Dhark & Desired
Page 13
“Shit.” She presses the heels of her palms into her eyes and draws in a ragged breath.
When Harlo and I move toward her to comfort her, she holds up her hand, halting us both in place. “Just give me a sec.”
We back off, acquiescing. She blots her eyes and wipes her nose on the bedsheet, then squares her shoulders and shakes off her melancholy.
“You know how to read the desires of the flesh,” she says to Harlo, the tone in her voice making it clear she’s moved on, and so should we. “You’d be able to draw out Creed’s orgasm and give him the fuck of his life. Plus, your pussy is the most delicious pussy I’ve ever put in my mouth. I want you to share that with Creed.”
She rounds on me. “And you. You have the hugest, most beautiful cock known to man. The pleasure you bring me is mind-blowing. I want that for Harlo. I want to watch as you pound into her, stretch her. I want to see her pleasure run down your giant Fae dick, onto your balls. I want it to be mixed with your cum.”
Harlo and I stare, first at Dhru, then each other.
Harlo cocks an eyebrow. “Well, that’s specific.”
Dhru stomps her foot. “I know what I want.”
“What about what we want?” I say, without thinking it through. Is this somewhere I really want to go with Dhru? With Harlo? “What about what I want? What you’re asking . . .” I run my hands across my bald head, missing the length of my hair in my true form. My teeth and jaw hurt from grinding them.
“It’s impossible,” Harlo finishes for me. For that, I’m grateful. It shows she feels the same way. That she understands why we can’t do what Dhru wants.
“It’s a little fucking late for impossible,” Dhru fires back. “You’re both here, naked, with me. I’m half-dragon, half-Fae, and double Destined, for fuck’s sake. One of my lovers is a Fae Called, the other a half-angel, half-demon Succubus assassin. Guys, we’re way the fuck past impossible.”
Dhru doesn’t understand. I don’t expect her to. She isn’t from our world. And she’s a dragon, besides. Dragons don’t do rules. They don’t do duty, or honor, or any of the things I stood for before I found her.
“I can’t,” I say, hoping I can make her see. This boundary is the only thing left of the old me. I’m not ready to let that guy, let all the good and bad I’ve done in the world, go. When I do, I’ll have to face the fact that I’m not who I thought I was. That everything I believed in, everything I worked toward, is gone. A lie. Wrong.
Harlo’s gaze traces a pattern from my face to my feet, like she’s studying an opponent. Sizing me up for battle. Learning what she can before the kill—or at least, that’s how it would be if we were on the battlefield.
Something like recognition and regret flashes behind her dark eyes when my gaze meet hers. She gets why I can’t do what Dhru wants. We come from the same world. In a way, she’s losing the same thing. We’re both losing who we used to be. Crossing this final line forces us to decide who we’re going to be next.
“Why?” The pout on Dhru’s full lips is back, but the look in her eyes, on her face, goes deeper than playful manipulation. Our refusal hurts her.
“There’s an unspoken line that we don’t cross,” Harlo says, taking the words right from my mind. “Ever. Named and Called are—”
“Enemies.” I cut across Harlo. “What her kind has done to mine—”
“And his to mine,” she adds.
“Is unforgivable,” we say in unison.
Our eyes lock as we size each other up. There’s no anger in Harlo’s gaze. Not like there should be. I’m sure it’s missing in my glare as well. It can’t be there. It’s not how I feel. The tilt of her mouth and the hollowness behind her eyes betrays sadness. I know. I feel it, too.
So much blood—wasted. So much time spent lost in hatred. Dharkling and Lightling. Fae and demon. For what?
I scrub my face at that thought, at the confusion it brings. Called don’t think like this. We don’t question. We do.
Another thought slams into me then, like a kick straight to the gut: I’m not a Called anymore. Not after what I’ve done.
Pain blooms at that realization, somewhere deep inside, but the sound of Dhru’s laughter distracts me. Brings me back from the ledge.
Dhru’s bent over, clutching her stomach, consumed with laughter. Her breasts dangle. Her ass sticks out. Suddenly, her body is all I can focus on. Fuck anything else. Nothing but being inside my Destined makes sense.
“What’s so funny?” Harlo asks.
Dhru snorts. “You’ve already fucked each other. You just don’t realize it yet.”
“Explain,” I grit out between my need to be inside her and my mounting frustration over this entire situation.
Dhru’s hands go to her hips. “You both claim to be enemies, but you’ve been on the same side, teaming up against me, since we got here. You finish each other’s sentences. You agree on everything, even this. And you’re both the other halves of my soul. Or souls.” She shrugs. “I haven’t decided yet how this works, since there’s two of you.”
“No one knows how this works,” I say, taking my time to digest what she’s implied. Not just about her soul, either.
“You’re mine,” she says to Harlo. “You’re mine,” she says to me. “And I’m yours. Which means we’re each other’s. Like it or not, ancient demon-Fae feud or not, you two are stuck with each other. Bound to each other. For life. Until death do us part, or some shit like that.”
She lets her words linger in the air like a ticking time bomb.
“I say, let’s make the most out of the life we have. Out of the bodies we have. The energy we have. Besides, I hate to break it to you both, but if there is some imaginary line you aren’t supposed to cross, you’ve already fucking crossed it. You crossed it when you decided to reveal what you are to heal me,” she says to Harlo. “And when you protected each other during the fight with the angels,” she says to us both. “You crossed it when we became more important to each other than following orders and obeying overbearing father figures.”
Dhru crosses her arms over her hard nipples. I want to complain that she’s hiding them. I want them in my mouth. Or Harlo’s. Doesn’t matter.
Shit. Shit. It doesn’t matter.
Neither should anything else.
Dhru’s right. Harlo and I crossed the line of ancestral betrayal a long time ago. In fact, we’re so far over it I can’t even see it anymore. The person I used to be is gone. Why I should keep fighting to hold on to him? There’s benefit in embracing my Destined’s demon. My other lover.
Shaking out the tension in my fists, jaw, shoulders—hell, everywhere—I cross the room to Dhru and move her arms away from her nipples. Cupping her breast in one hand, I grab her neck with the other and kiss her. Hard. Just like I am. Just like this is going to be. She returns the kiss just as fiercely. Gods, I love her fire.
Moving behind her, Harlo caresses her shoulders, then down her spine to the small of her back. Dhru shudders against me and moans into my mouth. That sound sends a fresh surge of blood straight to my cock. It’s ready. I’m ready. For whatever Dhru wants.
I don’t break the kiss with Dhru as I stare into Harlo’s fathomless eyes. Eyes I’m about to get lost in, just like I’m about to lose myself inside her body.
The demon holds my stare. I see the same shift in her face she must see in mine.
I nod once.
She nods back.
It’s on.
C.C. Dowling is an author who writes everything from gritty urban fantasy, to paranormal sci-fi, to steamy contemporary erotic romance (under the pen name C.C. Wylde. Full length titles to be released in 2018).
C.C. shares her love of writing with her love of singing, music, and science. She spent the first half of her college life performing, and the second half in a lab.
C.C. currently lives in America's finest city, with her husband (the financial shaman), her two children (who love to play in the yard with the faeries), and her very real pet
dragon (who guards the perimeter of her house at night).
When she’s not working or writing (which is still technically working), C.C. can be found playing a round of disc golf, or desperately trying to figure out which pair of sandals are the most appropriate for the harsh Southern California winters.
Connect with me through my website at www.ccdowlingauthor.com
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Also Available by C.C. Dowling
The Dharkstar Dragon Saga
The Dharkling Daughter: Dhark & Destined
The Dharkling Daughter: Dhark & Desired
The Dharkling Daughter: Dhark & Damned
(pre-order now!)
The Infinity Series
Conduit
Mana (coming soon!)
Short Stories
Grace Ever After
The Broga’s Curse
Sonya & The Sea Witch (FREE when you sign up for my newsletter!)