“Damn.” She sucked in through her teeth. What a mess. Had to get herself straightened out. She’d tried it and liked it way too much, like some sort of instant addiction.
The man wouldn’t have disappeared off the face of the earth. He’d be back, but she could deal with that. He’d listened to her, or at least he did until she’d lain down and let him walk all over her. She could handle him.
A distant scratching reminded her of Killer and his needs. She went to the back door and opened it. Killer bowled out, only instead of heading for the lawn, he pranced over to the man sitting with his back to her at the top of the steps. The dog’s tongue went into overdrive, slurping at Heketoro’s arm.
Chapter Four
Oh my God, he was here. A tremor ran through her. Finding Aragorn of Middle Earth seemed as likely—though he’d never had muscles like those.
The black fabric of Heketoro’s shirt stretched tight across his shoulders. Memories stirred—her body under his, her mouth around him. The hairs rose on her arms. No dream, this, he was real, in front of her, and what in hell should she, could she, say to him? The things he’d done to her, and she had done to him. Blood flushed her cheeks. Whatever had come over her, it hadn’t been normal, not for her.
She didn’t make love in a car, let alone in a hallway. And letting someone hold her down was just—her vaginal muscles clenched… Oh, hell, she remembered last night too well.
Keeping an eye on him, she felt for the cane sofa, edged over to it, and sat, drawing her legs up, crossing them into a lotus. She tucked her ankles in. Calm, cool breathing, girl. Remember your yoga—stomach, chest, shoulders. In…out.
“I have to talk to you, Danii.”
Her eyes widened.
He rose, standing there like a colossus.
“Stay there!” She had to keep him at a distance. Her face heated, and her heartbeat seemed to dance. Something in her…responded to him when he was close. He fascinated her and scared her, all at once. How could he scare her? She’d stood up to the worst scum brandishing weapons and fists at her. But of course this, he…was a different sort of scary, one she couldn’t define.
“Danii…” He held his hands out to either side, palms flat. “I won’t harm you.”
“Stay there. Not a step farther!” She put a hand over her mouth for a few seconds, took it away. “I know you haven’t harmed me. Look. Whatever we did last night, that’s it. I’m not that sort of person.” Her cheeks burned. She’d knelt before him, obeyed his orders like some sort of slave. Moaned as he drove himself up inside her. Her nipples hardened. No. She willed away that image, held herself…still.
“Are you sure?”
Silence hung between them.
Am I sure? What a damned impertinent question. She studied him. God, I can smell him from here. Rich, earthy, fuckable. This was seriously bad. She absolutely did not want to have sex with him again, and yet she did, oh how very much she wanted to. Betrayed by her body.
Maybe there was another way. Sex didn’t have to be as they’d done it last night.
He waited unperturbed, face unreadable, and she noted how the air seemed to brighten around him in some odd way. The garden looked more alive. Even her rickety pergola at the back of the garden looked vibrant with the plant twining through it. Fresh white blossoms punctuated the looping stems like distant stars.
She had the disturbing sensation, if she cut him, Heketoro wouldn’t bleed blood.
“Have you finished looking?” His voice rumbled deep, and her very bones seemed to quiver.
And she was suddenly quite sure that with Heketoro, sex would always be a nonnegotiable item. It would be his way, every time. That made her so hot she blushed again. She remembered waking earlier. His mouth on my clit. His fingers inside me. She placed her hand to her stomach, frowning. How could she have forgotten something like that?
He smiled, as if he knew exactly what she was thinking. “I only want to talk, Danii.”
“You… When I’m near you, something…happens.” She shook her head. “You should go,” she said, quietly, and as firmly as she could manage.
“What happens?” He tilted his head. An inviting darkness swam in his eyes. Her lips softened.
“Uh.” God, she shouldn’t be saying this. “You affect me strangely.”
At that he laughed, actually laughed. She pinched her lips together.
“And you find that wrong?” His gaze sharpened. “That strangeness, I’d call desire. You shouldn’t resist.”
She managed to speak around the lump in her throat. “You should go.”
The tiniest of creases appeared between his eyes. She could almost see the click as he reached some decision. He turned, strode as far as the raggedy, overgrown hedges of mock orange around the low stone seat.
“Wait!” An intense need to know something of this man had seized her. If he left and she had nothing of him and never met him again, she’d regret this a million times over. Face it, I don’t know what I want to do.
“I’m not going anywhere. We’re going to talk, but I’m not going inside your house again, not today.” Then he raised his voice. “So, unless you’d rather we discuss last night very loudly, you’ll come here.” He folded his arms.
“Shh!” She shot a look toward the neighbors’ fences to left and right. Neither had children, luckily. Only the buzz of insects and distant clattering of dishes came to her ears.
He didn’t want to go inside the house; well, that suited her too. She scowled, hopped off the lounge, and went down the steps, then far enough across the yard until they could speak in quiet voices. At two yards’ distance from him, she folded her arms, glared. “I don’t like threats.”
“Danii.” For a moment exasperation crept into his voice; then he snapped, “Come here!”
The command had her walking to him before her brain kicked in. Shocked at her own response, she melted inside as he regarded her. She wasn’t short, but up close, the difference was enough that she had to tilt her head to look at him.
“Better,” he murmured.
The warm, rumbling voice, the closeness, made her dizzy, and it took all her concentration not to drop to her knees and wrap her arms around his legs. Absurd. This man affected her like the most potent drug.
She inhaled sharply as he raised his hand and stroked her forehead. Gently, he drew an undulating line on her skin, as if tracing something. Electricity zapped through her nerves. Goose bumps rose, and a shiver flurried down her spine.
“Ah. This explains much,” he said, eyes narrowing.
What was he talking about? She quivered, wanting him fiercely, wanting that hand elsewhere on her body. No. No. This was so wrong. I need equality in any lover, not someone who can make me beg with the snap of his fingers. She pulled away.
“Why do you resist your feelings?”
Those eyes—she could drown in that sea of green, lost forever. She dropped her gaze, shook her head. “You’re too overpowering. I don’t want someone who makes me fall apart every time I see him.”
“No?” Light as a drop of rain, he feathered fingertips across her lips, tipped her head up, and smiled. “Are you sure? Do you enjoy it when I make love to you? Or now, when I touch you?”
Her body craved him. She couldn’t stop herself leaning into the touch of those fingers, her breasts rising and falling like the swell of waves before a storm. “I… Yes, damn it!”
He chuckled softly. “Come here.” He beckoned, and she went into his embrace, sighing. He turned her until her bottom and back curved against him. His arms went round her, his lips by her ear, gifting her skin with small kisses. Her knees weakened.
“And do you want to be here? Because, I swear, this is something I wouldn’t exchange for anything. I love the feel of your gorgeous body against mine. Your softness, your curves”—he nipped her ear—“your scent.”
She shut her eyes, absorbed in the sensation of his hard body surrounding her. Yes, I want this, to be here with him.
“Ouch!” She wriggled, and he tightened his grip, making her hold her breath a moment as excitement hazed her thoughts. Oh, how did he arouse me from just that? She caught up with the train of his questioning and sighed. What point was there in denying this any longer? Yet still the words dragged out of her. She whispered them. “Yes. I do. I want to be here.”
“Good. At last we are getting somewhere. I wanted to talk, as I said, but I could see there was no way you were going to agree. But this way, I think, is the best solution—I can make you listen and hold you at the same time. Sit on my lap.”
He sank to the ground, cross-legged, and settled her between his legs. Against her bottom she felt the line of his erection. Though it raised another wave of heat, she was glad they were outdoors, for her mind whirled. She didn’t want to make love again, not until she had time to think properly, away from his disconcerting influence.
Then he moved his hand into her lap and let his fingers dangle casually against her thigh, at the crease between her leg and pussy. She tensed, trying not to react. If he touched down there, he’d find her wet.
“I have some things to say that will seem unbelievable. Though there is evidence I can show you to prove what I say, it is up to you to decide whether to believe me or not. But I swear this is the truth.”
That made her sit up. Her mind cleared. She might have been taking down a statement at the station. If there was one thing she excelled at, it was knowing truth from falsehood.
“My first point is that you have a tendril growing on your face. Here.” He lightly touched her on the forehead where he’d touched before. “It means you have some of our blood in you.”
“What? What blood?” Already, this sounded like lunacy.
“Look here.”
Her mouth dropped open. In the center of his left palm was a flat mirror of what appeared to be water, only so very still, not rocked at all by the movement of his hand. It couldn’t be water. Could it?
He tilted his hand, and it stayed perfectly flat. She could see her face, and curling down her temple was a thin black ribbon. A tattoo? How though? He couldn’t have done it while I slept. She frowned and put her finger to her head, rubbed the tendril. Nothing happened except her skin reddened where she rubbed. Not ink, then, either. She stared down at the mirror on his palm, then slowly extended her hand until her finger entered its surface, going down into the cool liquid, and she felt his skin beneath.
“Water?”
“Yes. I am water fae. I can control water quite well, even on the worst of days. Providing I have power.” He dipped his fingers on her thigh a little lower, and even through the shorts, she felt them at the edge of her labia. “I can also sense moisture, here, dear heart.”
Unfair! But…dear heart? She struggled not to squirm, kept it down to merely a hissed intake of breath. Her almost-fear had dissipated at his touch.
What the hell? The fae? He thought he was a faerie? “Go on. And stop trying to distract me. Outrageous lies are still lies even when you”—he rubbed his fingers along her cleft, and she nearly bit her tongue—“do that.” Only thing was, they didn’t sound like lies. How much can I rely on my instincts?
“Almost a hundred years ago, I was exiled here, cursed under our laws, after I killed our Goddess’s only son on my own world. My half sister, Aroha, had led me to believe he’d done her a grievous injury; I challenged him, and we dueled. For a hundred years, I and Aroha have been forced to live in or around the lake. The years of isolation here have not been kind to her. To return to our own world requires an enormous amount of power. Power that can only be found inside something called a toah egg. They’re in common use in my world. To fuel this toah, the curse requires a woman to submit to me for three days. Though the first two days are important, it is on the third day that your submission must be absolute.”
At that, she stiffened. Her, he meant her. Fear spiked, then disappeared almost as quickly. She didn’t and couldn’t fear this man, not exactly, not in an oh-my-God-he-might-kill-me kind of way. Yet, what had she gotten herself into?
“On the last day there is a very exact ritual that needs to be performed. That ritual is the true key to success. I believe you can help me do this.”
“Me?” Jesus. Truth, her mind told her. All of it. Or maybe, just, he believes it to be true.
“I don’t expect you to take this all in and believe me in one simple step. But I ask that you think on what I tell you, and that you come to the lake again today. There I can show you more and convince you of the reality of magic.”
He stopped there, and waited, and he needed to. Her brain could barely figure out how to wrestle with anything he’d said. She cleared her throat.
“You think you’re a…a faerie, and that you can do magic?” She glanced at his left hand, though the mirror had gone. Illusion, or not?
“Yes.” His fingers resumed their slow circuits along the seam of her shorts, the pressure above her clit tantalizing, despite the cloth between his fingers and her flesh.
This time she did squeeze her thighs together. “Unh. That’s cheating. I can’t think clearly.”
“I don’t expect you to believe me as yet. Just to remember.” With his other hand he lifted her breast through the thin cotton of her bodice, as if weighing it. “I placed an egg, the toah, inside you”—Heketoro moved his hand down until it pressed flat just above her mound—“here.” Then he returned to caressing her breast.
He did what?
“The toah stores power that comes from sexual magic. And it makes you more aware, when bare skin is touched. Like this.”
He slid a finger between the buttons of the bodice and touched her nipple. Heat sizzled from nipple to clit.
“Ah!” She arched, gasping, suddenly exquisitely aware of the shape of his cock so close to her throbbing cunt, and of the blood pulsing through her engorged clit. “No.” The word came out strangled. “I’m not making love out here. You put this thing inside me? Without asking, or telling me what it was? I mean, hell, you might have asked.”
This toah, and she remembered it now, he’d put it inside her after she’d awoken to his mouth on her. Had he somehow made her forget? Now that was confusing. He couldn’t do that, make her forget, unless somehow he was a fae? How could he be a faerie when they were an imagined thing from children’s tales? And if he was—She jammed her eyes closed. Tried to think past the vibrations of lust thrumming her body. What would she rather—that he be a fae, or a madman?
“The toah is safe. If you want me to, I'll remove it. Or, at this stage, you can even do that yourself. It's your choice, but bear in mind, I wouldn't be asking you if this wasn't important. You are my last hope.”
She put her hand over his at her groin, trying to stop that infernal, delicious rubbing. “Stop that.”
“I don't think so.” His teeth clamped lightly on her ear. He shifted his fingers out from under hers, then covered her right hand with his, slid them both down between her legs. Heat flared.
“Oh.” She writhed against her fingers, pressed down hard by his, and closed her eyes.
“No matter how much I want to bury myself in here again”—he pressed down and made her arch into her hand—“I won’t, not until you’ve made your decision whether to help me or not. But there are other ways I can leave you wanting me.”
Oh no. She tried again to pull her hand away and couldn’t.
Again, that urgent pressure. Mmm. Red flared against the insides of her lids.
“You will keep this memory for the rest of your life.”
What does he mean to do? The question gave rise to another surge of desire. She squirmed, and her panties moved, slick with her arousal, beneath her shorts.
At the insistence of his hands and body, she sank to the grass with him behind her. Dazed, she squinted at sky bleached in noon sunlight, aware of the overarching hedge walls around them, the press of his cock into the crevice
of her ass, the smell of crushed grass, and her arousal. Only the house was visible from this shaded spot. The overgrown hedges shrouded them as if they’d found a grotto deep in a forgotten forest. Spots of glare drifted across her vision.
“First, these go,” he murmured.
The buttons of her bodice tumbled earthward down the cotton front, and the garment opened, spilling her breasts. Surprised, she went to grab at the bottom flap of fabric, only to find her left hand brought to cross her right, wrist to wrist, still above her groin. Something tickled the skin there, encircled her wrists, and held them.
His hand moved along the seam of her shorts, and something parted. “Touch yourself, here.”
More pressure against her swollen clit, skin to skin. He helped her right hand delve deeper between her legs. She groaned as his strength made it impossible for her to do anything except obey, and her fingers, entwined with his, slid across the naked folds of her labia.
How can that be? What happened to my shorts?
So wickedly wet, and she was doing this, stimulating herself, with this man making her, watching her. And every momentary graze of his skin against her aroused flesh seemed to turn her inside out.
She couldn’t help but wonder if there was a penalty for making love to a fae. But if there was, oh my, she’d pay it a thousand times over.
She attempted to look, glimpsed a circlet of tiny leaves at her wrists before he pulled her head back, and his mouth possessed her throat. He moved his lips up, marching across her neck and jaw in electric, stinging sucks and bites and kisses until he found her mouth and took it roughly. For a blurred moment her mind spiraled in a feedback loop of jolting electricity. Nip, sizzle, writhe, and groan.
His fingers and hers sank into the wetness below, her left hand tied somehow to her right, and she couldn’t tell where his skin and hers began and ended. Muddled, overwhelmed, she alternated between arching back against the length of his erection twitching at her buttocks and arching forward into her own hand. She came in a white-hot blinding surge, and winding down from that, discovered he’d not been satisfied.
Three Days of Dominance Page 5
