East of Ecstasy (Hearts of the Anemo)

by Laura Kaye

  “Let yourself go, Devlin,” she said, dragging her hand from root to tip.

  She felt his cock jerk at the same time he cried out. His hands squeezed her knees and his whole body braced as stripes of his warm release painted lines across her belly.

  Anna smiled when his eyes finally focused on hers again. And, man, how she wished she could see what color they were glowing. “That sounded nice,” she said.

  “Nice doesn’t begin to describe it.” His gaze dropped to her wet belly. “But, I’ve—” He frowned, grabbed the corner of the sheet, and gently wiped at her skin. “Soiled you.”

  Pain squeezed Anna’s heart and she pushed into a sitting position. Placing a hand over his heart, she said, “The only thing that just happened is you shared something beautiful and special with me. Understand?” She pulled the sheet out of his hand.

  He nodded and met her gaze. His cock jerked against her thigh.

  Looking down, Anna smiled. “You’re still hard.”

  “It’s been a long time, Annalise.”

  Biting her lip at the hunger in the way he’d said her name, she glanced toward her nightstand. “Get a condom, please. Gray box in that drawer.”

  Devlin released her, found the box, and pulled one free. Anna slipped the packet from his fingers. Slowly, much slower than absolutely necessary, she rolled the condom down his considerable length, taking her time to squeeze and drag her fingers over him. Devlin growled.

  Butterflies tore through her belly. At the sound. At his size. At the very fact that this was happening.

  At getting to share this with him.

  He nuzzled her face, kissed her cheek, licked the shell of her ear. With a hand on her chest, he pushed her back and walked his fingers down her belly to her core. “Are you ready for me?” The rough pads of his fingers slipped over her clit to her opening. “Oh, yes you are.” He spread her wetness with his touch, making her shudder and sigh and throw her head back. Kissing and nibbling at her neck, he leaned into her and penetrated her with his thick middle finger. “Fuck, Anna. You’re so little. I don’t want to hurt you.”

  She kissed him, loving how he had so many rough edges but was also so gentle and considerate. Without breaking the connection, she slowly leaned back until she lay flat, pulling him on top of her and forcing the length of his cock against her clit. Anna moaned at the contact, then again, louder, as he added a second finger. Their kisses grew more urgent and demanding as Devlin fucked her with his fingers and rocked his cock against her clit.

  A dizzying pressure congregated low in her belly. Anna whimpered and gasped in raw pleasure.

  “Have to have you,” Devlin said in a voice full of gravel, pushing his jeans down farther.

  “Yes.”

  She barely had a chance to miss his fingers before he aligned his tip with her center. He met her gaze with his blazing eyes and watched her reaction as he penetrated her inch by maddening inch.

  “Oh, God,” Anna said as he filled her so deliciously, just slow enough that her body could adjust to the size of his invasion, but not so slow that she lost her ever-loving mind. Looking down at where he entered her, Anna found the fact that he was penetrating her while still wearing his jeans so damn sexy. The extra sensation of the denim against her ass. The impatience it revealed.

  Devlin’s mouth dropped open on a groan. “Oh, gods, Annalise. I can’t…I don’t…it’s too—”

  “There’s no wrong or right here,” she said. His eyes almost pleaded with her. “Do whatever feels good.”

  A moment of hesitation. And then Devlin wrapped his hands under her thighs and lifted her bottom off the bed as he drove into her. Again and again and again, each thrust punctuated by a grunt that ripped from his chest.

  Anna was completely overwhelmed in the best possible way. She cried out with an answering moan each time his hips slammed into hers. Standing over her, commanding and dominating her body, he looked every inch the god that he was—powerful, beautiful, larger than life.

  Without losing his rhythm, he pushed her thighs to her chest so she nearly formed a ball. He rolled his hips as he pounded into her, and each impact ground his public bone against her clit.

  “Oh my God, Devlin. Oh my God.”

  Hooking one arm under her knee and the other hand under her shoulder, he collapsed on top of her, his hips snapping against hers, one amazing stroke after another. Hunched over, he kissed her mouth until her lungs burned for air, and then he worshipped her face, her neck, her ear. “Say my name again,” he rasped.

  “Devlin,” she said as she wrapped her arms around his big shoulders and held on tight.

  “Again,” he growled.

  “Devlin.” She buried her face in his neck and kissed and licked and breathed his incredible cool autumn spice deep inside her.

  He held her tighter as his strokes slowed on a series of mind-numbing punctuated thrusts. “I…can’t…get…deep…enough,” he ground out. “Anna.”

  Hot, pulsing sensation spiraled in a tight vortex centered on her clit, and then Anna’s body went nuclear as her orgasm detonated. “Devlin!” she wailed, and then the force of her release stole her breath. She clawed her nails into him as wave after wave of ecstasy washed over her, turned her upside down, and landed her back in his arms again.

  “Fuuuck,” he groaned as he wrapped both arms under her neck and pistoned against her in a series of breath-stealing, bone-melting strokes. “Oh, gods. Anna, I’m…coming.” Groans ripped out of him as his cock spasmed inside her. The movement of his body slowed and he worked his hips in maddeningly slow thrusts and circles that had her gasping again.

  “Don’t stop, Devlin. Just like that. Please,” she said, breathless at the possibility of a second orgasm.

  “Come on my cock, Anna. Give me everything.” He pressed kisses to her cheek and plundered her mouth.

  “Faster,” she whispered, clenching her eyes in concentration.

  “Look at me,” he said, resting his forehead on hers. He ground himself against her clit in a series of hard, fast rubs. “Come on. Give it to me.”

  “Yeah,” she rasped, her heart beating so hard she was light-headed. He slid one hand under her ass and tilted her hips upward. His body ground into her clit like a key unlocking a door. Her head wrenched back into the mattress and her whole body bowed as the orgasm crashed into her and rolled endlessly on.

  The minute her muscles went slack, Devlin withdrew, removed the condom, and gathered her into his arms. He turned them onto their sides facing each other, her body tucked in against the shelter of his, their legs entangled. Her head lay on the thick pillow of his biceps. Pressing a kiss to her forehead, he stroked her hair back off her face, their labored breathing the only sound in the room.

  I don’t want this to end, she thought. Realization of the depth of that feeling rolled in close behind. God, the thought of never having him again this way, nevermore being held in his arms so lovingly, made her chest constrict and her throat go tight.

  “Today, after we go to your grandfather’s, you have to break into your father’s house to look for that key?” Anna asked, her voice at a whisper. It was all she could manage just then.

  He splayed his big hand over her bare back. “Yes,” he murmured against her hair.

  “It’s gonna be dangerous,” she said, not asking, but needing the confirmation all the same. He nodded. “And there’s…there’s a chance you won’t come…back?” Her face and throat filled with the sharp pressure of restrained tears.

  Long pause. “Yes.”

  Emotion welled up inside her until it became hard to breathe. At most, she had a few hours left with him, but she suspected their time alone would significantly decrease once they left the cocoon of her room. And then he’d go confront some kind of evil the likes of which she couldn’t even imagine.

  And the worst of it? He’d go into battle thinking he wasn’t good and he wasn’t worthy and he wasn’t loved. He could die thinking he wasn’t loved.

 
; Not if you tell him. Tell him, Anna.

  She shifted so she could look at his face. And, oh, God, his irises were lighter yet. What she wouldn’t have given to be able to see the color. She brushed the hair off his forehead, his skin still warm with sweat from their lovemaking, and looked him in the eye. “I…Devlin, no one should have to stare down death without knowing that they matter.”

  Wariness slid into the depths of his eyes and his jaw ticked.

  “You matter—”

  “Anna,” he said, shifting away from her touch and onto his back.

  And holy hell, what a sight he was. His shoulders, chest, and abdomen were all formed with lean ropes of muscle. Maybe even too lean. But together with his scars, it gave him a rough, edgy appeal that made her core clench in aftershock. His hair was a sexed-up wreck, his cock lay thick against his lower stomach, and his jeans hung half off. He appeared absolutely ravaged, and it made her want to start all over again.

  But not until he knew what she felt for him.

  She braced above him with her arms on either side of his head and looked down into his eyes. “Don’t run away, Devlin. This is important.”

  He closed his eyes and swallowed hard. “I…please…” Shaking his head, he threw an arm over his eyes. “I don’t like anyone over me,” he finally said, reluctance and embarrassment clear in his tone.

  Anna flew back from him, her heart thudding inside her chest. “I’m sorry.”

  “Didn’t know,” he said, voice thick. “Gods, I’m ruining this…this perfection.”

  Anger and outrage on his behalf welled up inside her. She ached to hold him, to ease him. “Come here to me, please,” she said as she scooted up the bed and settled with her back against the wooden headboard.

  Devlin rolled his head to look at her, and finally lifted up off the mattress. He hiked his jeans up over his hips, but didn’t zip them, and then he moved toward her.

  Patting her chest, she parted her legs and said, “Lean up against me. I need to hold you.”

  Slowly, Devlin shifted until his back came up against her front. Anna wasn’t sure whose sigh was bigger—hers or his. All she knew was the rightness of holding him, of having him in her arms—one arm over one big shoulder and one under the other, her hands coming to rest on his chest.

  “Perfection is the absolute right word. And you could never ruin it,” she said in a low, calm voice. “Not when it was perfect because of you.”

  His muscles tensed under her touch. “Anna—”

  “Shh. Because of you, Devlin. Because of you,” she said, smoothing her hands over him and learning the contours of his muscles, his scars, the thin covering of dark hair on his chest. She kissed his shoulder, then licked the salt from his neck.

  He sucked in a breath and in the open fly of his jeans, his cock stirred. Anna smiled, and then her eyes noticed a stretch of off-white gauze under one of the tears in his jeans—the wound she’d questioned him about the previous night.

  “No one’s ever—” He cut the words off as suddenly as they’d started.

  Anna’s heart clenched. “What?” She brushed his hair off his face again, sweeping it off his forehead and raking her fingers against his scalp.

  Devlin hummed in appreciation and let his head go slack on her shoulder. His ease lit her up inside. “Done this,” he finally said.

  “Played with your hair?”

  “Showed me so much care,” he whispered.

  The words threatened to break her heart. How and why had anyone treated him so horribly? It made her sad and savagely angry at the same time. “Well, then, we have some making up to do.” When he didn’t respond, she brushed her fingers through his hair again and again. Looking down his big body, Anna’s gaze settled on that bandage visible through the denim again. Somehow, that injury was important, and her heart and gut couldn’t let it go. Taking a deep breath, she hugged him in tight and pressed her lips to his ear. “Please tell me about the wound on your leg.”

  …

  Dread filled Devlin with ice. He tried to sit up, but Anna grasped his chest with splayed hands and held him tight.

  “Please,” she said, kissing his cheek.

  A war erupted inside him—between the side of his soul that, thanks to her, had never found more pleasure and comfort and solace in his entire life, and the side that didn’t want to reveal anything else that might push this amazing woman away. Between his anger and his instability and his scars, he was already a lot for anyone to take on—not even considering the part about the very high likelihood that he was a dead man walking.

  How could he possibly expect her to understand what was going on with his leg? What he was doing to himself?

  He couldn’t.

  “Leave it be,” he said, as he swung his legs toward the side of the bed. His soul screamed at the separation from her, even as he moved farther away. He slid off the edge until his boots hit the floor. He glanced down at himself and shook his head. Wasn’t this the perfect fucking analogy for the difference between the two of them? Anna sat naked and guileless and completely open right behind him, while Devlin hadn’t even gotten undressed or taken off his goddamned boots to have sex with this incredible being of light and goodness. He couldn’t even be bothered to take off his fucking boots.

  Still covered up. Still hiding. Still running.

  Story of his life.

  Anna shifted next to him, still naked and seemingly not self-conscious of that fact. Devlin was glad for it, because petite, soft, and so damn beautiful, she was utter perfection. To him. And her mind and heart were even more stunning. She sat sideways on the edge of the bed, close but not touching him, which made his skin yearn even harder for the touch. “Tell me,” she said in a low voice. “It’s clearly important to you, so it’s important to me—”

  “Why?” He swallowed around the knot of self-loathing growing in his throat and threatening to suffocate him. Shame turned his skin hot, adding to the feeling of the room closing in on him. An insidious little voice whispered in his ear. Too good. Too good. She’s too damn good for you. “Fucking you doesn’t make me important,” he said, hating the acidic, false taste of the words as they came out of his mouth, especially when her breath caught and halted.

  “Don’t do that, Devlin,” she said, anger clear in her tone. The light in the room slowly but surely dimmed, as if some unseen forced deadened it. “Don’t be an asshole to divert me from digging too deep or getting too close. You’re better than that.”

  He shook his head, hair falling over his eyes. “No, I’m not.”

  “Goddamn it, yes you are!” Dimmer yet.

  “No!” He shoved off the bed and turned on her.

  She flung out her hands. “Devlin—”

  “Why is it so fucking important to you?” he yelled.

  “Because I fucking love you,” Anna yelled back, her eyes going wide and her cheeks bright red.

  The words echoed around the room, silent except for the sounds of their breathing,

  Because she…loves me? The words got stuck at the edge of his brain, like it didn’t know how to process them. He looked at her beautiful face, pink lips shiny, cheeks a deep scarlet, eyes so bright they were almost silver. That amazingly fearless, gorgeous, generous woman loved…him.

  His heart felt like a fist squeezed around it and kept it from beating. The pressure inside ratcheted up until Devlin had to press a hand to his chest. And then the constriction finally broke, and the hard-pounding organ expanded and grew until it totally filled him up. But, gods, what did he know about love? For him, it had only ever meant the drive to protect and defend and provide, which is what he’d tried to do for his brothers in the absence of their father. No, not the absence—Eurus’s presence had been so much worse than if he’d just neglected them. Then again, Devlin had failed both Farren and Alastor, so what did he know? That was the problem—because when it came to love, he knew absolutely nothing.

  Except…the turmoil inside him needed her soothing touch.
And her being in the slightest danger made him a little insane. And this one time with her hadn’t nearly been enough. Gods in heaven, he would give up forever in a heartbeat to touch her, hold her, have her for the speck that was a mortal lifespan.

  Was that…could that be…love?

  And had he just destroyed it with the wrecking ball of his words? After lobbing so many bombs into the space between them, he didn’t know what to do or say to try to get back to her again. “Anna,” he said, his voice cracking.

  He didn’t know what she’d heard, but she flew off the bed toward him, the light in the room brightening the minute she crashed into his body.

  He caught and embraced her so hard he lifted her off the ground. She wrapped her legs around him, her ankles just crossing against his ass. A profound sense of rightness and belonging settled in him, and it was a revelation after a lifetime of living amid so much that was wrong.

  “I didn’t mean it,” he said. “Making love to you was the single most special thing I’ve ever done. And it was an honor and a privilege I will always cherish. So fucking sorry.”

  “I love you, Devlin,” she said as if nothing else mattered. And if she truly felt that way for him, nothing else did.

  He stroked her hair as he lifted his face to look at her. “I…” Devlin shook his head. “I’ve never said…those words to anyone. Ever.”

  “And you don’t have to—”

  Devlin kissed her, just a soft brush of lips. “Yes, I do. Because, well, I do, Anna. L-love you,” he said, the admission of his feelings making him as exposed and vulnerable as he’d ever felt. She pressed her lips to his, and her kiss tasted of acceptance and compassion and forgiveness. He walked her to the bed and sat her down on the edge. And then, before he could second-guess it, he took two steps backward, shoved down his jeans until the ruined denim cleared the bandage around his upper left thigh, and unwound it.

  After everything she’d done for him, he owed her the truth—and a man strong enough to tell it, even when it was hard. Especially when it was hard.