by Presley Hall
She laughs quietly, shaking her head.
“I want to, Sadie,” I promise her. “I do. But—”
“I get it.” She holds my gaze, giving me a soft smile. “And it means a lot to me. I’m really grateful you’re willing to give me time. A day ago, I was sure I could never come from my own touch, let alone someone else’s, and that was how many orgasms ago?” Her lips tilt up in a grin, a flash of heat burning in her eyes. “A lot has changed in a short amount of time, and I like that you don’t want to rush me. But…”
She trails off, looking up at me through her lashes as she drags her bottom lip between her teeth. The sight is so breathtaking that my cock jerks.
“But what?” I ask, my voice a rasp.
“But I care about you, Jaro. In a way I’ve never cared about anyone else. Part of it is the mate bond, and part of it is just… you. I’ve never felt a connection like this, and I want us to share more things with each other, not less.”
“What do you mean?”
She steps away from me, putting a little space between us as she settles onto the grass by the tree’s trunk. “If you’re going to touch yourself, I don’t think you should have to hide it. You could… you could let me be part of it.”
My eyebrows shoot up, and my cock practically dislodges my loincloth as it jerks in response to her words. Did my mate just say that she wants to watch me?
Fire burns in my blood, making it hard to think straight as I drop to my knees on the grass in front of her. With my heart pounding in my chest, I reach down and shift the leather of my loincloth to one side, then wrap my fist around the base of my cock, sliding my hand up and down.
“Is this what you mean, my kira? Like this?”
Sadie’s eyes have gone wide, and her jaw hangs open slightly as her gaze zeroes in on the movement of my hand. For a long moment, she just stares at me, and then her chest rises as she inhales—as if she momentarily forgot how to breathe. Arousal and feral pride surge inside me, and I circle my thumb over the crown of my cock before resuming my strokes.
The fierce need that sent me into the woods in the first place returns with a vengeance, and I grimace at the almost painful pleasure gathering inside me. My own hand still can’t compare to what it would feel like to sink deep inside my mate, to feel her warm body beneath me as I plunge into her over and over again. But with her watching me, her breath growing faster to mirror my own and her cheeks flushed in the shadowy light, I feel almost connected to her. As if the two of us are touching somehow, even though a small expanse of space separates us.
“Oh god, Jaro.” Sadie’s voice is almost a whimper. “Fuck…”
She likes this, I realize, and the thought sends such a powerful surge of pleasure through me that I almost climax on the spot. I slow the movement of my hand, gripping tighter and running my thumb along the small ridge that travels the length of my cock.
Sadie leans back against the trunk of the tree, her heels digging into the grass as her hips shift a little from side to side. She presses her legs together, and my gaze drops to the place between her thighs. The part of her that tastes so slanching good I’m always starving for it.
I can smell her arousal on the air, musky and sweet, and it drives me nearly wild with lust. My fist becomes a blur on my cock, all thought of holding off or prolonging this moment lost in the torrent of raw desire coursing through my veins.
“Sadie.” I choke out her name, and even the sound of it makes my shaft throb and pulse. “You’re so beautiful. So perfect. So mine.”
She whimpers my name again, and only the promise I made earlier keeps me from closing the distance between us, tearing off her clothes, and impaling her with my hard length.
But then, to my surprise, Sadie’s hands go to the fastenings of her pants. She tugs at them desperately, and the moment they’re undone, she slips one hand between her legs. In the shadowy light, I can just make out the frantic movement beneath the fabric, and her head tips back slightly, her gaze still locked on me.
She’s touching herself. Bringing herself pleasure while she watches me. I imagine her little fingers slipping and sliding over the hard bud that makes her cry out when I lick it, circling it and teasing it the way I have, and my balls draw up tight against my body.
“Oh, slanch!” My stomach tenses, my hips thrusting into my hand as ropes of slick release spill from me, splattering over the grass and my fingers.
“Jaro! Oh, god!” Sadie’s hips buck upward, shifting and gyrating as her back arches. Her hand keeps moving inside her pants, and her entire body shudders several times before it finally goes slack.
She blinks up at me, breathing hard, mussed and beautiful and perfect.
“Holy shit,” she murmurs.
I can’t help myself. Leaning forward, I hook one of her ankles and tug her toward me until she’s sprawled out on the soft ground, no longer resting against the tree. Crawling up her body, I hover over her, looking down at her delicate features. Our faces are so close our noses almost touch, and she cups the back of my head and pulls me down to meet her as she kisses me hard.
I lose myself in it, in the indescribable relief of kissing her like this, both of us still recovering from our climaxes. Our lips move together for a long time, wild and ravenous at first, and then slower and deeper. My tongue strokes against hers as if trying to memorize the taste and feel of her, and her scent lingers on my skin when I finally draw back.
Rolling onto my side, I settle onto the ground next to her, pulling her flush against me as I curl my body around hers. I don’t bother to adjust my loincloth or redo the fastenings on her pants. I don’t care about any of that.
All I care about is the beautiful woman in my arms. The one who is vulnerable as well as fierce, who is brave despite her fear.
The one who has claimed my entire heart.
17
Sadie
Warm light filters through the branches of the tree as I blink my eyes open. It’s early, I think, although I can’t quite tell. It feels like I slept for days, but I’m pretty sure that’s just because I slept so well.
And that is due entirely to the man lying next to me. His chest is pressed to my back, and his arm is wrapped tightly around my waist, as if even in sleep, he can’t bear to be separated from me.
It definitely must be early if I’m awake before he is.
A smile pulls at my lips as I remember everything that happened last night. Sometimes it feels like none of this could possibly be real, like I’ll wake up at any moment and realize I dreamed the whole thing up. Somehow, I ended up with a man who, even though we haven’t known each other long, seems to know me better than I know myself. A man who is so dedicated to taking care of me that he would do anything to protect both my body and my heart.
And I get to keep him.
He’s mine.
My mate.
The first time I heard Droth speak that word, it sounded a little barbaric to me. It was plain to see that Charlotte cared about him just as much as he cared about her, so it’s not like I thought he had forced her or anything. But something about the word seemed to imply a lack of choice. A bond that tied two people together whether they wanted it or not.
But now that I’m in the same situation myself, it doesn’t feel like that at all. It feels like I do have a choice. And every part of me wholly and unequivocally chooses Jaro. I don’t think I could find a better man for me if I searched the entire universe.
Looking down at the arm slung around my waist, I marvel at the beautiful cast of his skin. It’s not a deep blue, but a gorgeous pearlescent color that reveals hints of purple at times. And the white markings that swirl over his skin are stunning too, highlighting the taut muscles that flex and bunch when he moves.
I trail my finger over one of the marks, following its path over his warm skin, and Jaro shifts against me, muttering something in his deep voice as he buries his face in my hair. His cock hardens against my ass, and at first, I think he’s still asleep. B
ut then his large hand slides up to cup my breast, squeezing and massaging it through the thin fabric of my shirt. My nipple springs to attention, and I let out a quiet laugh, grinding against him a little because I just can’t help it.
“Good morning,” I whisper, craning my neck to look at him.
“Yes. It is.”
There’s a growly quality to his voice that makes goosebumps instantly scatter across my skin, and he rolls me onto my back, bracing himself on one elbow as he drops his head and kisses me thoroughly.
I kiss him back without hesitation, reaching up to run my fingers through his thick brown hair. The bump on his head is fading a bit, but I’m still careful to avoid it.
Arousal spreads through me like a slow burn, and I let it fill every part of me, not fighting against it or letting the intensity of it scare me. I can’t believe the way my body responds to Jaro. I’ve never been more turned on than I am by him—even before all the shit with my stalker and the debilitating anxiety that followed.
It’s as if my body is waking up again after a long time in stasis, craving a man’s touch.
No. Not just a man’s touch.
His touch.
We kiss as if we have all the time in the world, as if we might just decide to live here under this tree instead of finding the village. As if there’s nothing else that exists, nothing else we could possibly need.
Honestly, in this moment, I can’t think of a single thing.
When Jaro breaks our kiss, his face hovers close to mine as he looks down at me. My lips tingle softly, missing the contact of his already.
“How do you feel?” he asks.
The broad smile that spreads across my face answers his question before I do. “Amazing.”
“Good.” He drops his head again, brushing his lips over my nose and cheeks. But when he draws back, his cat-like green eyes are shadowed, his expression serious. “Will you tell me, Sadie? What it was that frightened you? What made you feel broken?”
I hesitate, some of the bliss inside me evaporating like mist on a hot day. I don’t want to talk about it. But Jaro told me his history yesterday, sharing things that were undoubtedly painful. And I wasn’t lying last night when I said I want us to be close, to share more of ourselves with each other.
I guess that means both the good parts and the bad parts.
Scooting away a little, I fix my pants and then sit up and turn to face him. I want to keep touching him, to nestle deeper into his embrace where everything feels safe, but I feel like I need to stand on my own for this. I need to find the strength inside myself to do that.
“You remember how I told you I was an actor back on Earth?” I begin as Jaro adjusts his loincloth and sits up across from me. Our knees are almost touching, and he gazes at me intently as I speak.
“Yes. You played characters in stories,” he says, nodding.
“Uh huh.” I nod too, trying to think of a way to explain this that will make sense to my beautiful alien. “Well, some of the things I acted in—movies, TV shows, stuff like that—were pretty popular. A lot of people watched them, all over the country. All over the world. People recognized me on the street, even if they’d never met me before, because they’d seen me act in things.”
Jaro nods, his brow furrowing. I’m not sure he tracked everything I just said, but he hasn’t asked me any questions, so I plow ahead.
“Mostly, the attention was nice. People would ask for an autograph or tell me their favorite role of mine or maybe want a picture with me. But…” I lick my lips, my stomach clenching. “Sometimes having all that focus on me wasn’t nice. Several years ago, I started getting messages from someone. He claimed to be a fan, and the messages started off pretty harmless, almost sweet. But then they started getting more and more aggressive. Angrier. He thought that he had some kind of ownership over me because he’d seen all my movies and shows. He’d seen me act, and he thought that meant there was some kind of connection between us.”
As I speak, I realize I’m doing what Jaro did yesterday. Reporting the facts, describing what ended up being one of the worst periods of my life as if it’s a story I heard—something that another Sadie Ryan went through, not me.
“It got bad,” I say quietly. “The police got involved, but they couldn’t track down the guy. Somewhere in the middle of all of it, I started scaling back on acting work because the stress was getting to me. I signed with a new agent and hired a new manager, trying to take my career in a different direction and start fresh.”
My voice hardens as memories churn inside my head.
“It went on for another year. The police were following leads, but nothing was panning out, and the stalking was getting worse. Not just messages, but things left at my house, pictures of me sent in unmarked envelopes. It was terrifying. I was constantly on edge, always looking over my shoulder. I hired a bodyguard, but even that didn’t make me feel safe. Then one day…”
My voice dies out, my heart thudding hard in my chest. I look down at the ground, dragging in a deep breath.
The only way out is through.
I’ve already started the story, and Jaro deserves to know everything. He still hasn’t uttered a single word or interrupted with any questions. He sits completely still, his expression set in hard lines as he listens to me.
“My manager, Adam Murphy, asked me to drop off some headshots at his house,” I say. “I shouldn’t have gone. I should’ve known better. But I trusted him. I didn’t think—” A grimace tugs at my lips, and I shake my head, meeting Jaro’s eyes. “He was my stalker. He spent months working with me, earning my trust, making me think he was on my side, and the whole time, he knew how scared I was. He knew because he was the one sending me all of those things. The one following me. The one obsessed with me.”
Jaro lets out a quiet growl. We’re barely touching, but I can feel the tension radiating from his body. His nostrils flare as he draws in a breath, his green eyes turning dark.
“Adam drugged me,” I say simply, keeping my voice even. “It hit me so fast I barely had a chance to react. I had just enough time to realize what was going on, who he really was, before I blacked out. He abducted me. I don’t know what he planned to do with me, but I’m not sure I would’ve survived if he hadn’t gotten sloppy. The cops ended up tracking us down, and they found us before he could hurt me too badly. He was arrested, and they told me that was the end of it.”
I grimace, clenching my jaw. “But they were wrong. It wasn’t the end. I had to relive it all during his trial, and it haunted me for so long. I stopped acting entirely. I couldn’t even do the thing I once loved so much, because I couldn’t be around people. I couldn’t trust anyone. I went through a lot of therapy, and things were slowly getting better, but it was like he stole a part of me I never truly got back.”
My words die out, and I dig my fingers into the soft grass on either side of me, grounding myself a little. I glance up at Jaro, huffing a humorless laugh as I shake my head. “It’s nothing compared to what you’ve been through, really. I had a good life, for the most part. And I was free, even when it didn’t feel like it. Even when my anxiety was so bad I could barely leave my house, I still had the option to.”
Jaro gazes at me for a long moment, his jaw clenching. Then, in a movement so fast it makes me jump, he surges to his feet. His hands curl into fists, and he strides toward the drooping branches of the tree as if he’s going to burst out of our shelter and walk all the way to Earth if he has to, just to get his hands on the man who hurt me.
But he stops before he reaches them, turning back to stride angrily across the small space. Drawing his knife from where it hangs at his waist, he drives it into the trunk of the tree so hard that it lodges several inches deep in the dark wood. For a moment, his head drops, his hand still gripping the knife’s handle. Then he looks over at me, and the fury burning in his eyes is like nothing I’ve ever seen.
“I would kill him if I could,” he grits out. “He should not have been al
lowed to live.”
For a moment, I can imagine what this man looked like in the arena when he fought as a slave on Ybretti. I can see the full force of the warrior in him, in a way that I never have before. This is a man who knows violence intimately, who wouldn’t hesitate to kill to defend what he loves, and maybe that should scare me.
But it doesn’t.
Instead, seeing him so angry on my behalf seems to lift some of the heaviness I’ve been carrying in my chest for so long.
This man will always protect me.
The thought strikes me with the force of a boulder, and I climb slowly to my feet, keeping my gaze locked on Jaro. He’s breathing heavily, and he seems bigger, somehow, as if his muscles have swelled with his anger. The markings on his skin are glowing, making him look even more dangerous and… alien.
But that doesn’t scare me anymore either.
Nothing about this man scares me.
With steady steps, I walk toward him. He turns to face me as I near him, his hands curling into fists at his sides. When I reach up to press my palm to his chest, I feel the heat of his skin, the hardness of his muscles, and his heartbeat pounding wildly beneath them.
Going up on tiptoes, I slide my fingers through the hair at the back of his head and tug his face down toward mine. His body is stiff, still taut with anger, and when I press my lips to his, he doesn’t respond at first.
But I don’t stop kissing him. I kiss his top lip, then his bottom lip, then each corner of his mouth, breathing in the scent of him. I kiss the strong line of his jaw, and the side of his neck just below his ear. He makes a noise in his throat, a soft sort of groan that urges me on as I continue to trail my lips over his skin.
Slowly, he softens under my touch, and when I press my mouth to his again, his arms wrap around me in a tight hold.
Like a rubber band snapping, he kisses me back with fierce desperation.
18
Sadie
