again, but now that we’re here, it’s all I want. I kiss her lips once more, then graze my teeth gently down her neck, savoring her small moans as my tongue traces the line of her throat. She gasps when my lips touch her nipple, my tongue flicking at it as I cup her breast in my hand, and I allow my hips to thrust forward just a little, rubbing my tip over the soft flesh of her inner thigh.
“Tycran,” she breathes when I kiss the space between her breasts. “Oh fuck. Please, I need you inside of me.”
“Not yet,” I murmur, my lips curving in a hungry smile as I glance up at her. “First, I’m going to make you come with my mouth again, so I can feel you fluttering around me when my cock slides into you. I want you still spasming when I fill you for the first time, so I can feel you squeezing every inch of me.”
“Oh god.” Her eyes go wide as she moans, her body tensing and squirming under my touch. Her hips arch up against me, every inch of her taut with need, and that in and of itself is a pleasure—to know that I can arouse her with a slight touch, with nothing more than my words.
My hand moves up her inner thigh as I kiss my way down her body, and I can feel how wet she is, her thighs slick with it before I even reach the apex of them. She whimpers and moans with every caress, every touch. By the time I reach her abdomen, her legs are spread wide for me already, her hips arching upward and begging.
At this point, I’m teasing myself as much as I am her. I touch the space between her legs gently, not quite delving between her folds, but the needy moan that spills from her mouth is every bit as urgent as if I had.
I can’t wait any longer. I part her with my fingers, marveling at how wet she is, drenched with arousal as I lean forward to slide my tongue over her. My own need is forgotten as I lose myself in her moans and cries, in the movement of her body, the squirm of her hips and the tensing of her thighs as I learn the ways she likes to be touched best.
She moans when I slide my tongue over her in long, slow licks, cries out when I circle my tongue around her clit, and shudders when I suck that bit of flesh into my mouth, pressing my lips tightly against her to lick and suck until she is trembling under my hands. Her moans turn into breathless gasps of pleasure as her hands bury themselves into my hair.
Krax, I want to make her come like this. Once, twice, a hundred times. A thousand.
I could never get tired of the taste of her, the sound of her, the feeling of her in my hands. I can feel her climax coming as I keep my tongue pressed against her clit, licking faster than before. Her thighs are tight and trembling on either side of my head, and her hands have left my hair to claw at the bed, her fingers digging into the sheets.
“Oh god, Tycran!”
She cries out, her back arching hard as she comes hard on my face. Her hips buck upward, and I hold her tightly, never stopping for a second as I feel the spasms of pleasure wrack her body.
I keep going as wave after wave of her climax hits her, her moans so loud that I half suspect everyone on the dock might hear her. But even as I feel them start to recede, I don’t stop. I know she’s expecting me to take her now, to move up the length of her body and slide my cock into her. My rigid length is screaming at me to do exactly that, throbbing insistently, trapped between my abdomen and the softness of the bed.
But I want more.
I want to feel her thighs clasped around my head again, feel the pulse of her clit against my tongue as I make her scream with pleasure. I slide my hand up, thrusting two fingers into her, and the sensation of her velvety walls clenching around my fingers is almost enough to make me come here and now. The knowledge that I’ll soon feel her walls gripping my cock is overwhelming, but I don’t stop. I curl my fingers into her, sliding them in and out quickly, as I keep my tongue circling her clit, determined to make her come again before the first one is even over.
I’ve never done this to any other woman, and I’m not entirely sure what I’m doing. But the other men in my squadron talk, and in this moment, it doesn’t seem to matter whether I’ve had years of experience or none.
Lucy is my mate. My Irisa.
Her body calls to mine, and I’m so attuned to her that it’s easy to follow the subtle signals she gives me with every breath, moan, or shift of her hips. I don’t think, I just touch her, and from the way her body responds, I know I must be doing something right.
“Oh… oh!”
Her cry ends on a high shriek of surprise as I do exactly what I hoped to. The stroke of my fingers inside of her wet heat and the lash of my tongue against her clit takes her to the edge again, only seconds after her first orgasm has ebbed, and I feel her entire body go rigid as the second climax hits her, her hands delving back into my hair and pressing my mouth tightly against her.
She’s so wet I could drown in it, the taste and scent of her overwhelming my senses, and I love every moment of it.
I never knew I could be so hard, so lustful, and still hold back, wanting to bring her endless pleasure. But as her second orgasm starts to ebb, I know I can’t wait any longer. My groin is tight with need, my shaft erect to the point of pain, and while I intend to make her come at least once more before my own release, I’ll do it this time with my cock.
There’s no need to ask her again if she’s sure. I crawl up her body, and the moment my lips are c
lose to hers, she fists my hair, dragging my mouth down to meet hers as her legs wrap around my waist. My oversensitive tip presses against her, sliding in the slickness of her arousal, and my tongue tangles with hers as I do what I’ve been trying not to dream of since the moment I met her.
I drive my cock into her in one long, hard thrust.
The pleasure of it is so great that for a moment I think I might pass out. It radiates through my whole body, and I go rigid above her for a second, trembling with the force of it.
“Are you okay?” Lucy asks as she breaks our kiss, looking up at me with wide eyes.
I nod, finding it hard to speak for a moment. “It feels so deshing good,” I manage, my voice hoarse with lust, and my mate’s face softens with relief as she laughs, a bright and happy sound in the stillness of the room.
“Oh god, yes it does,” she whispers, pulling my mouth back down to hers, and then I start to move.
I forgot what this feels like.
No. I’ve never known what this could feel like.
The one and only other time I laid with a woman was nothing like this. It was like a single drop of water compared to the ocean I’m drowning in now. My body is aching to empty my seed into Lucy, but I make myself hold back, grateful for my long years of discipline now. I want this to last as long as I can. And I want to make her come again first.
I want to feel my mate trembling under me when I fill her at last.
21
Lucy
Holy fuck. I knew sex with Tycran would be good.
But if I’d known it would be like this, I probably wouldn’t have been able to tell him no last night on the ship.
I didn’t expect him to go down on me again. I thought the desire would overcome him, and that he’d be inside me almost as soon as we were on the bed, picking up where we left off, so to speak. But instead, he settled his broad shoulders between my legs and made me come not once, but twice.
As he finally begins to move inside me, claiming me with every stroke, something cracks open in my chest.
Nothing has ever felt like this.
Nothing else ever could feel like this.
I know in this moment that everything he said was true, and it doesn’t make me afraid anymore. I can feel his emotions as if they’re mine, filling me and washing over me, mingling with my own as his body merges with mine, and I know that I’m safe.
I’m protected.
Tycran will never hurt me in any way, and he will never let anyone else hurt me either. I am his… but at the same time, he’s mine. We belong to each other now, in a way that I never could’ve imagined belonging to anyone else. I don’t have to fear for my heart with him.
And it’s not just that I’m not afraid of the bond anymore. I want it.
I want to be his Irisa.
“My soul has recognized yours,” I whisper against his lips between fevered kisses. He tenses, groaning softly as he rests his forehead on mine. He’s pressed against me so tightly that I feel as if I’m melting into him, and I wrap my arms around his neck, reaching up to caress his horns. His cock thrusts powerfully into me as he whispers the same thing in return, in breathless words that float between my lips.
“My Lucy,” he whispers. “My wild, beautiful mate.”
I can feel how close he is. His hips jerk erratically as the muscles in his back ripple, and I urge him on, feeling my own orgasm approaching. I didn’t think I could come again, didn’t think I could have three climaxes in one night, but I can feel the inexorable pull of it deep in my body, the surging wave of pleasure that threatens to overtake me.
And I want him to go under with me.
“I’m so close,” I whisper to him, arching my hips to meet each thrust, taking every inch of his thick cock as his hips drive forward. “Come for me, Tycran. Claim me. Make me yours.”
He groans, a deep sound that seems to come from the very core of him. His hips buck against me, and he buries himself to the hilt as he kisses me hard.
“Oh desh,” he moans, stopping for a moment to grind against me. “I’m…”
“Yes! Come with me. Please, oh god, Tycran…”
The words spill from my lips as my own orgasm begins to crash over me. He starts to thrust again, harder and faster than ever, and with a final roar, he drives in deep as his cock pulses.
I clutch at his shoulders, clinging to him as my body shudders, wracked with the spasms of my climax. I feel dizzy, breathless, and I can hear the desperate, pleasured sounds spilling from his mouth as he presses his lips to my shoulder, grinding against me as he spills himself inside me for the first time.
For a long moment, as the last shivers pass through both of us, neither of us moves.
Hell, I’m not sure I can move.
I definitely don’t want to.
At last, I gently push at his chest when the weight of him becomes too heavy, and he rolls off me with a soft laugh. He gathers me to him, his arm going across my waist as he pulls me into the solid curve of his body, and I close my eyes for a second, reveling in every sensation. I can feel his softening cock against the back of my thighs, the hardness of his chest and abdomen against my back, the safety of his arm holding me against him.
This is where I belong, I think dizzily to myself. This is where I was meant to be.
I tilt my head up, craning my neck a little to look into his eyes, and I can see the same knowledge in them that I feel.
Things are different between us now.
Something shifted when our walls came crashing down, when we joined so deeply and intimately, and it will never be the same again. But that’s all right—I don’t want to go back to how things were.
“I want you,” I say softly, reaching up to touch his cheek. “I want… this.” I gesture helplessly at the two of us, trying to make him understand what I can’t quite find the words to say.
“You have me,” he says simply. “If you still want all of me now. If you still want the bond.”
“And if I don’t?” I look at him curiously. A small hint of pain appears in his eyes, but he merely shrugs.
“I would never demand that you stay with me, Lucy. If you didn’t want to be my Irisa, I would not force you.” He doesn’t say what we’re both thinking—that it might not matter soon. That if he goes ahead with what he’s planning, he’ll be dead. “But I’ve heard stories of mates who tried to refuse the bond after it was consummated.”
“What happened?” I ask, my brows pulling together.
“They longed for each other forever,” he says in a low voice. “It was a pain like no other. Neither of them was whole any longer, apart.”
“I do want you,” I tell him, my fingers still caressing his face. “The bond, I mean… not just the sex. Although I want that too.” I let out a long sigh, pursing my lips. “I realized, once I stopped running from it, that there’s a reason why I could never seem to set my sights on anyone else. Even when you were like a stone wall, unresponsive and cold, I was drawn to you. I thought it was just the challenge of getting you to want me, of seducing you. But it was something else.”
I expect him to laugh, but he’s quiet for a long moment, taking my hand and setting it on my hip as he trails his fingers over the back of it and up my arm.
“Something in me was drawn to you too,” he admits. “Since the moment I noticed you above all the others on Wauru. But for a long time—for more of my life than not, in truth—my entire purpose has been focused on one thing. I’ve been a warrior, single-mindedly bent on revenge. I couldn’t let myself see past that. I couldn’t let myself recognize the bond, or see anything beyond my purpose.”
His fingers trace a pattern over my skin, making goosebumps spring up in their wake.
“After I lost everything dear to me, I channeled my pain and rage into something better. Into protecting Kalix. That focus served me well for many years, but now I see that I was only living a half life. I was wrong to think that vengeance is all that’s worth living for, wrong to try to d
eny myself this. You make me more, Lucy, not less.”
“What happened?” I murmur, rolling onto my back to look up at him. “What did you lose? You don’t have to tell me, if you don’t want to. But if it would help…”
“The Orkun are responsible for the deaths of my entire family,” he says quietly. “My mother and sister died of the virus. When the first wave of Orkun soldiers tried to invade, before the formation of the Alpha force, my father died trying to defend our home. It left just me and my little brother.” He takes a deep, shaky breath. “I was young, then. Only twelve. But my brother was younger still.”
I know what he’s going to say next, before he does. I want to stop him, to not hear the words out loud. But I know he needs to say them. He needs to tell someone about all of this, at last. I slide my fingers through his, curling his hand into mine, holding on to him. Giving him something to hold on to in return.
“My little brother died in the first battle. He was too young to fight, more of a child than any of us were. I tried to leave him behind. But he made his way onto the ship anyway, and by the time I saw him in the ranks, we were already fighting. It was too late to stop it.”
I remember Tycran’s face, full of rage when he saw that I’d snuck onto the ship, and guilt washes over me. No wonder he was so upset. My stupid, reckless action reminded him of something horrible.
“Every warrior, every Kalixian, has their own story of loss,” he continues. “I’m not the only one. Not even one of a few. We are a race mired in grief now, and I’ve lived with it every single day. I’ve taken my pain, and the pain of all the others, and carried it in my heart every day, from that day until this one, waiting.”
“Waiting for what?” I ask, although I know the answer.
“For my chance to do something,” he says simply, his voice full of sorrow.
I can’t bear it. I feel overwhelmed with love, and sadness, and longing. I want to see him smile again, to take all of his pain and heap it onto my own shoulders, to bear his grief for him. I can’t, and so I do the only thing that I can think of instead. I lean up, clasping his face in my hands, and kiss him.