Well, I muttered it, really.
Without bothering to gauge their reactions further, I walked to the oval door and pulled it open with a jerk. I stepped over the raised lip of the doorway and entered the corridor. I had walked nearly to the end of the first segment when Revik caught up with me.
He didn’t say anything. He just grabbed my upper arm, then continued to walk beside me, only now it felt like he was steering our direction, not me.
“Are we having that meeting now?” I asked, a little amused, in spite of myself.
“Something like that,” he muttered.
A few doors later, and he turned us down a different corridor. I didn’t realize where he was taking me until we stood in front of the locked door to our room. I recognized the security panel installed to the right of that door.
Even as I thought it, Revik leaned over for the retinal scanner, his thumb already pressed to the organic panel. When the red light switched off, I heard a click and Revik had his hand on the door’s handle, pushing it down and shoving the door open to drag me inside.
I found myself staring at the windows first.
Portals, I guess...view ports.
They lined the entire wall over our bed, right next to the desk that had been moved up from the tank and now stood nearer to the door, bookended by several rows of cabinets. The bed wore a dark blue coverlet, thick despite the heated walls. Right before we moved in for real, a group of seers headed by Maygar created a “welcome home” present to congratulate us for moving out of the tank––a blue, white and gold mosaic of the sword and sun in the cabin’s ceiling.
The painting I’d made for him hung on the wall, too.
The mountains of the Himalayas shone from between the thin and thick lines, along with the same words in Old Prexci that Revik had tattooed on his arm. I’d imparted as much of him as I could into those lines, and in the profile of his face which slid into the contours of the mountains.
In the background of that one lived the sword and sun too––a glowing starburst around it with just enough color to pop in the sky.
Lily had declared it “beautiful” when she saw it and Revik seemed to like it, too. He’d been the one to hang it on the wall, anyway, and I’d seen him staring at it a few times, a small smile on his face when he thought I wasn’t looking. He told me no one ever painted a picture of him before. I found that hard to believe, since I knew his first wife had been an artist, but when he said it, I believed him. I’d sketched his face numerous times before, so maybe his wife Elise had done the same and never actually painted him.
I stared at the image of his profile there now, and it caused a pain-filled shiver to course through me.
Revik caught hold of me around the waist.
He had me against the nearest bulkhead then, his mouth on mine, his fingers clenching in my hair. He startled me enough that I tensed, gripping his shoulders, but not enough that I didn’t kiss him back once I realized what he was doing.
He threw his pain at me the instant I parted my lips, and after a few more minutes of that, he let out a groan, his hands on my belt, unhooking it roughly while I wound my fingers into his hair with him looking down. He yanked my pants down over my hips even as I tried to reach for his, but he wasn’t willing to wait for me there, either.
He stepped back from me just long enough to get his own pants undone, then he slammed me up against the wall again, kissing my mouth hard enough to bruise my lips, using so much of his light that I could scarcely breathe when he didn’t ease up. I felt my body melt against his, even as the pain in him worsened, sliding out of urgent until it felt closer to desperate. My own light had broken ranks by then anyway, scattering around me, and I held on to him to stay upright when he wound his light into mine, making my knees buckle.
“Fuck, Revik.. .what the hell...”
“Shut up... gods, Allie...”
I let out a laugh, until he kissed me again.
He had his hands under my shirt by then, pushing it up my body. He lowered his head, pressing me against the wall and using his tongue, lips and teeth until my throat emitted a low sound. Gripping his hair tighter, I leaned most of my weight on the wall and on him, especially when the hand he wasn’t using to hold me up slid between my legs. He didn’t put his fingers inside me, though, just held me there, using his light. By then my whole body was begging him for it. I writhed against him a few minutes later, and then I cried out.
“Revik... please. Please...”
“Give me head,” he groaned, looking up at me.
I fought to answer, but he slid up my body before I could, kissing my mouth, his light coiling into mine. He’d slowed now, despite that flaring urgency I still felt in his light. He used structures in his aleimi and his hands and tongue and lips to pull on me with a sensual, slow insistence that made me fight him all over again.
I tried to do as he’d asked, to slide down him, but he seemed to have changed his mind. He caught my wrists in one of his hands and held them over my head. Once he had me trapped, I felt his light in mine, too, grasping the same structures in my aleimi that might have been able to fight him off. As soon as he had ahold of my light for real, he let out a groan, a heavier one that time. I felt his pain worsen abruptly, even as he pressed into me against the wall, his eyes closing longer than a blink when I couldn’t move.
I laughed again. “So you don’t want me to agree?” I said, still fighting to breathe. “Was I supposed to say no? So you could make me do it?”
He released my wrists.
As soon as he had, he slid his hand back into my hair, kissing my mouth, slowing down, testing his hold on my light by releasing me with his fingers and body. When I tried to fight him and couldn’t get free, I felt his pain abruptly spike.
“Fuck,” he groaned. “Yes. Yes, I want to make you. Allie... you have no idea how badly I want to. Since you walked into that damned room...”
“What do you want to make me do?” I managed, a near murmur. “What, baby?”
He only shook his head, though, leaning his face against mine.
He didn’t want to show me yet, not even in my mind, but I felt his pain worsen as he thought about it outside of my reach, behind a shield wrapped into his light. He didn’t want me teasing him with it yet, either, pulling at his light, making it worse. He pressed against me a few seconds later, harder than before, his skin warmer where it touched mine.
“Gods,” he murmured. “You have no idea, Allie...”
“Revik...”
“Tell me if I go too far,” he said, soft. “Tell me, Allie... promise me you’ll tell me.”
“I will.”
“Promise?”
I let out a gasp when his hands tightened on me. When he met my gaze, looking for an answer in my eyes, I nodded, feeling my light slip out of control again.
“I promise,” I told him.
Gripping me tightly around the waist with one arm, he pulled me flush to his body, then half-carried me over to the bed. He had me down on it seconds later, and he lay on me, his pain worsening once he’d finished yanking the shirt over my head.
“They’ll know where we went,” I reminded him, fighting to catch my breath, closing my eyes when he wound deeper into my light. I got an image of him hitting me, and my pain abruptly spiked. Feeling my reaction, he gripped me tighter, letting out a low gasp as he turned me over. “...We left in the middle of a strategy meeting, Revik...” He pulled on me so hard I thought I was going to lose consciousness. “Revik...” I gasped. “Revik... they’re really going to feel this. Someone will look for us...”
He paused, looking down at me, his clear eyes tinted green and lit from within.
“Do you want me to stop?” he said.
Turning my head to look up at him, I fought to think, to control my light. “No.”
“Do you want to wait?”
“No,” I said, shaking my head as my pain worsened. “No... but do you really want them to find us like this? With them down th
e hall?”
I saw the total indifference to that idea in his glowing irises. I saw him fighting to think about it, to make himself care, until he shook his head, clicking softly.
“I’ll block us,” he offered, smiling faintly.
“They’ll still feel it if they look.”
“Not as much.”
I had a sudden flush of panic. “Where’s Lily?”
“She’s in school, Allie... she’s not here. She won’t feel anything.”
“The others will.”
He shook his head, smiling.
“They’ll feel it enough to know what we’re doing...” I said.
“I don’t give a shit, Allie,” he said. “Do you?”
Looking up at him, I tried to decide if I did.
His pain snaked through my light, intensely enough that I was having trouble even thinking in straight lines, much less caring what a bunch of other seers were doing in the next room. My light still felt all over the place. I could feel the want on him so badly that I fought to care about much of anything else.
A part of me would do anything to calm that pain in his light.
My own light grew submissive under his and he let out a heavier groan, right before he reached down, grasping hold of the elastic on my underwear and ripping it off with one hand. I felt the bite into my hip before the fabric gave, but all that did was turn me on more.
By the time he had me naked, I didn’t even care if he blocked us, not anymore.
His pain worsened enough that I knew he’d heard me.
Before I could catch my breath, he had his fingers inside me.
He gripped my hair, watching my face with those glowing irises. He paused long enough to position me with his hands, forcing me partway to my knees before he slid his fingers all the way into me again, using so much light I could barely stay still, and wouldn’t have been able to, if he hadn’t been holding me there. I felt his cock harden more as he did it, as the pain grew denser in his light. His aleimi wound even deeper into mine as he continued to use his light on me, until I felt him extend.
He let out another low sound when I cried out, half out of my mind when he pressed his body against me, when he started sending me more specific images of what he had in mind once he had me where he wanted.
I felt possessiveness there, felt it wind into the more violent flickers I felt through his light. He wanted to hit me. He wanted to fuck. He wanted anal sex, too, maybe after I gave him head, maybe with his cock or the telekinesis or both. More than any of that, he wanted me to submit, for my light to be completely submissive to his while he did it.
I got flickers of positions, where he wanted my legs and arms, how he wanted me so that both of us would feel more, so that it would hurt. He wanted surrender.
I felt the wanting like a physical force through his light even as his pain worsened.
I felt him wanting things he’d seen Ditrini do, things I’d felt him react to before.
When that only made my pain worse, he showed me more.
Looking up at him, I moaned, watching him tremble as I fought to arch up against his hand and couldn’t. I heard him give another low gasp when I agreed to what he wanted, right before his eyes closed, longer than a blink.
I still felt him suppressing things, trying to decide how far to push things with me. I felt that restraint enough that I fought against his hold on my light, trying to get free for real. His grip on my aleimi tightened more as I fought him, and I felt my fighting him turn him on, too, until his pain blinded me again, nearly making me lose touch with the room.
“Gods.” He murmured it against my ear. “What the hell is wrong with us?”
I let out a short laugh, but I couldn’t move, and his pain made me cry out when I fought him again. “...I don’t know. Are you wanting more children or something?” Feeling another hard stab of his pain, one that worsened exponentially as I felt him think about my question, I added with a half-humorous gasp, “...Because I think that’s pretty much impossible for the next ten years or so, isn’t it?”
He didn’t answer, but kissed me. He deepened the kiss until I lost my train of thought. When he finally paused, a few minutes later, he sat up long enough to yank his shirt over his head.
When he leaned down to kiss me that time, I noticed his tongue tasted like hiri.
It grew hotter in my mouth the longer the kiss went on, even as he slid more of his pain through my light. His body went soft and heavy over me. Everything but his arms, which tensed where he gripped my wrists, and his light, which grew more urgent the longer we kissed. The images in his light got more explicit again, even as he let out another heavy groan, fighting to get the hard end of his cock to retract so we could fuck for real.
When he finally managed it, he still had my light held under his.
I found myself thinking whatever this thing was between us, it was getting worse, seemingly worse every time we were together. Lately I’d felt almost as out of control as when we’d been at that cabin the first time, when we’d forget to eat, we’d lose time, we’d forget how to talk aloud and spent all of our time wrapped into each other’s light.
We weren’t quite that bad (...yet, my mind supplied unhelpfully), or maybe we were bad in a different way, but we’d definitely lost the ability to track priorities to some degree... or social etiquette maybe... or, yeah, priorities in terms of other things going on in our world.
I felt Revik agree.
This felt different than that time at the cabin, though. We were different, maybe.
I could also feel some purpose behind this I couldn’t put my finger on.
The closest my mind could come to understanding it came in the form of pictures––of the two of us smashing walls, breaking something that stood between us, that kept us separate from one another, even now. Even at the cabin, we’d been careful with each another. The emotions had been softer, more cautious... more insecure, maybe. Some of that had been vulnerability and openness, but some of it had been a kind of politeness, too. That politeness broke down a few times at the cabin, but I could scarcely remember what that felt like now, or why we’d once been so afraid of showing one another the less-gentle sides of our natures.
All of that just felt like a waste of time to me, now.
Maybe we’d been through so much together at this point that we finally trusted one another enough to drop a few more veils.
Or maybe we just couldn’t afford them anymore.
I also found myself wondering––again––in something like guilt and something like worry and something like squeamishness––if this had anything to do with Wreg and Jon going through their whole marital thing so recently. Even as I thought it, though, so much humor erupted over Revik’s light, I couldn’t hold onto the thought for very long.
Relief flooded my light, too, I admit, when I felt how deeply he disagreed.
Whatever this is, wife, he murmured in my mind. I can absolutely fucking promise you... I’m not thinking about your goddamned brother. Or about the commander of our damned military division. Or either of them naked.
I laughed, my hands clenching over my head where he held them to the mattress. I found myself agreeing with him, even as I opened my light.
Before I could get very far into that thought, though, he was inside me...
And then I wasn’t really thinking anything at all.
“ALYSON?” BALIDOR SAID, his voice polite.
I turned, feeling myself tense... and blush... even before I saw the uncomfortable look on the Adhipan leader’s face. My rear end still hurt from Revik’s hand, my skin and bones from the cuffs he’d tightened around my wrists. My back hurt... along with other parts of me... and I had the disconcerting feeling that everyone around the two of us knew it.
Worse, it kept pulling my mind back to Revik, back to sex, back to what I could still feel both of us wanting to do... or really, get back to doing.
It also made me conscious of the darting yet somehow overly in
timate touches I still felt from Revik’s own light, which of course only made it that much more likely everyone else in the room would notice the two of us.
Jorag was the worst about staring, and getting too close to me with his light. For some reason, he’d been positively shitty about that for months now. I had no way of knowing whether his reaction to seeing me and Revik so obviously post-coital had anything to do with specific knowledge around what we’d been doing, anything to do with me specifically, or just horniness in general. Whatever the cause, I felt more pain off the other seer than I ever had.
It was bad enough that I gave him a warning look, glancing at Revik meaningfully.
Jorag caught my stare and flushed.
He looked away pretty damned quick the instant he saw Revik glance in his direction, but I couldn’t help thinking––probably too loudly––that Jorag needed to get laid. Badly.
Revik didn’t have a lot of patience with other seers messing with my light at the best of times, and right now he was positively hair-trigger on the issue.
Even as I thought it, I saw Jorag glance at me surreptitiously again.
I could have imagined it, but it seemed like his eyes lingered longest on my rear end, which made me wonder again if they’d seen more of me and Revik in that flag cabin than I really wanted to think about. Either way, I probably needed to have a little chat with Jorag privately before his light’s more specific interest in me earned him a black eye from my somewhat hovering and overprotective husband.
Or worse, really.
I’d seen Dalejem’s eyes on Revik’s body more times than strictly necessary, too. Unlike Jorag, he had the sheer politeness (or maybe common sense) to stay away from us. I consistently saw him hovering at the more distant edges of the room, putting himself as far away from us as physically possible. He even avoided sitting at the table with the rest of us during meetings, preferring to stand and watch the proceedings from the wall, his muscular arms folded.
I still didn’t like it. Truthfully, I had to fight not to give him hostile glares, as well.
Kali and Uye had left while we’d been gone.
Allie's War Season Four Page 113