by Presley Hall
He squeezes and massages my breast with one hand as the other threads through my hair, his lips devouring mine in a hot kiss. His tongue strokes against mine like he can never get enough, and I kiss him back the same way.
I’m losing myself in it, just like I wished I would, and when he drags his lips away from mine and ducks his head, I run my fingers through the thick strands of his shoulder-length hair. He tugs the hem of my tank top up, exposing my breasts to the cool air, and when he wraps his lips around one nipple, I let out a little scream of pleasure.
Immediately, Jaro steps back, straightening as worry flashes in his eyes. “Did I hurt you?”
“No.” My voice is shaky, and I can’t seem to catch my breath. My shirt is still shoved high on my chest, and I’m very aware that my breasts are completely bare, my nipples hard and peaked. “No, it felt… really good.”
“Are you sure?”
He seems reluctant, worry still creasing his features. I don’t like to see that look on his face, can’t stand the idea that he might think he hurt me. So I do something more bold than I would’ve thought I had the courage for. Reaching up, I grab the bunched fabric of my shirt and pull it over my head, dropping it to the ground beside me.
Jaro groans, his gaze dropping to my chest again as his loincloth shifts. His cock is hard, jutting out beneath the soft leather and nearly rendering the small garment useless. It would be so easy to move the loincloth aside and see what’s under it—but although I’m finding my bravery, I’m not quite that brave yet.
So I just bite my bottom lip and crook a finger at Jaro, inviting him to come closer. He closes the small space between us in a single stride, wrapping one arm around my back and pulling me into his embrace as his feverish lips find my skin.
He doesn’t kiss my lips this time. He kisses me everywhere else. His mouth roams over my neck, gently biting at the sensitive skin there before moving down over my shoulder and upper chest. His teeth scrape my collarbone, and I suck in a shuddery breath at the unexpected rush of pleasure.
When he drops his head to nuzzle at my breasts again, I promise myself I won’t cry out. I don’t want to scare him or make him think I don’t want this. Because I really, really do.
With a low growl, Jaro drags his tongue over the space between my breasts, making goosebumps scatter over my skin. When he draws one nipple into his mouth again, rolling the other between his thumb and forefinger, I tuck my bottom lip between my teeth and bite down hard. Even that isn’t enough to fully suppress the sound of pleasure that rises up from my throat, and Jaro’s eyes roll upward as he meets my gaze.
“It’s—good,” I gasp, grabbing on to his head with both hands just in case he misunderstands me and tries to pull away.
But he doesn’t.
Instead, he laps and sucks on my nipple, alternating between his hand and his mouth as he teases me into a state of near euphoria. I feel like I’m floating, my clit throbbing hard as pleasure radiates through my body in waves.
I didn’t know it could be like this. Even before my stalker made me terrified of people, even before I had to teach myself to control my anxiety enough to function again, I never knew anything could feel this good.
“Jaro!” I gasp out. “Please!”
I don’t know what I’m asking him for. It’s been so damn long since I’ve had sex that I barely remember how any of this works.
But he doesn’t seem to need any more urging than that. Dropping to his knees in front of me, he splays his hands over my lower back and presses hot kisses to my stomach, my ribs, the dip of my waist, and the curve of my hips. Then he drops his head even lower, dragging his nose over the space between my thighs and inhaling deeply.
Shock ricochets through me. My body tenses in both surprise and anxiety as I realize what he just did.
He was smelling me.
Smelling my arousal.
Even I can smell it, lingering in the air in this small space under the tree—the smell of pheromones and desire. The smell of sex.
Holy shit. Holy shit, holy shit, holy shit.
I clench my jaw, trying to shove aside my nerves so that I can enjoy this. The sight of Jaro kneeling before me, his muscled shoulders bunching and shifting as he worships every part of me he can reach, might be the most breathtaking thing I’ve ever seen.
But even though I try to hide it, Jaro notices the tension that rises inside me. He backs off a little, leaning away slightly as he looks up at me. “Does it still feel good?”
I nod, holding his gaze. His beautiful green eyes look darker than usual under the shade of the tree, and as I stare down at the gorgeous alien in front of me, I feel like I’m in some kind of dream.
God, if I am, I don’t want to wake up.
“Yes,” I whisper. “It feels better than anything.”
A smile tilts his lips, and I see a flash of something wicked gleaming in his eyes. I have a sudden idea of all the things he might do if he weren’t worried first and foremost about taking care of me, and the thought sends a ripple of heat through me. It relaxes my muscles, and as Jaro feels me soften under his touch, he moves closer again.
He makes a rumbling sound in his chest that’s almost a purr as he presses his lips to my lower belly, right above the waistband of the pants I scavenged from the Foreigner II before we left. When his hands move to flick open the button and pull down the fly, I have half a second to wonder if he’s ever seen a zipper before—and then his hot breath ghosts over my core, and I forget everything else.
He tugs my pants down, leaning in to nuzzle the space between my legs with a hungry growl, and I yelp when his nose brushes over my clit. He looks up at me sharply to gauge whether it was a good or bad yelp, and whatever he sees in my expression makes him smile. He drags his nose over my skin again, and when the pressure on my clit makes my breath catch, he stops.
With one hand gripping my hip to hold me steady, he slides the other between my legs, making small noises of appreciation in the back of his throat as he starts to explore me with his fingertips.
It suddenly occurs to me that I have no idea exactly what Voxeran anatomy is like. I haven’t gotten a look at Jaro’s cock—yet, the little voice in the back of my mind that’s bold and brave whispers. And I have no idea if the females of his species are built the same way I am. For that matter, I have no idea if he’s ever slept with one before.
Does he have any idea what his fingers on my clit are doing to me?
If he didn’t know before all this started, he’s getting a pretty damn good idea now. As he touches my throbbing core, exploring my folds and dipping his fingers inside me, gathering my wetness, I can’t stop myself from gasping every time he touches my clit. It’s been so fucking long since I was touched like this, so long since I wanted to be touched like this.
But I want it now.
My hips jerk toward him as pleasure builds like molten lava in my belly. Jaro’s breath is coming faster too, and as I try to keep myself from falling apart completely, I take a little satisfaction in the knowledge that this is affecting him almost as much as me.
Leaning forward, he nudges my clit with his nose again. I let out a shaky cry, grabbing on to a fistful of his hair as my legs shake.
“Gods, you smell good. So sweet. And you taste…”
He doesn’t even finish that sentence before his tongue darts out to lick me, following the same path his nose did a second ago. When he finds the hard nub of my clit, he swirls the tip of his tongue around it experimentally, and I moan so loud it makes me blush.
His face is so close to the most intimate part of me that I can feel his smile against my skin as he realizes how much I like what he’s doing. He circles his tongue again, then draws it up and down the line of my core, lapping in smooth, languid motions. His hand tightens on my hip, as if his self-control is reaching a breaking point, and he keeps running his tongue over me until stars dance before my eyes.
An orgasm is creeping up on me. I can feel it gathering deep ins
ide me, so foreign and yet so familiar. But as pleasure washes over me from the rolling motion of Jaro’s tongue, old anxieties rear up again.
The more I think about coming, the farther away the orgasm seems, and my body starts to lock up again, my cheeks flushing from embarrassment and not from pleasure.
Fuck. I am broken. The demons in my head can’t even let me enjoy this. The little gremlin of anxiety has to rear its ugly head even when I have the most perfect man I’ve ever seen between my legs.
I clamp my lower lip between my teeth, trying to get back to that place where I was just enjoying this, where my fear of losing control and my worries about making Jaro wait endlessly while I try to come weren’t tugging at me like heavy weights.
Slowly, the movement of Jaro’s tongue slows. He draws back and looks up at me, his eyes glinting in the dim light. “Do you want me to stop?”
I swallow, trying to force a smile and failing. “Yeah, maybe you should. I… I thought I was close, but I got all in my head, and I lost it. I don’t want to make you keep doing this forever. That’s not—”
“Sadie.” Jaro’s deep voice cuts into my rambling. His brows pull together, and he licks his lips as he gazes up at me. “I would gladly do that forever. If you are not enjoying it, I’ll leave you be. But if…”
He trails off, glancing down at the space between my thighs again. The look of raw hunger that crosses his face makes my breath hitch, and I feel like my heart might crash right out of my chest.
“It… it might take a while,” I whisper, my cheeks turning hot.
“Good.”
With that single growled word, Jaro grips my hips again, looking up at me for confirmation. I nod jerkily, and that’s all the invitation he needs. He buries his face between my legs once more, lapping at me and teasing me with his tongue. It’s like he’s trying to devour me, like I just invited a starving man to a feast, and as I watch him, I realize that he truly meant it.
He’s doing this to make me feel good, but it’s not a chore for him. He’s enjoying it.
So fucking much.
That thought makes arousal spike in my veins again, and I don’t fight against the cascade of pleasure that rushes through me with every movement of his tongue.
I wasn’t lying—it does take me a while. Several times, I get close, only to tense up at the last second and send my orgasm flitting away. But Jaro wasn’t lying either. He never shows any sign of wanting to stop. Instead, he takes the time to learn my reactions intimately, testing my responses to various tempos and patterns of his tongue.
How is he so good at this?
The half-formed thought trickles through my mind as he slides one hand up to play with my breast, rolling and plucking at my nipple until I’m gasping for breath. When he slides a thick finger inside me as he flicks my clit lightly with his tongue, I whimper. Then he closes his mouth around the sensitive bud and sucks, curling his finger…
And I detonate.
My orgasm doesn’t creep up on me. It crashes over me like a tidal wave, flooding my body with so many sensations that I can’t force air in or out of my lungs. My mouth drops open, but for a long moment, no sound comes out. It’s just a silent scream of pleasure.
Jaro wraps one arm tightly around my waist, securing me in place and keeping me upright as he keeps his lips wrapped around my clit, his tongue lashing back and forth in time to the curling motion of his finger.
And I just keep coming and coming, as if every bit of pleasure that my body was too tense and jittery to experience over the past several years is flowing through me now.
Wave after wave of ecstasy surges through my veins, and finally, some sound does come from my open mouth. It’s a low moan, breathy and ragged and raw. My legs give out completely a second later, and Jaro only stops lapping to catch me before I can fall. He surges to his feet, holding me tightly in his arms, and the feel of my bare chest pressed against his is enough to make my core pulse with an aftershock of desire.
I’m breathing like I just ran a marathon, my vision a little blurry as I gaze up at him. The lower half of his face glistens in the dim light under the tree, and I realize with a shock that it’s from me.
It’s my arousal.
As if that wasn’t breathtakingly sexy enough, Jaro slowly licks his lips as he gazes down at me, his face just a few inches from mine.
“Not broken,” he murmurs roughly. “Perfect.”
Then he kisses me.
I’m too turned on to even be embarrassed by the fact that I can taste myself on his lips. All I can do is cling to him and return his kiss with everything inside me as his tongue tangles with mine.
His cock is sandwiched between us, hard and hot even through the leather of his loincloth. As our kiss deepens, his loincloth shifts, and suddenly, we’re skin on skin there too. He groans, and a thrill of excitement and fear runs through me.
He just made me come harder than I ever have in my life. I want to return the favor, even though anxiety tugs at me again as I think about it.
Slowly, I start to reach between us, my fingertips seeking the length of him. But before I can touch him, Jaro catches my wrist gently in his hand, dragging it away. He keeps kissing me but steps back a little, opening up some space between our bodies.
The kiss goes on for a long moment, growing a little slower and less urgent. Then he pulls back and presses small kisses to my top and bottom lip, my cheeks, and the tip of my nose.
With a pleased smile stretching his lips, he bends down to retrieve my tank top from the forest floor, then tugs it back over my head and pulls it down.
I swallow, my gaze flicking down to where he cock is still poking out from behind his loincloth. “Don’t you want me to…?”
“We are mates, Sadie,” he tells me, running his knuckles down the side of my face. “We will have time for all of that. Later.”
He seals his words with a kiss, and I kiss him back as confusion spins through my mind. Does he not want me to reciprocate? To touch him too? I don’t see how that could be true, considering how obvious and large his erection is.
As if he’s sensed the direction my thoughts are going, Jaro clears his throat, reaching down to twitch his loincloth back into place. He gently fixes my clothes too, tugging my pants up and closing the button and zipper.
“We should find more food and water before dusk falls,” he murmurs. “It won’t be safe to forage after dark.”
“Okay.” I nod, chewing my lip as I look up at him.
He smiles and clasps my face between his large hands, dropping one last chaste kiss to my lips before taking my hand and leading me out of the small shelter. I blink in the light as he holds the branches aside for me, still reeling from everything that just happened.
Honestly, I don’t know if I’m relieved or disappointed that Jaro stopped things before they could go any further.
14
Jaro
Slanch, I’m not sure I’ll survive this.
Stepping away from my mate as she looked up at me with those wide, beautiful eyes, still glazed over from the power of her release, was one of the hardest things I’ve ever done.
Even now, the feel of her hand in mine is making my cock pulse with need, the raging hardness refusing to die down no matter what else I think of. Not even the lingering pain in my head is enough to distract me.
She was reaching down to touch me. I know she was. And every fiber of my being craved that touch. I want her mouth on me, her hands on me, her skin against mine. I want to lay her down on the ground or press her up against the nearest tree and bury my length inside her over and over again until neither of us can move.
But I can’t forget the fear in her eyes earlier, the tightness in her voice when she told me she felt broken.
I can’t forget that she told me someone hurt her.
I don’t know who it was, and I don’t know what they did. It must’ve been someone back on Terra, someone she knew before she came to this planet, and frustration floods
me at the thought that this person is safe on the other side of the universe. If they were on Nuthora, I would find them and make them pay for putting that look of fear and sadness on my mate’s face.
Sadie is strong. She’s braver than many of the people I encountered on Ybretti, and although fate may have tried to break her, I can see that she’s a survivor. Just like me.
But I refuse to push her beyond what she’s ready for. I refuse to even take the chance of hurting her or reopening old wounds in her heart. I asked if I could make her feel good, and the fact that she allowed me to touch her the way I did means something.
Pride swells in my chest as I think of how I delivered on my promise. Her sweet little noises were the best kind of torture, my cock growing unbearably hard, arousal leaking down my shaft as I feasted on her. I want to do it all over again, but we really do need to find food before it grows too late.
Thinking of Sadie’s taste, of the way she fell apart beneath my tongue and of the sweet little button that made her cry out so loudly, makes my cock throb with a nearly blinding need. Turning away from her for a moment, I surreptitiously slip my free hand beneath my loincloth and squeeze my shaft near the base, trying to relieve some the aching pressure.
“Um, I think I hear water over that way,” she says in a slightly strained voice, and I wonder if my action hasn’t gone as unnoticed as I hoped.
“Good.” I turn back to her, tugging my misbehaving loincloth into place over my cock as well as I can. “I see some tari fruit on that tree. Tomorrow, I’ll try to hunt for some small game, but the fruit of the tari tree is nutritious and filling. It will do for tonight.”
“Okay.”
She nods, and we head in the direction of the water, crouching by a stream and sipping from our cupped hands. Then I reach up into the low-hanging branches of the tari tree and pluck several of the large, round fruits. We carry them back to the shelter of the tree, and since there’s no need to cook them, I abstain from building a fire. The warmth and light would be enjoyable, but there’s a chance it could draw predators or nomadic prisoners, so there’s no reason to take that risk tonight.
