by Claire Kent
“Come lie down,” she told him, patting the bed.
He didn’t argue. He stretched out on the bed on his back, and she lay beside him, turned on her side so she could face him.
“I hope you’re not expecting a long, vigorous round of sex right now,” he said with an ironic lilt in his voice, “because I’m not sure I’m up for it.”
She chuckled. “I’m not feeling very energetic today either.” She reached out to stroke his chest. “I’m just happy to be with you.”
She felt and heard him let out a long breath. “Me too.”
“Did something happen, Desh?”
“Yes. Just a minor setback, but… Can we talk about it later?”
“Of course.” She kept stroking his chest and abdomen, putting pieces together in her mind. They’d been in a holding pattern with the Coalition for a few weeks now, and the only real action was on one large planet that had joined them just this month and had almost taken control of all their Coalition bases.
Desh had sent in some of their forces to support that planet. There must have been some casualties.
He would tell her about it as soon as he was feeling better. He always did.
When her gaze returned to his face, she saw he’d closed his eyes. For a moment she’d thought he’d actually fallen asleep, but then the corners of his mouth turned up in a smile.
“What are you smiling about?” she asked him.
“Just happy.” He opened his eyes and held hers. “I missed you.”
She experienced a warm wash of pleasure. “I missed you too.”
“So things have really been okay here for you?”
“Of course. I keep telling you every time we talk I’m doing just fine. I’d rather be with you, of course, but I like Rone and I like helping out here. I really like this planet. It feels… good. The fresh air. The nature. The work.” She paused. “I really wouldn’t mind living in a place like this, after all this is over.”
“Yeah. Me too.”
Her fingers were brushing across the tight muscles of his belly. He was starting to get hard. She could see it beneath the towel. “You know they’re going to expect you to take on some sort of leadership role, after this is over.”
He shook his head, closing his eyes again. “I know. But I don’t care. After this is over, I’m going to… do something else. Maybe something with books. I’d love to… study again.”
She wanted that for him too. So much she could feel the tug of longing in her chest. “Then that’s what we’ll do. When this is over, we’ll let other people take the reins, and we’ll do something else.”
He sighed, his whole body relaxed except his cock, which was fully erect. “Yeah. That sounds perfect.”
She slowly unwound the towel from his waist. “You know, you never used to talk about when this is over.”
He opened his eyes. “What do you mean?”
“Even a year ago, you would talk like this rebellion was all we’d ever do. I think something is different now. You’re seeing an end.” She stared down at his naked body before wrapping her fingers around his cock. “That makes me happy.”
He sucked in a sharp breath at her touch. “I guess… maybe I am. I didn’t realize that.” His body tensed up palpably as she caressed him. “Oh fuck, sweetheart, I missed you so much.”
She was washed with waves of pleasure and entitlement and affection as she saw his body respond to her touch. It still gave her irrational thrills every time she remembered that she was the only one who had ever touched Desh this way. And she was the only one who ever would.
She was hot and excited and pulsing with arousal as she lowered her mouth to his groin.
He moaned when she licked a line up his shaft and then moaned again as she took him fully in her mouth.
“Oh fuck,” Desh breathed. “Oh, sweetheart.”
She sucked him a few times, thrilled at the way the muscles in his thighs and stomach tightened.
Then he reached for her head and pulled her up so she could see his face. “If you do this for me right now,” he said hoarsely, “I’m going to come in about two seconds. And I want to do more than that with you right now.”
She nodded mutely, emotion strangling in her throat. She slipped off her robe and straddled his hips.
He gazed up at her, naked adoration in his expression. His gaze never faltered as she lined herself up on his cock and then sheathed him with her pussy.
Both of them moaned—and kept moaning as she started to ride him.
Desh raised his hands to grip her bottom, holding her in place above him, and he rocked up into her with the same kind of focused eagerness he’d had from the beginning. He’d never gotten jaded or controlling in bed. He always poured all of himself into their lovemaking, like it was the most important thing in the world at that moment. Like she was the most important thing.
She’d never known sex could be like this—not until she’d met Desh.
She was feeling full and deep and emotional, rather than particularly sexy, so she didn’t try to prolong it. She pushed down against the urgent bucking of his hips until she felt a climax tightening. She huffed out her pleasure until the pressure broke, and Desh cried out hoarsely as her pussy clamped down around him.
He jerked and shook through the spasms of his own climax until both of them had worked through the lingering contractions. Then she fell down on top of him, and they held each other, panting and hot and sated and clinging.
It was several minutes before Desh’s breathing evened out and he was able to move again. He helped her move off him, and she snuggled up at his side before he pulled the covers up over them.
After a few minutes, she lifted her head to check to see if he was still awake.
He was. His eyes were open, and they met hers with soft fondness.
She smiled. “I did want to ask you about something.”
His eyebrows drew together, as if he could hear the slight hesitation in her voice. “What is it?”
“It’s time for me to renew my birth control. And I need to… I need to know for how long.”
He blinked.
She cleared her throat. “I can do it for five years, two years, one year, whatever. I just need to… need to know.” Her stomach twisted as she waited for a response.
They’d talked about having children in theory but never in practical terms, because both of them agreed that they didn’t want to have kids while this rebellion was in progress.
The last six months had brought them huge strides closer to their goal. They weren’t there yet. Not even very close.
But the end seemed to be a possibility now, when it hadn’t felt like that before.
He reached a hand over to cup her cheek gently. “What do you want?”
“I… I want to have a baby with you as soon as I can. Not right now. But as soon… as soon as this is over.”
“That’s what I want too.” He took a breath and then swallowed. “Maybe just do the birth control for a year. I don’t think… it’s unlikely to be over by then but maybe… maybe we’ll be close.”
A burst of joy awoke in her heart she’d never experienced before. “If it’s not close, I can always do another year then.”
“Right. No sense to put it off longer than we need to.” His lips turned up in a smile. “And I feel like… being hopeful.”
She was grinning like an idiot, but there was no way she could stop. “I feel like being hopeful too.”
She did.
She’d lived for most of her life not knowing she was allowed to hope for anything beyond the taste of grapes and the possibility of having her own room.
Her world had grown so much bigger. Harder, more dangerous, but so much better.
And now she could hope—she could dream—of a future that was even better. A future with Desh and the children they would have, in a better world than they lived in now.
Nothing was promised. Anything might happen.
But the fact that anyt
hing might happen meant that hope existed.
She wasn’t going to live without it again.
***
Author’s Note: Yes, that’s the end of the book and of the entire series. The series has always been shaped around getting the characters to the point of taking action. I never wanted to write about the details of a rebellion, and I’m quite sure I never will. If you haven’t yet read the earlier books in this series, Hold is about Cain and Riana, Release is about Hall and Kyla, and Fall is about Rone and Lenna. You can find out more about them here.
I started writing as Claire Kent on a whim—because I had a manuscript of Escorted pretty much ready to go, but I was worried it was too erotic to work with the Noelle Adams pen name I was just getting going with. So I put Escorted up on Amazon one night, publishing it as Claire Kent, just because I could do it. I didn’t think it would go anywhere. Then, when Escorted took off, I decided to publish a number of other very sexy books I had already written (or mostly written) under the pen name as well. When I got my rights back to Hold, I was able to republish it under the Claire Kent name as well and finally got the chance to write the rest of the series I had in mind—exploring in four different ways how an oppressive regime like the Coalition could affect the most intimate parts of humanness, including sex and sexuality. It took a long time, but I’m really glad I finished the series, and I’m particularly happy with what I was able to do with Fall and Rise.
For the last two years, I’ve been mostly uninspired for this pen name, only holding on so I could finish this series. I feel like I’ve done everything I wanted to do with the Claire Kent name (plus, my Noelle Adams books sell a lot better) so Rise will probably be the last book I publish as Claire Kent. It’s not impossible that I could get re-inspired in the future, so I’m not closing all doors completely, but I don’t have any plans to write any more books as Claire Kent as of right now.
Thanks to all of you who have read the books and supported Claire Kent along the way! And I’m definitely still writing as Noelle Adams. If you want to sign up to my newsletter to receive monthly updates and chapters in the serial novel(s) I’m writing, you can do so here.
About the Author
Claire has been writing romance novels since she was twelve years old. She writes contemporary romance and women’s fiction with hot sex and real emotion.
She also writes romance novels under the penname Noelle Adams (noelle-adams.com). If you would like to contact Claire, please check out her website (clairekent.com) or email her at [email protected].
Books by Claire Kent
Hold Series
Hold
Release
Fall
Rise
Revenge Saga
Sweet the Sin
Darker the Release
Escorted Series
Escorted
Breaking
Nameless Series
Nameless
Christening
Incarnate
Standalones
Seven
No Regrets
Finished
Complicated