Property of the Fae

by Laxmi Hariharan

  She draws in a breath, and her heartbeat ratchets up.

  Hmm. Maybe I’ve been using the wrong tactics so far. It isn’t about using my strength; it is about using the part of me I haven’t shared with anyone else. That tenderness inside that crawls under my skin, bleeds out through my pores when she is around. That feeling of wanting to hold her close, until our skins meld into one… I yank on that emotion and pull it to the surface, then lick the hollow at the base of her throat.

  She moans.

  I cup her breast and squeeze her nipple. A trembling starts from her heels, pulsing up her legs.

  I drag my fingers down her waist, slipping it between us until I brush her clit.

  “Chef, no”

  She scissors her legs around my waist and digs her heels into my back.

  Goosebumps pop on my skin. I am not sure what I am doing anymore. Punishing her? Hurting her? Making her come? Or maybe…maybe I am making love to her. Love? That ol’ sentiment that humans waffle on about. The kind that I have only seen some couples have, and which I know is not in store for me. No, it can’t be that. It can’t be this need to make her come, to make sure she enjoys what I am doing to her, as I try to break her? Nope. Not that. Not for me.

  I rub the heel of my hand against her clit. Her thighs tense, and her pussy clenches on my dick.

  A low pressure builds in my groin, beginning to radiate out. I am running out of time.

  I pinch her clit, and her body bucks.

  I let go of her arms, and she flings them about my shoulders, digs her nails into my back, and angles her pelvis up so I inch that final, infinitesimal, few millimeters more into her.

  Liquid lust slams through me, and I go impossibly hard. My dick pushes into her cervix wall, and I feel myself extend.

  No, this is not right.

  This is only meant to happen when you mate. I am one step away from knotting her and…I don’t want to stop. The realization sweeps through me. I have been fighting this all along. The inevitable. The fact that her body was made for me. Her soul calls to me. The fact that I don’t want to admit it, yet my dick doesn’t care for all that. The fucker has a muscle memory that is driven by instinct, and this time I cannot hold back.

  “I am sorry, but it’s too late to stop.” I gasp.

  She turns her face toward my voice. Her pupils are blown. She opens her mouth to speak, but no words come out.

  I pull out, just a little, just enough to grip the edge of the bed with my toes. Bringing both arms down, I angle her hips, then I plunge in.

  She screams, her head snaps back, and the tendons of her throat strain. Heat, lust, intense white emotion rams through me. I extend completely, finding that opening deep within her where no one else has been, where no one else is going to be, no one other than me, and go through.

  Her body spasms, and her arms fall to the sides, her thighs clench about my waist.

  “Tr-i-stan.” Her voice is a keening cry that hits me in the chest.

  My ears pull back, my canines ache, and there is so much fire in my throat, in my chest, I am burning up, and only she can put it out. Can you put out a fire with another? Not the time for word games. Not. I lower my head and bury my teeth into the side of her throat.

  23

  Jess

  Pain rips down my side, burning a trail to my core. My pussy quivers, and the moisture gushes forward to bathe his dick. There is a direct connection from where he bit me to that deepest, most secret core of me. The part he owns already. He moves his hips, and his cock plunges deeper. All the way inside, so deep that I am sure he's splitting me in half.

  “So what they say about the Fae is true then?” I gasp.

  His big body freezes above me, and waves of tension roll off him. “What…?” The cords of his throat move, and when he angles his head, a trail of blood runs down his chin.

  I smell the copper, and my stomach lurches. It’s my blood, and really, it should gross me out. But it doesn’t.

  “You bite.”

  He flicks out his tongue and licks up the blood.

  My skin puckers.

  It’s as if he’s tasting me, drawing in my essence. It’s almost more intimate than the fact that he’s still inside me.

  “Here’s another thing they don’t tell you.” A smirk pulls at his lips.

  I don’t want to know. I am not curious. Not one bit. “What?” The word stutters out, and hell, when had this become a dialogue?

  This isn’t supposed to be an exchange; other than that of bodily fluids, and not that I am keeping track or anything. But you know what I mean? He’d all but carried me away from that gathering and then…I could have escaped but chose not to. My bad.

  He lowers his head, then licks the space where he’d bitten me. A shiver of warmth flows from the site of the wound. Some of the pain abates.

  “You going to keep me in suspense?” Facepalm. Why did I say that? Now he knows I am dying of curiosity. That I want to know what he’d been about to tell me.

  “How about I show you?”

  “Hmm, okay, I guess.” This is a strange conversation to be having when there’s a Fae male whose dick is extended way too deep inside you.

  As if sensing my thoughts, he rubs the heel of his hand on my clit. Slivers of heat zing up my nerves.

  Every part of me tenses.

  There’s a precision to his movements, a kind of almost meticulous attention to detail in how he knows which part of my anatomy to touch, to caress, to pinch, and yeah, to bite, all of which adds another layer of pleasure to my already sensitized nerve endings.

  “Promise not to freak out?” He sets his jaw. “At least, not more than you have already.”

  I frown and dig my nails into his shoulders.

  He doesn’t wince. Of course not.

  A fresh burst of copper seeps into the air. This time it’s his blood, not mine. Fair is fair, right?

  “Not helping with all that buildup, but do your worst already,” I drawl.

  His eyes gleam. His shaft thickens further inside me. Whoa? The alpha-hole is pleased when I challenge him, huh?

  His dick throbs, filling me up, nudging that secret core of me. Sparks burst behind my eyeballs, and little pinpricks of pleasure tug at my scalp, so sharp they almost tip over into pain. A groan whines out of me. Guess it’s not a good idea to bait an alpha dominant Fae when the sharpest, pointiest part of him is deep inside you, when his fingers are playing with your clit as if you are his musical instrument. When he growls in his throat, then angles his head and licks at your lips, sending another burst of heat and ecstasy racing over your skin.

  “Patience, Fire, else you’ll burn out too fast.”

  “That what you doing? Trying to slow me down, pacify me so I last longer?” I force myself to speak the words slowly when every muscle in my body is wound tight. When the soles of my feet tingle and my fingers itch and everything is waiting…waiting for his next move.

  “Nope.” One side of his mouth curls. “Just priming you so you hurtle toward a big finish.”

  Before he can complete his sentence, all my senses jangle. My dragon roars up, the amber-gold energy flooding my blood, overflowing my cells, reaching out through the psychic plane to him, only to slam into a barrier. Then he swoops down on me.

  His lips fasten on mine. He hooks his arms under my knees, then yanks my legs up over his shoulders. His entire body tenses, and he slams into me. Breaking through a second barrier—one I hadn’t known existed—he knots his dick behind my pelvic bone.

  Agony screams through me.

  Blue and gold sparks flash in front of my eyes. My dragon slams against the psychic shield he’s imposed on me, only to draw back and shatter. The energy flows through my blood, out through my cells. A blanket of heat pours over us, wrapping around our bodies so tight that sweat bursts from every pore in my body, and yet he doesn’t stop. He locks his lips over mine, thrusts his tongue into my mouth, and drinks from me. A scream boils up, and he swallows it down. Ev
ery cell in my body is owned by him. Possessed by him. He’s marked me, and I…I want it. Want more. A splintering sensation sweeps up from my toes. I stretch out my legs, straining to get closer to him, trying to take him in deeper, reaching from a primal part of me that is more dragon than human.

  The climax crashes over me, and moisture floods from my core. Then darkness flings its net over me and pulls me down.

  When I come to, I am alone in bed.

  24

  Tristan

  What had come over me? I had rutted her, then buried myself balls deep in her, and taken her over and over again, and she…she’d matched my every move.

  She’d taken it all and come back for more.

  Warmth flushes my chest at how she'd matched my every move, and hell if that doesn't puzzle me.

  There are no straightforward emotions where Fire is concerned. She brings out an intensity in me, a compulsion to see things through all the way. No half measures with her. Nope. Leaning over the stove in the kitchen of the safe house, I pour the pancake batter over the hot griddle, then spread it out.

  Some men work out their frustrations, maybe go for a run. I’ve done that already.

  After Fire collapsed in a state of exhaustion—thanks to my ministrations, and I take full credit for wringing out every last drop of response from her before she’d gone out—I’d tucked her over my chest. I couldn’t bear to have an inch of her skin separated from me. So fuck me, I am possessive that way, something I am learning about myself. I wanted her as soon as I laid eyes on her, but this need to hide her away from the world, so she sees no one else but me, breathes in no other scent but mine, eats only what I cook for her…all of it is…ah, alarming, to say the least.

  It was that which had me tearing myself from her side after giving up all pretense of trying to sleep.

  Maybe Fae metabolism is more resilient than shifters or I am just one horny motherfucker, but as she’d slept curled up on top of me, every breath of hers had pushed her breasts against my chest. The curve of her waist nestling into my hip bones, the softness of her pussy that had settled so beautifully over my dick had made me hard all over again.

  I’d wanted to turn her on her back and plunge into her. Had brushed my finger over her slit and found her wet and aching. She’s so tiny that I could have simply maneuvered her over my already throbbing shaft and speared her, and what would that have made me?

  No different from that mofo ex-boyfriend of hers. Speaking of whom, when I get back, I am going to hunt that bastard and kill him. The smell of burning pancakes assails me, and I swear.

  The only thing I hate more than the thought of the man who had got his hands on my property—and she is my property, mine, not going to apologize for thinking that—is the thought of wasting food.

  I scoop up the burned-to-a-crisp pancake and set it aside.

  Her soft footsteps reach me a second before she swoops out an arm from behind me for the burned food.

  I shift my stance just enough to plant my bulk in her path. She gets to the food anyway— I let her, can’t deny this woman anything. “There are fresh ones coming, you know?”

  She tears into the pancake, “Likhe them ohverdone.”

  “Not polite to speak with your mouth full.” I pour the pancake batter onto the skillet and swirl it around.

  “Yeah, you prefer me to do other things that make my mouth full. Oops.”

  I hear the slap of her hand on her mouth and click my tongue. “You ever stop to think before you speak?”

  “You do enough of that for both of us.”

  I freeze. My shoulders go solid.

  There’s no noise behind me either.

  Guess the significance of what she said is not lost on either of us. Okay then. Time to get some things out in the open, before either of us gets the wrong idea about what just transpired earlier in that bedroom. What had unfolded was nothing more than mind-blowing sex. A good rut. And you had knotted her, you bastard. You had lost all control and taken her without warning, treating her the way a Fae male would his mate and without giving her enough notice about what it meant. And strangely, maybe that is my exit clause.

  That she doesn’t know the significance of what had unfolded between us. I hadn’t soul-bonded her, so that is something.

  It means I can still walk away from this with…nothing.

  I would be leaving the best part of me with her.

  She makes me feel good about myself. Gives me purpose. Makes me feel one hundred fucking feet tall, and not just my dick. Corny, real corny the way I seem to think around her. She makes me feel fucking awesome, and I am going to walk away from her. I am an asshole. Heh, so nothing has changed, right? Nothing except what I am deep inside. She is my redemption. And it’s imperative she never finds that out.

  The sizzling of the griddle cuts through the heavy silence. I place a fresh pancake atop the already sizeable stack and turn to find her staring at me.

  “You’re breaking up with me?” Her lower lip quivers.

  Her hair is mussed around her shoulders. That sleek, waist-length hair is tangled up. I did that. The sensation of wrapping those strands around my fingers as I had yanked her head back, right before I had buried my teeth in her throat… I had staked my claim on her.

  I had come within a millimeter of mating her. My gaze falls to the wound on her throat. As if feeling the direction of my gaze, she raises her palm to cover the mark. My mark.

  “Don’t do that.” The words just rip out of me. Right. Now, you’re going to tell her to shout the marks of your ownership to the world? When I’d all but indicated to her that it needed to be otherwise?

  She drops her hand and juts out her chin. “My shifter healing powers will ensure that the wound closes up fast. It will have healed by this evening.”

  I take a step forward, and my hand holding the plate of pancakes wobbles. My insides churn, and the familiar bite of anger twists my guts. Why am I feeling this way? She’s right, the wounds will fade, then no one will know what happened between us. No one will know that I had knotted her…no one except me. And what does it mean? That once more I am back to hiding what is most important for me. Just like the time when I had been raped, then beaten to within an inch of my life and it had been left to Nolan to nurse me back to health. I hadn’t shared just how much that experience had scarred me. Not then. Not now. I had survived that, hadn’t I? The filth that I am. I am marred for life. And I have no right to ask her to be my mate. “You deserve better.”

  She stiffens. “What does that mean?”

  “You know I was abused.”

  She winces.

  “Sodomized and left for dead.”

  The color leaches from her cheeks, leaving her skin as pale as her T-shirt. My T-shirt by the looks of it and… A fierce pleasure flushes my skin. The next best thing to having me draped over her is for her to wear my clothes, what belongs to me—she belongs to me. The telekinetic energy rolls under my skin, and I push it away. She’s not yours, motherfucker. Never will be.

  “So, you see, I cannot do this to you.”

  “Do what?” She throws up her hands. “As always, you are two steps ahead of me, and I can’t keep up.”

  A smirk pulls at my lips. Damn, it feels good to get any kind of compliment from Fire.

  “And why is it so easy to feed your already bloated ego?” She pouts.

  Of course, my gaze drops to her mouth. My dick twitches. Fucker hasn’t got the message yet that this is a breakup conversation. Get on with it, tell her why you must leave her.

  “Because, darling, it’s the only thing that saw me through my past. The fact that I got through everything and still had any kind of personality left is a near miracle. It's because, I've always had this oversized belief in myself. I was determined to make it despite—or maybe because of—the odds, and that’s why I am standing here in front of you.” With a throbbing cock that after being inside you not a few hours ago, wants another encore, and another.

&nbs
p; Get your mind out of the gutter and feed the woman, Chef.

  Right. I stalk to the table and place the pancakes on the table. “Sit.” I yank out a chair.

  “What’s this?”

  “Breakfast.”

  “A breakup breakfast?” She props her arms on her hips.

  And she thinks I am the one with the smartass comebacks?

  “If that’s what you want to call it.” I jerk my chin toward the chair.

  She stomps over and drops into it.

  I swivel around and, walking to the shelf, pull out the honey, the maple syrup, the butter, then stride back to the table place it in front of her.

  “Wow.” She blinks. “You managed to balance all that in one go, and ah, this is…quite a spread.”

  “Let it not be said that I did not take care of you…”

  “And what am I going to do after you leave?’

  “You’ll manage.” What’s wrong with me? Had I actually said that? And how am I going to manage without her? It’s never simple where she is concerned, is it?

  The telekinetic energy once more swirls under my skin. My chest squeezes. Apparently, my instincts are going into overdrive. My heart insists that I cannot leave her. But I must, it is the only way out. Reaching forward, I slide the crepes on her plate and pour maple syrup over them.

  “Presumptuous much?”

  I prop my hip on the table next to her, then, carving out a piece of the crispy flat cake with a healthy dollop of the maple syrup, I hold the fork up to her lips.

  She purses her mouth and folds her arms in her lap.

  “Don’t forget you’d agreed to do as I asked.” I tilt my chin down.

  “That was before—”

  I slide the forkful of food into her mouth.

  She chews; her features freeze. I am sure she is going to protest, then her gaze widens. She swallows and glances at the plate.

  “Good, eh?”

  She opens her mouth, and this time a sigh wheezes out. “It’s almost as good as…” Her gaze darts to my face then away.