That heat that’d burned through her face while she’d rubbed herself upon him returned brighter than ever.
“But, you just came. I thought men couldn’t—”
“I’m not a man, my love. But a centaur. As I said, we’re very different.”
Her mouth formed into an O. Already, he was hard for her again.
Alador had lost himself completely during her taking of him, and while he was not at all ashamed to admit that, he also wanted to prove to her that he was a male who knew what he was doing.
But first, he needed to clean up the mess he’d made on her.
A nice, soft pile of snow had formed around them already. Reaching out, he picked up a handful of it and, moving off her body, rubbed her thighs and lower stomach clean of his mess.
She lay there staring up at him, one of her arms bent behind her head, as she nibbled delicately on the tip of her other pinkie.
His muscles shook, snapping and jumping deep inside of him with the awareness that he’d mate bonded to her eternally.
She was his, always and forever. No matter what came. Whether they were destroyed in that world or shunned by his kind…he’d made his choice, and he did not regret it.
That knowledge was freeing, exciting, and thrilling.
He hadn’t realized the shackles of his life until he no longer had them. He would be sad to leave his herd, sad to not be able to visit with his kind as freely as before, but he had his woman, and that was all that mattered to him.
“Luminesa.” He breathed her name like a benediction. Splaying his hand wide, he flattened it upon her belly.
He wasn’t sure what he wanted to say. He felt words, lots of words, trying desperately to break free of the cage inside of him, but none of them could come out. They were too heavy on his tongue.
She nodded. “I know, horse. I feel it too.”
With a sound that poured from the very depths of his soul, he dragged her up to his side and cradled her to his chest.
He loved his sister. Loved his herd. He enjoyed life. Enjoyed the feel of a mare in his arms.
But he hadn’t truly lived. Hadn’t truly known what it meant to let go and let someone else take over. Trust his heart, mind, and soul over to another being. It wasn’t the centaur way.
That level of passion, of feeling, it terrified him. Left him shaking, breathless. As if he were a top spinning out of control.
But then her hands were bracing him, guiding him back from the madness of losing control.
“This is terrifying,” she admitted softly in his ear. “But I feel as though…as though…” She sighed, turning away, and intrinsically, he knew what she’d been about to say.
He felt her words breathing through his heart. Already, the magic of their mating bond beat powerfully inside his chest.
“We were made one for the other. As though we were one whole, split in two, and just waiting to—”
“—find each other,” she finished, staring up at him in wonder. “Yes, Alador. Just like that.”
She planted her palm to his chest, and immediately, he did the same to her. Smiles split both their faces as they felt the rhythm of their hearts beat in tandem.
“Did you know?” she asked. “Did you know it could be like this?”
He’d read it in journals. The miracle of the soul mate. The miracle of the mating bond, of finding one’s perfect half.
He shook his head. “I do not think I ever fully understood this. Nor did I want to, Luminesa. I am a centaur. It is not our way.”
She started to look down, the smile fading from her lips, and he knew he’d bungled his words badly. Catching her heart-shaped chin in his hand, he tilted her face so that her eyes met his.
“But I want it now,” he said oh so softly, letting her hear the depth of sincerity in his words, “desperately. You are mine, and I would fight anyone or anything to the death to keep you safe.”
She sucked in a sharp breath. “It is hard to believe that this is real. That you are real. That you won’t leave me once this is all said and done.”
“Never, my love. You own me body and soul. You have from the moment I heard your voice whisper to me on the wind.”
She trembled.
And he knew it was time to prove his words with actions. Cradling the back of her head in his, he took her lips. The kiss wasn’t rough, but it was passionate. Filled with all the longing of his soul. Sweet and tender kisses. Not practiced. Not skilled kisses simply meant to raise her lust for him but kisses that came from the very depths of his heart, that spoke of his commitment to and ardent admiration for her.
She mewled like a tamed kitten, melting beneath his touch once again. The woman of ice had completely thawed to him.
Goddess, he adored her.
And once again, he found himself falling headlong into her, losing himself completely to the feelings and emotions she elicited in him each and every time she moved against him, touched him, kissed him.
He couldn’t get enough of her. The touch of her. The taste of her. He licked and nibbled his way down along her body. When he got to her navel, he lapped at it slowly, like a cat with a bowl of cream, savoring the frosty sweetness of her flesh.
She was unlike anything he’d ever tasted before. Addicting. That was what she was. Her toes rubbed against his calves as her hips bumped him from below, and he smiled, knowing what she wanted though she probably didn’t know it herself.
He could have feasted upon her navel until the sun rose the next morning, but there were other, more pleasurable places on a woman’s body to be sure.
Moving down until he was between her legs, he nuzzled along the soft skin of her inner thigh. She trembled and looked at him.
Her eyes were wide, her face flushed that pretty mauve color he’d only ever seen on her. The snow that’d fallen in fat flakes before was coming a little harder, a little faster.
He grinned, and then with a final kiss to her inner thigh, dipped down and took his first taste of her.
The frosty sweetness of her flesh was more intensified there. Every lick was like diving into a pile of freshly fallen snow face-first. His breath steamed up as he continued to feast on her.
“Oh gods,” she grunted with a voice so deep it caused him to chuckle.
She didn’t join him, however, she’d palmed the back of his head with both her hands, cradling him as he continued to sup. Finding the little pink pearl, he gently sucked and rolled it along his tongue, watching as the color rose higher and higher on her, and then she went rigid on him, keening out a cry that shook the very beams above them, causing tiny slivers of ice to drop down like missiles.
Dangerous, if not for the fact that the snow and winds she created caused them to fall harmlessly to their side.
After a minute, she blinked open her eyes. Her lips were red and swollen from biting down on them so hard. And she breathed heavy.
“Horse.” She laughed. “Oh gods, I adore you.”
He chuckled, but when he moved to rise up on tiptoe so that he could kiss her delectable lips, his cock rubbed against the ground, and he groaned. Painfully.
Lowering his head to her belly, he breathed in her sweet essence, letting it fill his lungs as he tried to fight through the burning need raging through him to shove himself deep inside her.
Josiah had traumatized Luminesa. Alador never wanted her to think of that man when he lay with her. He wanted to go slow for her, wanted her to like it, wanted her to crave him as badly as he craved her.
Her fingers dug through his hair before giving it a good hard tug, forcing him to glance up at her.
“Please tell me there is more,” she said with a smile.
“What?” He frowned. “Have I not given you two orgasms?”
She lifted a brow. “And here I thought centaurs had more prowess than that.” She shrugged. “Well, I guess you can’t be perfect, can you?”
He growled, shoving up but making sure to keep most of his weight on his forearms as he pinned
her beneath him.
“Take it back, woman. We’ve prowess for days.”
She pursed her lips. “Two orgasms, horse. I’d hardly call that—”
Shoving himself against the outer rim of her wetness, he let her feel just how painfully hard and erect he was.
But then a slow as molasses smile curled the corners of her lips as she sighed, “Oh yesss…right there, horse. Right there.”
She wiggled her hips a little, as though trying to force him into her. He was confused. He was trying to take it slowly. To ease her into lovemaking so that she’d no longer fear it.
He chuckled in confusion. “Luminesa, but I thought—”
Rolling her eyes, she pounded her tiny fist onto his back. “So help me goddess, if you do not give me what I need, I shall go and find it with another male.”
With those words, she made as though to wiggle out from under him. But Alador growled and bit down on her shoulder without stopping to think first. Not hard. Never to hurt. Biting was just as sensual to a centaur or centauress as kisses were to humans.
But then he released her, fearing he’d gone too far. That he’d hurt her. He winced when he saw the crescent moon mark on her left shoulder blade.
Rather than fear it, or tremble away from him as he’d half expected her to, she instead traced the mark with a smile and shivered.
Then looking back at him with a challenge in her eyes, she whispered, “Don’t stop. Show me everything, horse. Everything.”
With a groan of utter longing, he kissed her, making love to her mouth the same way he planned to make love to her body. She was wet for him, coating his cock with her honeyed warmth.
“Are you sure, my sweetheart?”
His answer was a grunting nod of assent.
The same instant he slipped his tongue in her mouth was the same instant he slipped his cock between her swollen folds. She gloved him like a fist, and he trembled, his forehead breaking out in a wash of sweat, realizing he wouldn’t last long.
He’d once made love to a mare for half the night, able to hold onto his orgasm so that the pressure of his climax had built for hours. He’d thought there’d been nothing better than that night.
But right then, where he would surely lose his seed in less than a minute, he knew that night had been nothing compared to the present.
She wrapped her lush legs around his, moving in tandem with him. Pressing up as he pressed down. Their groans and moans of ecstasy were the only sounds in the room.
Alador planted his toes onto the floor, giving him better access to penetrate more deeply. The first stroke in that new position did her in.
With a scream, she shouted his name. “Alador!”
And that was it. He was lost, falling headlong into the petite mort he never wanted to end.
Chapter 13
Luminesa
After that evening, they’d made love every night since.
Their days were spent keeping the children as entertained as possible inside the castle, while their nights were spent either tangled up in the sheets or battling ice demons.
After the last incident with Baatha getting hurt and Gerda nearly dying, neither of them had felt it safe to leave.
So they invented fun games of seek. What the children didn’t know was that the games weren’t really games at all but a search for the key that the Goblin swore he’d hidden somewhere within the castle.
But after another two weeks of intense searching, Luminesa had begun to fear the worst—that the Goblin had deceived them. He couldn’t outright lie, but he hadn’t given her the full story either.
Lying atop a pile of furs, Luminesa watched the crackling flames, worry lines scrawled across her forehead. They had a week. Only one week to find the key’s whereabouts before the Goblin sentenced her to a purgatory of living out her life as human and killing the other three.
A fate she would never allow. Not anymore. Not since she’d come to know the children so well, since she’d fallen completely, madly, and passionately in love with her horse. She would figure something out.
She had to.
“Penny for your thoughts,” Alador said, rolling to a sit-up position as he gently rubbed her shoulders.
“Gods, you have hands of magic,” she moaned, tipping her head forward as she lost herself to the sensuous pleasure of being touched by her male.
Somehow, by some miracle, Luminesa had fallen head over heels for him. It terrified her, really. That he had that much power over her. Power she’d freely given him the moment she’d bonded her soul to his.
Smiling softly, she touched a finger to the bracelet of hair around her wrist, dark and light. The power of their union flowed through her arm anytime she did.
He kissed her shoulder, then leaned forward, pressing his naked chest tightly to her back, and when he spoke, she felt the rumble of his words move through her chest.
“Are you happy, Luminesa?”
Such a loaded question. Was she happy? Incandescently.
“I am. But—”
Taking her shoulders, he gently nudged her to turn around. She did, sitting on her legs as she looked at him. Her heart squeezed. Gods, he was glorious.
Big and brawny and such a beautiful male with such wise and spirited eyes. Sometimes, it was easy to forget that she willingly shared a bed with a male that looked as human as the one who’d nearly killed her.
But she no longer saw Alador in that way—as partly human. He was simply her horse. Her Alador. Her partner in life…and maybe even in death.
She sighed.
“You are worried too.” He nodded, finishing her statement for her.
They did that nearly constantly, finished one another’s statements. She had no idea if it was a result of the mating bond or simply the fact that she and Alador were special in a unique way.
Tired of worrying so much, she made a half-hearted attempt to change the subject.
“You know, I rather wondered, the first time we slept together, whether I’d lie with the man or the horse.”
He snorted, the sound so like a neigh that she giggled. He might not like being called a horse, but…
His lips twitching, he poked a finger in her ribs. She loved that playful side of him.
Just like her, Alador had been so serious when they’d first met. She’d never have expected him to tease her as he did then, or look at her as though she literally meant the world to him.
“Female, when will you learn I am no horse?”
“So you mean to say you couldn’t have sex with me in your centaur form?”
His lips twitched. “Are you asking?”
“Are you crazy?” She shoved his chest. “You forget I’ve seen you excited in that form. I do not wish to be broken, thank you very much.”
“I’d go very gentle with you, my pet.”
She rolled her eyes and patted his cheek. “You’re sweet. But I much prefer the male in my bed.”
“Legs and all?” he asked in all seriousness.
She understood what he referred to and nodded solemnly. “Yes. Legs and all. I wouldn’t trade you for the world, male.” And then she told him what she’d promised she wouldn’t say until she knew they’d all make it out of there alive. “I love you, Alador, with all my soul.”
Tucking her into his body, he hugged her tightly, dropping several kisses to the crown of her head.
Alador loved nuzzling her hair. Probably a centaur thing. Not that she minded. He was always finding reasons to play with it, though—braiding it, brushing it.
After a while, it dawned on her that maybe he might like the same affections back. She’d been right. It was definitely a centaur thing.
She latched onto a long swath of his hair and wrapped it around her finger, tugging on it gently. He shivered.
“I love you more than all the stars in the sky, my darling,” he murmured after a while, and she knew he meant it. Because every day, he showed it.
Alador had become her rock in every way. S
he would be lost without him and couldn’t imagine her life without him in it. She stared at their matching bracelets.
“Alador, what if they banish you?”
The thought of him losing everything weighed more and more heavily on her heart as the days passed. How could she say she loved him and then allow for everything that mattered to him to be taken away?
Somehow, she’d have to prove to his herd that what they’d done, what they’d chosen had been for love and not lust. That it was pure and right. Just as pure and right as it would have been if he’d decided to pledge himself to a centauress.
He grabbed her hand in his, brought her palm to his lips, and pressed a tender kiss to the horse’s hoof imprint inside of it.
“You are my whole world, Luminesa. That will never change. I made my decision, and there’s no turning back for me.”
“What if we can’t find this key, Alador? What if we are stuck in this purgatory forever?”
“Would that be so bad?” he asked. “We have all that we need here. Food, clothing, shelter, my family.” He rubbed his knuckle along her cheek.
If she were a selfish person, she’d agree with him. Goddess, she wanted desperately to agree with him.
“The children,” she whispered.
And he inhaled deeply. Alador was a good male. A kind-hearted male who understood that the sacrifice was not theirs alone to make.
“No, I suppose we couldn’t do that to the children.”
“They need their parents, and as fond of them as I am—”
“—we are not their parents.” He agreed with a nod. “You are right as always, Luminesa.”
She clutched his hand, keenly feeling their lack of time. “A week, Alador. Just a week. What if we don’t—”
Shushing her, he lowered his head to hers, breathing in her air as he let her breathe his in. It was probably one of the sexiest things he did with her.
And he undeniably reminded her of a horse, though she’d never tell him so.
“We will, sweetheart. We will find that key. I believe in us.”
Squeezing her eyes shut, she prayed to the gods that he was right, but deep down, she knew her usually sensible centaur was acting anything but.
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