by Aubrey Rose
He kissed me on the neck, his warm breath melting me into nothingness. His lips felt soft and hot against my skin as he moved down to my shoulder, following the line of my collarbone. When he began to move farther down I placed a hand on his arm. He stopped.
“Wait,” I said. “It’s not fair.”
“What’s not fair?”
“I’m completely naked,” I said, blushing as the words came out. It was the first time I had been naked in front of a man, but with Eliot I felt that it was completely right.
“And?”
“And you have entirely too many clothes on.”
“Is that so?” I saw a flash of hesitation in his eyes. “Well. If the lady insists.”
“I do.”
He unbuttoned his shirt slowly and pulled it off. My breath caught in a soft gasp. The scar on his face was not the only one he had. His muscled arms and chest were covered in long, jagged white seams that puckered his skin. The longest one reached from his shoulder to his waist in a diagonal bolt over his chest. I reached out to touch it. His eyes tracked mine as they lingered on his skin.
“I’m sorry,” I said. I did not know what else I could say. He shook his head.
“All reminders,” he said. I remembered what he had told me in the piano room, back in California.
“A reminder to be careful,” I whispered.
He leaned over me and kissed me on the lips.
“I’ve been careful for long enough, I think.”
His mouth moved down to my neck, his teeth grazing my shoulder and sending shocks of pleasure running through my nerves. I ached for him as he bent his head down to my breasts. As his tongue slipped over my nipple, I could feel myself growing slick between my legs, wanting him. I had never felt such a rush of desire as when he circled my breast slowly with his tongue and grazed the sensitive tip with his teeth. A scream tore up my throat and stopped there, strangled before it could leave my mouth.
Eliot felt hard against my leg, and I did not realize what it was until I slid my leg slightly underneath him and he gasped. A newfound sense of power swept through my body as I realized that he was in some small way under my control.
In retaliation, he sucked on my nipple hard and I gasped as pain and pleasure entwined together. I froze as his fingers slid over my thigh, nearing my virginity, and he sensed my hesitation. His body hung above me and his fingers curled back on themselves quickly as though he’d touched a hot iron.
“We can stop, Brynn.”
“No,” I said, the word escaping my lips before I even thought to speak. My desire had taken control of me and I was no longer able to press down on the feelings that had been threatening to escape since the first time I set eyes on him. “Please, no.”
He hesitated, and I continued softly, embarrassed that the truth should be spoken out loud.
“I want you... God, Eliot, I want you so badly.”
His eyes went wide, and I thrilled again at the thought that I could surprise him in that way. He bent his head and kissed me on the shoulder, whispering in my ear.
“You’re amazing, Brynn.”
My heart and body both yearned toward the man whose breath warmed my neck, the man whose chest was crisscrossed with the tragic reminders of a love he could never bring back. I could not erase the scars or the memories, but I could help him to look forward, and we could both move on from our pasts.
Unassuming and quietly confident, Eliot sat up on the side of the bed and pushed down his pants and underwear at the same time. Turning again to a kiss on my shoulder, he let me see him naked for the first time. If there had been a mirror in front of me I’m sure my eyes would have been perfectly circular with awe and curiosity. His member stood erect, so large that I couldn’t see how it would fit into me. Without thinking, I reached out and touched it in wonder. The skin was so soft, smooth, and as my fingers stroked the tip lightly he twitched under my hand. I drew my hand back.
Eliot must have seen my expression.
“I told you, slowly,” he said. “Tell me if it hurts.”
He reached over to the bedside drawer, obscuring the light. When he turned back to me he was sheathed in a condom. His eyes filled with stormy desire and when he placed his hand on my breast my heart pounded against his palm. He kissed me on the nose, his erection grazing my hip. I felt myself twist toward him instinctively.
“I’ll take my time, Brynn, but if you want me to stop, just say the word.”
I was frightened in the best kind of way, amazed that he still wanted me now that I was naked and he could see all of me. Amazed that the two of us should be here, together, under the silken drapes of the canopy bed in a castle. The candlelight flickered as a draft whispered through the room. If he’d wanted to make me feel like a princess, he’d done an admirable job of it. Every part of this seemed like a dream.
He bent his head down again to my chest, this time sliding his hand between my thigh as he suckled my breast. I whimpered as his fingers stroked me on either side of my most sensitive area. A rush of lustful power shot through me in increasing intensity as his fingers moved closer and closer. Each lick of his tongue mirrored the strokes of his hand, and when he finally circled the hard nub of my nipple with his tongue I was ready to explode in ecstasy.
Eliot stopped his fingers withdrawing abruptly, and an agonized cry rose from my throat.
“Incredible,” he whispered. I could do nothing but watch in a paralysis of lust as he moved over me, gently sliding between my legs. His fingers found their way to my core again, this time slipping down and inside me as his lips kissed mine in soft insistent motion. The pressure, so intensely shocking, had disappeared, replaced with the slick movement of his fingers testing my depths. He looked at me, and his face was a question I could only answer one way.
“I want you, Eliot.” I moaned as Eliot shifted himself to slide inside of me. The cold air of winter had been replaced by springtime’s blushing warmth, and my entire being blossomed with heat as he gave me my new womanhood. His lips hovered inches from mine, our breaths mingling between our bodies, and he paused there, at the crux, letting my body adjust itself to the lovely invasion that sent thrills through every single nerve I had.
The first thrust of his seemed to fill me completely, but but as he moved I could feel myself adjusting, stretching to accommodate his girth. A fiery pain shot through me, replaced almost instantly with a rush of pleasure as he bore his body down to accommodate my most sensitive place.
“Oh God! Eliot!” My cries caught in my throat as he worked himself deeper inside of me.
“Brynn?” He paused.
“Yes,” I said, pulling him tight against me. He couldn’t stop now. In my mind I heard the sharp strains of the Satie building into a climax. The secret part of me that I had kept hidden burst forth in a frenetic desire, and my body arched itself against his.
We found each other anew as our bodies came together in twin passion. Eliot’s hands caressed me, his lips tearing the breath from mine. He rocked faster and faster, his breath hot against my skin. I found his rhythm and matched it, my body responding despite myself. Normally I lived in my head, but right now my mind was lost in the wild rhythm of our lovemaking, every animal sensation too raw to comprehend on an intellectual level. I moaned passionately as he found an angle that sent my nerves into sharp thrills.
He thrust deeper and deeper, sending shocks of pleasure coursing through my body with each connection. Inside of me my desire rose in waves that came close to crashing down on me but stopped at the last instant, each wave building on the last in an intense agony of lust. My fingers scrabbled at his back, pulling him deeper inside of me. I wanted more, more.
Every second stretched into infinities, the flickering light dancing shadows on the walls. His lips caught mine and sucked at my bottom lip as he thrust, and I felt the wave push past the crest and over, the desire surging through my body echoed by his own.
“Brynn.” He groaned, calling my name. I could feel him pressing to his edge an
d it sent me over mine as he rocked into me once more.
Waves of orgasm rocked my body and I clenched my eyes shut, sparks of white passing over my vision even in the darkness as the shudders passed through me. The sparks whirled around, turning from snowflakes into burning embers as the shocks of pleasure rolled over my body and I twisted, writhing under the first man to love me, to make me love him.
He orgasmed only moments after me, his muscles stiffening above my hips as he spasmed once, again. I did not know what had happened until he moaned, his eyes rolling back in pleasure. His lips pressed against my shoulder hard as he thrust one last time, sending me into another wave of ecstasy. My knees buckled as the shivers continued through my arms and legs, and I crumpled my hands against his chest.
Eliot’s lips fluttered soft kisses on my cheek, his hands caressing me in compete possession. I gazed up into his face and smiled, tears springing unbidden to my eyes. After pressing another kiss to my lips, he rolled off to one side and rearranged himself, circling his arm around my body and bringing me close to him. My ear pressed to his chest, I could hear his heartbeat sounding quick and hard against his skin. Slowly, carefully, his long fingers stroked my hair.
“Thank you,” I said. “For bringing me here. For everything.” I tilted my head up to see his face, and his kind eyes gazed back at me.
“It’s been a pleasure,” Eliot said, his lips pressing briefly onto the tip of my nose. “Everything.”
“Even the damn cat?”
“Especially the damn cat. He can stay.”
I laughed. “I’m glad you’ve changed your mind about him.”
“I haven’t changed my mind about him. I’ve changed my mind about you.”
“Oh?” I raised my eyebrow in a question.
“No, that’s not what I mean. I was scared to risk anything with you.”
“Am I so risky?”
“Yes. But I had everything to gain from the risk.”
His heartbeat was slowing in my ear, but I still felt as though every nerve inside of me was shivering.
“What’s going to happen? After the internship ends, I mean?” We only had weeks until I had to go home, graduate, and start my life. I didn’t want it to be over.
“I don’t know, Brynn,” he said. “What would you like to do?”
“I’d like to keep studying math,” I said firmly, then laughed at myself. Out of everything, that was the first thing that leapt to mind.
“The academy has wonderful programs,” Eliot said. “Of course, with the paper you’ll be publishing soon, I’m guessing you’ll have offers from any grad school you decide to attend.”
“Paper?” My heart beat faster. It was unheard of for professors to share credit with interns.
“Of course. Did you think I was going to let you slack off in your last days here?”
I kissed his skin in response, letting my hands move freely across the raised marks on his chest. When I reached his face, he looked serious, like he had when I first saw him sitting on the bench in front of the library cafe.
“Thank you,” he said. His hands moved in small gasps along my back.
“For what?” My voice caught as his hand found the small of my back and pulled me against him.
“For helping me...to know I can live again. For helping me to find love.”
“You’re the one who found me,” I said. “Even though you didn’t know my name.”
“That’s right,” Eliot said. “I had forgotten. A temptress who runs away to hide from me. What have I gotten myself into?” He smiled.
“I’m sorry,” I said. “I shouldn’t have run.”
“I’ll just make sure to keep an eye on you.”
My gaze wandered over the room. The candlelight reflected on the windowpane, but I could almost make out the stars in the sky outside.
“I can’t believe I’m here in Hungary. Finally. After all these years.”
“I’m sorry you had to go through so much to get here. I know it’s been hard.”
“That’s the understatement of the century. But I’m here now,” I said, turning my gaze to him. “With my prince. It’s a Cinderella story after all.”
“Your life hasn’t exactly been a fairy tale.”
My hand reached out to his cheek, my fingers tracing the line of his scar. I looked deep into his eyes and saw in them the same longing for peace that was in my heart.
“Neither has yours.”
I visited my mother’s grave again that weekend. Springtime had arrived in full force, and the trees around me blossomed with white flowers. When the wind blew, the flower petals fell like snow onto the warm ground. Sitting there, I felt like every atom in the wind moved exactly the way it should. Life would move on with or without me, and I didn’t need to change myself in order to be beautiful, or happy, or worthy of love. I already was.
Forget the castle, the crown, all of the gilded trappings of royalty that shone brightly but meant nothing. Forget the glass slipper, the horse-drawn carriage. None of that mattered now. Eliot wasn’t a prince, and I wasn’t a princess. We were just two broken people, half-mended, struggling to make sense of the world as best we could.
I once thought that happily ever after was only true in books. Now, I’m beginning to see how the future might play out if my dreams continue to pale before reality. Every sentence I could think of has already been said a hundred times over, by people whose words come out perfect and beautifully formed, where mine die on the tongue or straggle out onto the page, mangled and imperfect. But my story isn’t perfect, because I’m not perfect. Nothing is perfect except maybe in math, in the line that extends forever in both directions. Math is beautiful, I have always known that, but so is life. And I have grown to accept imperfection.
I am living my own fairytale to which nobody, not even me, knows the ending. But I can imagine my life written down, all of my past and future tragedy and triumph and yes, even romance, and the book does not always end in sorrow. For the first time in my life, I can imagine the reader turning to the end, the pages already lighter for being finished, and reading the final few words that an unknown author had scrawled across the last page:
“And they lived happily ever after.”
- The End -
About the Author: Aubrey Rose
Want to be notified of any new releases? Sign up for my mailing list now, and never miss a new book! You'll also get a FREE copy of my bestselling shifter romance Blind Wolf as soon as you sign up!
http://aubreyrosewrites.com/subscribe/
*** New York Times and USA Today bestselling author Aubrey Rose lives in sunny San Diego, where she likes to lay around in a hammock reading her favorite romances. When she's not writing steamy stories, she can be found dancing naked in front of the mirror to Abba while her cat watches disdainfully.
If you liked this story, you might also enjoy:
Shifting Fates (Urban Fantasy Shifter Romance Book One)
From New York Times bestselling author Aubrey Rose and Nadia Simonenko comes a thrilling new shifter romance series: Shifting Fates: an Urban Fantasy Shifter Romance What happens when a soldier falls in love with the shifter he’s been sent to kill? In post-nuclear Manhattan, there are two kinds of survivors: humans and shifters. Cage After his older brother Ben was killed by shifters, Cage followed in Ben’s footsteps and joined the military. His job is simple: protect the surviving civilians in the wreckage of Manhattan and put down the dangerous shifter mutants prowling the streets. Bitter with revenge, he can’t wait for a chance to get even with the monsters who killed his brother. Bindi Half-wolf, half-human Bindi is one of Cage’s monsters. She lives underground, hiding away from military patrols and protecting the ragtag pack of shifter children who have come to depend on her. She’d do anything to get out of the city and get her pack to safety, but nobody gets in - or out - of this city. On Christmas Eve, Cage catches Bindi –in human form - stealing extra rations for her pack. In a moment of pity he lets her go, but not witho
ut being struck by a sense that there’s something special about her. Something... different. *** a Shifter Romance Series that will pull at your heartstrings *** When he finally discovers her secret, Cage must decide what’s more important to him – finally avenging his brother, or saving the woman he’s come to love. And Bindi will learn a lesson about humanity...and about love.
Burned by Passion by Dez Burke
Chapter One
The plane touched down in JFK without incident, and it was mere minutes later when a tall, very good looking man emerged carrying a small leather case.
Blake Harrington Carter adjusted the dark aviators atop his blade of a nose, letting his grey eyes run over the unfamiliar surroundings before making his way down with the rest of the passengers.
He was back. To a place he hadn’t called home for the past eighteen years, not since he’d moved with his British mother to England. There’d never been a reason to return – not a good enough one anyway. And yet now at age twenty-eight he’d arrived and was finally going to meet a father he hadn’t seen or spoken to in all that time he’d been gone.
He’d written his father months earlier informing him of his planned visit. And though he wasn’t exactly expecting a red carpet treatment, it would have been nice if someone came out to meet him, he mused. He glanced around at the crowd waiting as he finally made it through arrivals, but didn’t see any familiar faces.
He should have known he wouldn’t be getting an overjoyed welcome. After all it had been almost two decades since Blake had left with his mother when she decided to separate from his dad. They’d never been that close and yet...
Totally oblivious to the admiring looks from many of the women standing by, he strode out of the airport with his luggage and into the New York sunshine. He glanced around for a taxi.
“Excuse me, sir?”
Blake turned at the sound of the stranger’s voice, and found a heavily built male of average height dressed in a chauffeur’s uniform standing there. Blake frowned slightly.
