It tightened, swelled, broke over her like waves breaking over the sand, and she fell back against the sheets. There was still an edgy, needy yearning in her belly and she reached hungrily for him as he surged inside her, the clinging, wet muscles of her sheath holding snug to his cock as he drove back into her, quick and hard.
Pepper tensed as he started to pound heavily into her, felt the promise of pain, but she didn’t really care as long as this wonderful, incredible man kept stroking her clit, as long he kept touching her, as long he kept suckling on her nipples and looking at her through his ridiculously long lashes like he thought she was so amazingly sexy and beautiful…oh.
“Please…again, please,” she sobbed as she felt something tightening inside her again as he continued to ride her hard and fast.
He growled against her flesh, released her nipple with a wet little pop and moved up on her body, murmuring in a deep rasp, “Such a hungry pretty you are.” Then he framed her face in his dark, long-fingered hands, kissing her roughly as he started to fill her with deep, long, slow strokes that had her arching her hips against his.
With near bruising force, he drove deep inside and Pepper screamed, her choking cry dying in his mouth as he swallowed it down. His hand tangled tightly in her hair, his hips pounded against hers, and the room filled with the sounds of deep, hungry moans and gasping sighs, the sounds of good, hard sex.
When she came this time, he came with her, in hot, wet pulsing jets, with a muffled roar against her neck, while she screamed and raked her nails across his shoulders. Her vagina clamped down around his jerking cock, squeezing and milking him until he emptied himself and collapsed atop her with a moan, wrapping his lean, muscled arms around her and rolling until she lay on top of him.
He murmured to her, his words musical, sweet, concerned. Foreign. And questioning. She lifted her gaze to his, unable to summon the energy to actually move. “Huh?” was about all the intelligent thinking she could manage.
He chuckled and closed his eyes. “Are you…well, pretty one? Hurt you, did I?” he asked, stroking one hand down her back, lingering on her bottom.
“Hmmm. A little. I’m fine. Tired. Sleepy.” Then she closed her eyes and snuggled up against him.
“Your name…first,” he whispered against her hair. “Bad enough, it is, I’ve seduced you and have had my wicked, wicked way with you—”he was grinning against her hair, she could feel it. “But we shouldn’t tumble into dreams without at least knowing our names? Arys, I am called.”
She smiled, stroked her hand down his sleek, smoothly muscled chest. “Pepper. I’m called Pepper. I’m really not dreaming, am I?”
He sighed. “Non. No. No dreaming. Sleep, pretty little Pepper. I will explain what I can. When you waken.”
She couldn’t fight such logic, not when delivered in such a sexy voice. She closed her eyes and slid into sleep even as he was tugging a blanket over her, one that was warm, and smelled of him. Arys, his name was.
Arys.
* * * * *
Arys was a bloody bastard.
Arys was selfish.
Arys was a moron.
Arys was a lecher.
Arys couldn’t stop grinning. He stroked his hands down the smooth warm expanse of her naked back and wondered how long it had been since he had felt so content. Weeks. Months. Years? He missed Lorne, mourned her. Had loved her, in a companionable way, had lusted after her, truly.
But had he ever felt like this after mating with her? He did not think so. Resting his hand right above Pepper’s smooth, delightfully round little ass, he pondered it. And the smile that stretched his face. No. Long had it been since he had felt so happy after a fucking.
Pepper. What an odd name.
His knack for languages of the mortal realm told him it was something they used to spice their foods, like gnomes used, similar to kiar, spicy and hot. He glanced at her hair and wondered if that was why.
But his mind was heavy with exhaustion, and the need to rest. He had explanations to make upon the human’s waking—and she was quick-witted, so he’d best have all his wits about him as well. Not that he was likely to be able to do that. Every time he would look at her, from now until the world stopped spinning, he would remember how she felt, with her sweet sheath wrapped snug around his cock, how she tasted, how she moaned…
* * * * *
Pepper woke with a moan on her lips, and his mouth on her sex. His hands, those elegant, masculinely beautiful hands, gripped her hips as soon as he saw her eyes flutter open. Taking his mouth away from her sex he pulled her to the edge of the bed and flipped her onto her belly, urging her to her feet and bending her over.
Arys stared hungrily down the sweet curve of her rump as he pushed his dark cock into her sex, shuddering as her wet, swollen tissues closed tightly around him, the fat head of his cock rasping against the bundle of nerves deep inside her passage as he buried himself completely inside her. Her body trembled around him and he stroked his hands over the globes of her ass, the curve of her hips as he murmured reassuringly in his own tongue and started to thrust deep. His balls were already drawn tight against him, and his cock felt as though it were on fire as he thrust inside the silken wet well of her pussy.
She whimpered and pushed back at him, sobbing out his name. Bracing his knees, gripping her hips tightly, he drove harder and harder inside her, shuddering as her cries echoed through the iskita. The muscles in her vagina started to convulse and clamp down around him.
Arys used his weight to ride her down, pinning her between the bed and his body, wrapping one muscled arm around her slender torso, and cupping a plump breast in his hand, tweaking the nipple. He set his teeth in her shoulder and bit down as he drove his hips higher and higher, harder and harder into her, as her sweet little pussy clung wetly to him, as though trying to keep his cock inside her.
Pepper’s head fell back against his shoulder and she started to scream as her orgasm began, starting with slow, delicious little milking sensations that built and built until she was locking down on Arys’ cock to the point of near pain. He jackhammered his cock into her and flooded her with hot, wet jets of semen and she milked him, drawing it on and on, until she had drained him, totally emptied him. And left him feeling more complete than he had ever felt in his life.
He slumped forward, his hair tangling with hers, his horns on the mattress as they gasped and struggled to breathe. In his own tongue, he whispered, “The unicorn said you were coming, and you were coming for me. Please, do not ask me to let you go.”
Chapter Four
Pepper sat neck deep in a warm pool of mineral water that soothed her muscles and bubbled and frothed around her better than even the finest Jacuzzi. Arys sat across from her, dangling his legs in the pool, watching her somberly. “No bath?” she asked, feeling a little nervous under his intense scrutiny.
“Not as sore as you, am I,” he said in his slow, lyrical way, shaking his head. His black hair slid over his shoulder as he did so, his slender, slightly spiraling horns catching and reflecting the dappled sunlight. “I bathed in my iskita while resting you were.”
She smiled slowly. “I love your voice, the way you talk,” she said suddenly, her cheeks flushing pink. “Of course, you probably already know that.”
He grinned slightly. “Non.” He frowned, shook his head. “No. Only touching you. I need to be touching you, thinking of you to see your thoughts.” A wolfish grin slashed across his face and he added, “Touching you evermore will be making thinking difficult, I fear. Sweet, hot little thing…”
Pepper swallowed, her mouth suddenly dry. Hadn’t the water been warm a few minutes ago, a few seconds ago? Why did it suddenly feel so cool? Staring into his slanted, blacker than black eyes, she felt as through she were falling, drowning, flying all at the same time. His lids lowered, his lashes veiling his eyes and she felt as through a spell had been broken. “You need your rest, pretty mine,” he said roughly, his wide shoulders lifting in a sigh. “And ta
lking, we must be. You are wanting to know what is…going on?”
Going along with his obvious attempts to guide the conversation to safer topics, she decided to have a question answered. “How do you know English?” she asked. “French? Are those the languages spoken here?”
“Several of your tongues, I know. English, as you say. French, Spanish, some Deutsch. A bit of Portuguese. The Gate opens to places where these tongues are spoken. I have a…talent for languages, so easy it was to learn when a refugee came through the Gate. Some who speak like you, though not well, I fear. The words tangle my tongue. And many who speak French.” His eyes got a bit distant and he didn’t seem to seeing anything. “Lorne…my woman, she wished—non…no reason to…how feel you?”
Pepper frowned. What had he been going to say? Lorne? His woman. The one who had died. He was so sad. But something inside her said that wasn’t his normal state. There was laughter, love, and light locked inside him. Forcing her melancholy away, she fluttered her lashes at him and teased, “I’m not sure. Should you come and feel me and see?”
His eyes heated and a reluctant grin crept across his face. “Minx is what you are,” he said, shaking his head again. “Devil woman.” He took something from his side and rose, coming around the pool and sitting behind her. “Clean you up. Before you tempt me beyond all reason.” One hand slid down her wet shoulder and closed over her breast, rolling her nipple into a tight, hard bud while he lowered his head and whispered darkly, “Many things I wish to do, and show, to you. If you are still wanting me, after we talk, then we will be starting. I promise you that, sweet Pepper.”
A few moments later, she was sighing in pleasure as strong hands massaged her scalp and washed her thick, heavy curls. Forget the hair salons when you get back home, Pepper. They will never measure up to this, she thought as his hands urged her to slide forward and lean back so he could rinse her hair.
She frowned slightly at the odd little sensation low in her belly as she thought of home.
Going home would mean…leaving Arys.
* * * * *
She watched nervously as he prowled the house. No, is-something or other. Is…is…iskita. Iskita. That was what he had called it. She wore something of his, a long flowing white shirt that fell to her knees. It was practically transparent and probably not worn much, because his scent clung to it only faintly, but since she didn’t have any clothes…and besides, it was his.
Something was bothering him.
“Out with it, Arys,” she finally said, fidgeting a little with the flowing lace on one of the cuffs. Then she shoved her hair out of her face and met his eyes when he stopped pacing and turned to stare at her broodingly, crossing his arms over his chest. He had donned some clothing, of a sort. Loose breeches, held around his waist by a drawstring. It hid the pelt of hair that started right below his navel. She felt a fine tremble run through her as she recalled how those strong, muscled legs, that silken hair had felt against her last night and this morning as he had loved her. And it had felt like loving, not like, well, just sex.
Of course, she hadn’t ever done it before, so maybe she was just confusing the two.
Damn it, but she loved looking at him. His sable hair fell halfway down his back, in straight, silky tresses that she had buried and tangled her hands in only hours ago. It spilled over shoulders wide and strong and proud, sculpted with firm, delineated muscles, as were his arms and his chest. His skin was a swarthy, coppery gold, and a lean, flat belly tapered down to his hips and groin where the fine dark pelt of fur started. His hips, narrow and slim, his ass, and his legs, save for the pelt of hair, were exactly like a human’s—perfectly formed—until right at his knee, when they curved back and arched, then down into the cloven foot.
Long, lean, and perfect, just looking at him made her heart hurt, and her body ache, itching to touch.
“Does what you see disturb you?” he asked, his voice soft, silky, menacing.
She shook herself, realizing she had been staring at him. Again. Lifting her eyes, she smiled softly, and said, “No. What I see fascinates me, seduces me, and enthralls me. You’re the most beautiful man I’ve ever seen in my life.”
That seemed to take him aback a little. A frown turned his mouth down.
“You don’t smile enough, satyr,” she said softly, walking across the distance that separated them and pressing her finger to his mouth. “So serious. Have you always been so serious?”
“Non. Not always serious,” he said slowly, grasping her wrist. Staring into her eyes, he slid her finger into the hot, wet cave of his mouth and sucked it, stroking it with his tongue, then withdrawing it in a slow, subtle caress. “But laughter has been gone from me, long has it been gone.”
When he released her hand, Pepper spread them both in front of her and formed a glittery, silvery ball of light, pleased that even though she was not in her world, the magick was still there. “Do you know I was a baby when I first found my magick? It was bad, though. Very bad. I first tried this when I was five, in front of my parents.” The ball grew bigger and bigger, and as it did, Arys realized there was water inside, or the illusion of it.
And the illusion of fish.
“They wouldn’t let me have a pet. Said I needed to be a little bigger and understand responsibility. So I told them I was a witch, and I could make my own, and it would be the biggest and bestest fish bowl in all the world—”
And the results were, as she planned, exactly the same now as they had been twenty years ago. The silvery fish ‘ball’ exploded, the illusory water spilling out and the power of her illusion making them both appear to be wet and soaked, the sheerness of her shirt making her look as though she wore nothing. The ‘fish’ faded away to nothing, because the trauma of watching her ‘pets’ die had hurt, even though her mother had assured her they weren’t real.
A deep, rough, startled chuckle escaped Arys’ lips without him realizing it as the fish ‘ball’ broke over them. She gave him a mock pout, even though hearing him laugh made her want to dance. “Oh, go ahead and laugh about it. You’ve no idea how frustrating it was, being such a talented, awkward little witch. Mama and Daddy were at their wits end trying to deal with me. When I was eight, I decided I wanted a pony…”
He smiled as he moved closer and cupped her breasts through her ‘wet’ shirt. “You are trying to distract me, pretty mine,” he murmured, rocking his hips against her belly, sliding his hands down and around to cup her butt and lift her against him.
Smiling flirtatiously, she said, “Did it work?” as the ‘water’ just dried away from them, leaving her shirt as opaque as it was going to get. She stared up into his eyes, reaching up to cup his cheek. “You’ve got sad eyes. I don’t like seeing anybody sad. But it hurts my heart to see you sad. Why is that? Yesterday morning, I didn’t even know you, didn’t know anything about this place…”
His mouth cut off her words as he kissed her hungrily, almost desperately, his fingers biting into her ass as he lifted her up, one arm under her buttocks bracing her weight, the other hand burying itself in her damp hair.
She was suddenly adrift when he set her on her feet and stalked away.
“You fell through the Gate. You were using your magick, trying to open it. Succeeded, you would have, and soon. Such power you have inside you,” he said, biting the words off as though they hurt his throat. He stood across the room, his hands at his sides, curled into loose fists. “The Gate is mine to watch. A…friend sensed a disturbance and we went to see. We saw you.
“The Gates open to allow refugees, we call them—those who are hurt, desperate, or in danger—to enter our world from yours. Usually children who are gifted, like you, and who are treated harshly or cruelly by their kin. Battered, abused women find the Gates as well. Sometimes those who fall into the death-sleep fall through the Gates. We do not understand them completely, no, we do not.
“Guard them, we must. Some strong black magick workers can use the blood of the Gate watchers to force it
open and slip through from our realm into yours. But such an act causes pain and death in our world, and disasters in yours, disruptions in your nature. Those who try, we kill. The Gate opens when it chooses—we do not allow it to be opened by force.”
With those final words, he jutted his chin out at her.
Daring her to speak.
“So basically, you’re telling me I’m stuck here.”
Chapter Five
Arys watched as she slid through the door, watched as she walked to the stream and settled at the edge, her face somber and serious. Handled that well, didn’t I?
A familiar, gentle touch on his mind and he glanced out the window and saw a shining white-and-gray form. Faryn whickered softly. I smell a woman, and sex.
Go away, meddlesome unicorn.
Is that any way to talk to somebody who is trying to help you attain what you desire most?
What I desire most is to stop this infernal hurting—
You were hurting even when you were with Lorne. She kept you warm at night, but she was not your true mate. I pity you the loss of your babe, truly I do, Arys. But while Lorne did love you, she did not accept what you are, she was not a helpmate. This one will be. He nodded his head toward the stream. And more than a helpmate, truly. She has the heart of a warrior. A heart like your own. Arys, we have trouble coming. We feel like it, in our hearts. The Watchers feel a darkness in the world. You are bound to the earth. Do not tell me you have not felt it.
“You expect me to believe that sweet, pretty little thing is a warrior witch?” Arys scoffed, shaking his head. “Fool’s dreams, you are telling me. She’s like a faerie, making rainbows dance and…”
Forgotten your history, have you? Remember the Legion Wars? The Faeries made the forest of Asmere run red with the blood of their enemies, Faryn said, his ‘voice’ dropping to a soft throb that lingered just behind Arys’ eyes. Even the meekest creature will turn into a demon if it is provoked. But she is not meek. She may look sweet, but she is no mild, easily cowed little mortal.
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