Annoyingly, though, it had only grown more intense with sleep instead of less. If the incubus and succubus did this to everyone every night, it was going to get old real fast. Either that, or she was going to wear her vibrator out like an overworked butler, and she wouldn’t have a forwarding address to buy a new one.
After unlatching and lifting the door, she climbed out, not bothering to be quiet this time. She didn’t have to be afraid if it ended up like the last dream. If it started going the way of a nightmare, then she could scream and run.
“Anyone out there?” a man shouted into the silence. ”Anyone? Fuck!”
Caroline couldn’t even hear crickets.
Oh, please don’t let this be a nightmare.
Caroline didn’t bother with the door of the cage. She vaulted over the gate. Her hand slipped and she hit the sliding knob that started the carousel slowly spinning, the music lower and therefore creepier than usual. She cried out when her wrist hit one of the cast clockwork gears after slipping, but she managed to land on her feet, even though the ground was moving underneath her. Caroline crouched there to gather her balance and bearings.
The man standing in the middle of the carousel rows whirled around, his eyes wide.
She actually let out a rushing breath of relief when she saw that, though his leather trousers were closed, he was as hard as the man last night, his cock almost violent where it wanted to push through the trousers. But this was a different man, transformed from a different carousel mount, the one with whip marks on his side. They were still there, their edges ragged and the welts cast an angry red.
Definitely a dream.
“Who’s there?” the man called. He winced, groaning and pressing his hand against his straining erection. “Goddammit, don’t torture me anymore. I can’t stand it. I can’t take another day of it.”
“What kind of help were you looking for?” Caroline said, standing up behind a bejeweled black horse. She grasped the pole when the horse came down from its riding motion then lifted herself up to straddle the saddle.
He stared at her hand as she twisted it over the spiral brass pole. His mouth went a little slack and his eyes glazed.
“Are you—are you the one?” the man asked.
Unlike last night’s man, this man was slighter, his leather trousers low on his hips, his hair so ash blond it almost looked gray, and maybe some of it was. He had one of those faces that defied age. At one moment she thought he was over forty and another under thirty. The dim light wasn’t helping. In the end it didn’t matter, not with the way he approached her against the carousel’s direction, his gaze moving over her like she was a feast for the starving. The hollows under his eyes and under his cheekbones only solidified that impression.
“The one what?” Caroline asked. She rose up on the stirrups, sliding both hands up the pole. She wanted her body against something, and he was still too far from her, as though he couldn’t believe what he was seeing.
“Are you here to save me?” the man asked. “Please, baby, please save me. I’ll do anything, give you anything. Just please save me.”
“Anything?” Caroline said. God, she liked the way he’d said that and the promise he carried in his expression.
He grabbed her waist and lifted her off the horse before she realized what he was doing. Then he pushed her against the horse’s flank, crowding her. He smelled of blood, sweat and leather. As he brought his cock against her belly, he bared his teeth, the hollows of his cheeks going gaunt as he hissed in air.
Caroline whimpered, grabbing at his bare chest to steady herself. Her nail caught his nipple, and he exhaled all at once, as though she’d stabbed him.
“Wicked girl. Can such a wicked girl really save me?”
It seemed more of a moan than a question. She licked her lips to taste the way he’d called her wicked, as though it was the most delicious thing he could think of. He looked so desperate…not quite as undone as the man from the night before, but just as desperate.
“I think I could be of some help,” Caroline said.
The low burn of arousal from Lord Mikhail and Lady Sasha had spiked the second he’d shoved her against the mount. It only got stronger, almost painful, when she reached the placket of his trousers and ripped the buttons open and the zipper down to free him.
He struck the wooden horse with his fist when she took his erection in her hand and roughly stroked the shaft. It was slick with sweat and pre-cum, but the way he sidled away then thrust back into her hand told her it had to chafe from sensitivity…and he didn’t care.
“God, yes, you’re it, wicked girl,” the man groaned. “Thank you. Thank you.”
It was really quite an experience for her presence, her very touch, to be considered a man’s salvation. A woman could get used to it—and the way he clenched his eyes shut, the way he clutched at her shoulders with a bruising grip as she stroked him, and the barely restrained, rhythmic growl as he held back shouts when his cock swelled and jerked in her hand, gushing cum over her fingers.
“Ah,” the man breathed. His shoulders slumped, and he rested his forehead against hers. “I’ve been like that for ages.”
“Glad I could be of service,” Caroline said.
She derived some smug satisfaction from having been the co-author of his climax, although her body begged for its own pleasure. Now she just waited for the dream to fade or go in another direction, something and somewhere that wouldn’t make sense in retrospect, the way that dreams did. Maybe the horse behind her would come to life too. Maybe one of the clowns would show up eating a corn dog and juggling fire. Anything could happen, but she’d resigned herself to not getting any tonight. The universe apparently thought one mind-blowing orgasm dream was enough for one girl for a while.
And Caroline was okay with that, strangely enough. Her subconscious was the bastard, not him. She wished she could spend more time with him, just as she’d wished the same for the first man. She wanted to experience that more articulate yet rougher edge to him, like a carved blade to the first man’s blunter instrument. But she was mostly content with having had the chance to touch him, to save him.
“You think we’re done?” the man asked when she removed her hand to wipe the cum away and leave for wherever her dream sent her next.
He grabbed her wrist with the same bruising grip as he’d grabbed her shoulders—except this time, it was deliberate rather than desperate.
The man guided her hand to her mouth, brushing it against her lips. He stared into her eyes with a smoldering gaze that managed to just avoid being mean. Caroline shivered against the wooden horse. Then she tentatively parted her lips and licked at her hand, tasting him on her skin.
“There’s my girl,” the man said, his voice going husky. “Taste me. Taste what you did to me. Taste my gratitude.”
Caroline slipped three of her fingers into her mouth and sucked his cum off. He was captivated by her lips tight around the base of her fingers. She pulled them back out clean then sucked on her last two fingers and let him move her hand up so she could lick her palm. He leaned in to lick the back of her hand, moving his tongue in time with hers as though he was kissing her. A moan escaped her. She tightened her hand into a fist and jerked it away from their mouths.
“You trying to leave?” he asked.
But Caroline grasped the back of his neck and pulled him down for a different kind of taste. He met her with greater ferocity, twisting her arm behind her to shove her hips against his. He bent her over the rising and falling horse, the carousel still rotating slowly around and around, but she barely noticed her surroundings.
Everything about the moment was surreal—not necessarily dreamlike this time, but not at all anything she’d expect. Whenever the horse dipped down, he had the upper hand, her back pressed against her twisted arm and his weight over her. When it rose up again, she met the thrusts of his tongue with her own. He caught her tongue then her lips between his teeth—not pressing down, but the threat shuddered t
hrough her.
Caroline scrabbled at the waist of his trousers, pushing them down to grasp his ass and grind him closer. When his already hardening shaft pressed the thick placket of her denim shorts directly against her clit, she whined high in her throat and threw her head back.
“You like that, you wicked thing?” He ground against her in the same place, bit the stretch of neck she presented to him.
Caroline practically sobbed as he did it again and again, thrusting his hips against hers in a parody of fucking her. She could see the image they made in the brass mirrors up in the carousel canopy.
“I think I can make you beg. I think I can give you so much pleasure you’ll beg me to take you right here in the middle of the circus where anyone can see you. It’s the least I can do, and I’ll do it happily. I can’t tell you how much pleasure it’ll give me to give it to you, as much as your tight little body can stand.”
He released her wrist and pushed her shirt up her stomach before grabbing the waist of her shorts.
“Tell me when,” he murmured. He mouthed and bit at her nipple through her shirt and bra, making her jump, then kissed down her bare stomach. The man dipped his tongue into her navel. He groaned into her as he opened and yanked her shorts down, along with her panties.
This was all moving so fast, barreling forward, her arousal so much farther ahead than her brain, her body wanting whatever he would do to her. But she didn’t know what to make of his roughness, the cruel glint like a razor in chocolate.
She pushed against his head, whether to shove him away or encourage him closer, Caroline couldn’t say. Regardless of her intention, when he ran his tongue over her folds and flicked the tip against her clit, her knees went weak. All thought or inhibition melted down her spine with the molten pleasure dripping to meet the man’s mouth.
She grasped the pole and the horse’s tail, seeking stability and purchase, but there was no stability here. It raised her up and lowered her down. The night world outside the carousel moved past her in shadows. The lights glittered and the music thrummed as though it played strings inside her, strings this man had already plucked.
Caroline bit her lip to hold in her moans, almost too hard. The man caressed up her left leg, squeezing the flesh as though testing its strength and give. He lifted it up, tucking it over his bare shoulder. Her juices smeared against his cheek.
He kept a grip on her thigh, though, digging his fingers into her whenever she bucked closer to that mouth that wrenched desire from her through her clit and cunt. He slid two fingers into her pussy and pulled at her from the inside, forcefully beckoning to her pleasure. It hurt a little, but still she clamped down around those thin, insistent fingers.
The man drank the moisture from her folds. He tugged at her just this side of painful and teased her with his teeth before returning to her clit. He flicked it with the barest tip of his tongue before licking her full-on and sucking until she nearly collapsed onto him when she lost her grip on the horse.
Caroline managed to hold herself up—no thanks to the man. He was relentless, jerking his curved fingers in her cunt and drawing her shuddering orgasm out of her like hard waves hitting a jagged shore.
As soon as her thigh relaxed over his shoulder, he dipped down farther and licked her pleasure at its source. Caroline whimpered when he wriggled his tongue into her along with his fingers where they drew out more for him to drink. He laughed into her.
Then he dragged the flat of his tongue back over her clit and up her stomach. Her leg slipped down his shoulder. He caught it in the crook of his arm to keep her open for him.
The man shoved her shirt up over her bra then pushed her bra cups down to expose her nipples to him.
“Look at you, ripe, wicked girl,” he growled. “So soft and tender for me.”
The man alternated between her nipples, the slight stubble on his jaws rasping against her sensitive breasts. He had already come and made her come, but his cock was hot and hard on her thigh again. He still seemed hungry, as though it took all his control to avoid actually consuming her alive—no matter how much it seemed he was doing exactly that. And she let him, serving herself up on a platter for his voracious appetite.
“And such little resistance. You like what I do to you. You like being taken, don’t you?” The man bit her chin hard enough for her to cry out.
He took advantage of her open mouth to slip in again, effortlessly dominating her with his whole body. As soon as she adjusted to one thing he was doing to her, he’d change his angle or dig his blunt nails into her or slap her ass hard enough for her to feel the whole muscle shake. Then, just as she let go of the horse to wrap her arms around his shoulders, he pushed his cock into her.
It was big, bigger than the first man, even though that one had been thick, especially in the middle of her dry spell. However, this stretched her more, her folds thin and tight around him—yet it didn’t even sting. Instead, she squeezed her muscles around him, pulling him in deeper, moaning as he bit and sucked at her lower lip.
She was disheveled, slick with sweat, reduced to little more than a bundle of raw nerves. She gave herself completely over to the sensations without fear of the consequences, nor what it might say about her that she didn’t mind bite marks or a few drops of blood smearing over their skin or that she didn’t know whose blood it happened to be.
They were one fucking body, his cock driving into her, her sinking down over him, their breaths mingling, their tastes indistinguishable from how much they had shared. He hurt her all over, but she encouraged him. Caroline voiced her pleasure with every thrust until he pulled her away from the horse and held her with his own strength and balance alone.
He stood under the changing lights and clanging music, and they clung to each other until he grabbed her thighs and pushed her all the way to the base of his cock, which throbbed inside her. She kept one arm hooked around his neck. Trusting him to keep holding her, she insinuated her other hand between their sticky bodies. She rubbed against the hood of her clit and ground against his cock until she felt him come, hotter than their overheated bodies, his whole body like a furnace.
She dropped her forehead against his shoulder then lunged forward and bit him as she came hard and harsh with her own orgasm.
“God, you’re a tasty little morsel, aren’t you?” the man said. He panted as he lifted her off his cock.
Caroline’s legs couldn’t hold her. He eased her down so that she wouldn’t fall.
“But you’re the one. You’re the one to save us, aren’t you?”
“I don’t understand what you mean,” Caroline murmured, closing her eyes against his shoulder and waiting for her breathing and racing heart to slow down.
But she didn’t expect herself to understand. It was a dream. There was nothing to understand.
* * * *
Caroline woke up cool and tangled once again in her bed, this time to her phone alarm, since she now knew when she was supposed to wake up for breakfast. As depressing as it was to wake up back into this damned reality, her stomach didn’t seem to have been affected by her despair. It was audibly groaning and twisting with hunger.
Caroline sighed. She didn’t have a stitch of appetite, but she’d have to eat something more substantial than the apple she decided to liberate from the fridge before going for a shower.
The dried blood on her forearm stopped her short.
The scratch there wasn’t bad, no worse than when her uncle’s Pomeranian had tried to get away and ended up running a back claw over her skin. Brownish red flakes crackled away when she brushed at them.
The problem was that she hadn’t hurt herself like this yesterday.
She’d hurt it in her dream. She’d slipped and caught her wrist on a clockwork gear when she’d gone to investigate the second man.
Caroline clambered over to the floor-to-short-ceiling mirror next to the fridge so that she could see her whole body in the light.
Bite marks. There was no way to mistake th
em for scratches. Bruises that were obviously from hands and fingers. She lifted her shirt and pushed off her shorts to check the rest of her. There were no signs that she’d had sex, although there were residual effects of arousal.
Had she done this to herself? Or had someone done it to her, in spite of the assurances that the demons would never hurt her? Caroline had heard of psychosomatic injuries, like stigmata, but it had never happened to her before. Then again, miracles and magic had never happened to her before either. Maybe she’d just been so stressed out that…
No. She couldn’t have made bite marks like that. Bruises could occur spontaneously, like from some kind of bleeding disease—which she doubted she had, since the scratch on her arm had healed just fine—but she couldn’t make hickeys on her neck, shoulders and chin. Right?
This had to be some new game by Madoc. Some kind of trick. He was the one who said it was part of his nature. If he was as psychic as he pretended to be, it wasn’t a stretch that he could also see into her dreams, and maybe he’d made her look the way she had felt in those dreams.
Caroline’s face flamed. She watched herself turn red in the mirror, all the way to her ears. Sex dreams were fun because they were hers, because they were uninhibited and weird and, most important of all, private. She’d gotten off on the most fucked-up things in dreams, and she didn’t need anyone knowing about it. The idea of Madoc peeking in on one of those dreams offended her, made her feel stripped to her very spine.
Caroline crawled over to her bag, yanked out a pair of black skinny jeans, a black screen tank top, new underwear and sandals, then hurried out of the cabin and into the cage. The metal screamed as she forced the gate open. She slammed the door behind her. The carousel was still and quiet, only the dim lights on, mostly obscured by the morning sun.
No one was there to gloat at their own cleverness, at least not where she could see.
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