He walked back around to stand facing her, rolling up his shirt sleeves and staring down at her upturned face gazing back at him with a stubborn set to her jaw. He had to restrain himself from bending to gather her in his arms and kiss her. If he was going to push her into Garen’s arms, he couldn’t be as sweet a lover as he knew Garen was. “It’s been a long week and your purpose here is to satisfy me. I’m not in the mood for preamble so turn around and spread your legs.”
She didn’t hesitate, but moved languidly in the huge chair, tucking her feet under her and rising up onto her knees on the cushioned seat. She turned slowly, watching him over her shoulder as she gripped the back of the chair and spread her thighs.
He had trouble being disappointed in her compliance. Even though he’d hoped for even a glimmer of resistance, he was entranced by the lovely swell of her hips outward from her narrow waist, the curving sweep of her buttocks, and the way her sweet core parted its pink folds as though beckoning to him.
If she were to be his, he would have taken his time, touched her—tasted her—made her come on his tongue twice over before even fucking her. Abruptness was necessary.
He unzipped his trousers, tugged out his erection, and slammed into her with one quick, brutal thrust. She cried out and clamped down around him, her hips surging back to meet his urgent fucking. Sweet Mother, he wouldn’t last, but regardless of his ploy, he still needed her to find her Nirvana first.
Reaching around her with both hands, he slid one up her torso to squeeze roughly at her breasts, pinching her nipples while he pressed the other between her thighs and rubbed mercilessly at her clit. Her panting moans grew harsher and her muscles gripped him ever tighter.
“You really wanted to just fuck me today, didn’t you?” she said in an amused, hitching voice. “No sweet, attentive Skye anymore? Are you still pissed at me for coming all over Garen’s fingers? Jealous little Skye needs my pussy all to himself, huh?”
Her words caught him off guard and he paused mid-stroke, his mind so lost to pleasure he almost didn’t process what she’d said. When they finally clicked, he growled and tangled the fingers of one hand into the long hair at the base of her skull and gripped, pulling her back toward him. His mouth tight against her ear, he said, “I might forgive you if you hurry up and come on my cock right now.” Yet he was secretly elated at her needling. Something was working.
Her throat rippled with a slight laugh and she turned her head so that her lips brushed against his.
“I fucked Garen today,” she said before grabbing at his mouth with hers and plunging her tongue between his lips.
He was too far gone to argue or even process the confession, only aware of its implications. She was trying to hurt him for some reason, and the idea of the pair of them entwined and moving together did precisely that. He moaned into her mouth, surprised at the confusion of anger that shot through him. He pressed his fingers harder against her clit, and fucked deeper into her, moving faster and faster as her aura swelled close to bursting with her pleasure. She was enjoying this, too, he realized. Perhaps a little too much, if the rush of emotion that met his senses were any indication. She had wanted to hurt him, and felt vindicated, but only because she truly craved his attention.
She broke away from their kiss, tilting her head back against his shoulder and grabbing the back of his neck with one hand for stability. He released her hair and clutched at her breast again with the free hand while the other brought her fully to a loud and enthusiastic climax. The flood of her delicious energy pushed him across and he pistoned hard into her slick depths with a violent final stroke as his cock pulsed and exploded, his seed filling her.
“Are you trying to piss me off today?” he asked, grinning secretly into the soft, damp skin of her neck. The sweet, needy Melody from the other day was lovely enough, but this angry, defiant, and very sexy woman in his arms right now was more than he’d bargained for. The confusion of emotions she incited in him made his head spin trying to pin down whether he was thrilled or angry. Both, perhaps.
“Trying to make it clear to you that you’re playing with fire, leaving us alone together for so long. Contract or no contract, everyone has their limits. If you want to help me fulfill the damn thing, don’t leave for so long.” A hint of petulance threaded through her words, and he had to damp down the elation at the idea that she had actually missed him.
“You might have fucked him, but you didn’t break the contract. I would know. And I do know you left the penthouse earlier this week, despite my order that you stay put.”
“His idea. Do you know he carried me out over his shoulder naked?”
Skye frowned. He hadn’t been aware of that detail, only that he’d left a request for the concierge to let him know if she passed through the front doors of his building while he was gone. He pulled out of her and stepped back a pace while she sat facing him. The fact that Garen had withheld that detail from him troubled him, but he couldn’t object to it—he had told the Guardian explicitly to encourage her rebellion and it seemed to be working.
He shifted his mental focus to her emotional state again, surprised to find as much conflict warring in her as he felt in himself. It couldn’t just be her own will overcoming the influence of the bond. She still stared at him in challenge, but something inside her clearly wanted more of something.
“Lie back on the table,” he said, determined to test the limits of that particular inclination of hers. She continued to comply without protest, standing without a word and hopping up onto the shining polished wood and sliding back.
He could sense her question as well as her eager anticipation of what he would do next. She lay there, legs spread and knees bent, propped up on her elbows watching him intently while he stripped.
“When do you think you’ll make love to me in your bed?” she asked.
“If you had met me in my bed, we could be there now, but you chose to make a meal of yourself and so you’re getting devoured like one.” He flipped the chair she’d sat in around and sat. She yelped when he gripped the backs of her knees and pulled her toward him, wasting no time burying his face and tongue between her thighs. She came twice more from his relentless attention. When she heaved a harsh sigh, he still refused to give her a reprieve.
He climbed up onto the table, hovering over her and pushing her knees to her chest. She was still gloriously sodden from his attention as well as her own arousal, and her aura filled again as surely as his cock filled her clenching pussy. Sweet Mother, he would miss this when she finally turned to Garen. No other human woman had ever incited such a level of raw, hungry need in him. Precisely the same need he’d seen in Garen’s eyes—and in his overflowing aura—earlier.
“Oh God, Skye. You fucking bastard,” she said amid harsh panting just before her entire body writhed and bucked with another orgasm.
He came hard inside her, just barely aware enough to perceive the glimmer of tears in her eyes when he pulled back from sucking hard on her nipples. A torrent of strong emotion washed over him along with her energy when he absorbed it. Confusion, desperation, anger … and something deeper and more confounding that he could not abide. And it was completely pure and free of any influence, including the power of her blessing that he could still sense somewhere deep within her.
Shit. She was in love with him. Leave now. Leave now and let Garen take over entirely. Tell him the truth. Make him agree. Anything but this—he needs her more than I do.
Yet he couldn’t bring himself to stop. He fell above her, bracing his hands on either side of her head. Even though she’d just climaxed and was breathing heavily, she wrapped her legs around his hips and urged him deeper into her again. He kissed her in an attempt to avoid the confusion of emotions in her eyes, but it was still there, clear in his mind, and her mouth accepted him with a whimper of surrender as he fucked her with renewed vigor.
“Melody …” he said gr
uffly against her lips.
“Shut up,” she bit out. “I hate this … hate you … fuck you both … oh God, don’t stop.”
As if he ever could now that it had started—it wasn’t just the need he had to please her and find his release within her depths, but the need to believe his mother’s puzzle box opening for her had meant something more than the beginning of a bond. Even though he’d given up that dream, he wanted desperately to believe she really had been the one.
But Garen … His friend meant the world to him and Melody might be his only chance at true happiness apart from Skye. He couldn’t let himself love her. Not if he meant to let Garen have her.
The wash of her energy soaked into him, leaving him replete but hating himself for how much he loved the feel of it—for how much he never wanted it to end.
Without a word he pulled away from her, dressed, and left. Cursing himself for his need to stay as much as his need to leave as quickly as he could before he betrayed his promise to himself.
It was, thankfully, still full dark and he headed to the roof, stripped by the side of the rooftop swimming pool, and launched himself off the lip of the building. He shifted as the air rushed past, beating his wings violently against the panicked well of emotions.
Chapter Twenty-Nine
Melody’s tears flowed freely when she was finally alone again for the first time in days. It wasn’t the abruptness of Skye’s departure that had done it. That had only been a part of it. She felt trapped between two overwhelming desires. She craved the release of letting go, letting herself be in love for the first time in her life. The need overwhelmed her in spite of her promise that she wouldn’t let that happen until she’d achieved her dream. To let herself be loved, because what else had that look in Skye’s eyes meant? Deep in her soul, she’d felt it—a completely irrational, yet unbreakable connection.
And to think that it had snuck up on her the way it had, in the middle of her pissed-off challenge to him. She’d been trying her best to goad him into being even more of an ass to her than he’d started out being, hoping that it would help her to maintain some level of control over her feelings—to keep from letting them control her instead. Yet with every plunge of his cock into her, the feelings she’d been struggling to keep at bay were hammered deeper into her heart. She tried logic to fight it—she barely knew him—yet every word he spoke, even the harshest ones, plucked deeply at her secret need for love from a man like him.
She had only the most fleeting, foggy memories of Alec now, but he had left and the men her heartbroken mother brought home after that had never measured up. The craving had never been so apparent as it was with Skye. Even in his worst moments, she responded to him. It made no sense and she hated herself for it, but there was no denying that the feelings existed. Not now that she was a naked, blubbering mess, curled up into a ball on the massive table while the city glimmered with jewel-like beauty outside the windows behind her.
The air had cooled drastically and she shivered, but didn’t have the will to move and find the robe she’d left draped over a chair in the corner of the room.
The contract was her means to an end, but she hadn’t counted on wanting precisely the thing she’d always told herself she’d avoid for as long as possible. It became clear in that desolate moment, however—she didn’t want adventure, or freedom from the ties of the world. She didn’t want to travel and experience new places, open her mind to new ideas.
She wanted love. And she hated herself for how much she wanted it. How much she might end up sacrificing for the sake of it, just like her mother had.
“I won’t be that sad,” she cried, slapping her hand onto the table, then curling in on herself and crying more. Because, in spite of how much she loved her mother, admired her for her sacrifices, there was still that measure of disrespect for how much of herself her mother had given up for the sake of love. Even though most of it was to raise Melody herself.
The cool air in the apartment made her shiver harder, and for the first time she truly felt cold here. Cold to her core. She’d always reveled in her own solitude. Found strength and happiness in her self-reliance. She had few friends in her life and they were fleeting. Her closest friend was the last man she’d dated, who wasn’t really a friend anyway because he was still in love with her, but he had been kind and understanding of her quirks at least. It wasn’t like she could call him to talk, and she certainly couldn’t call her mother now, even if it hadn’t been the middle of the night in her old hometown.
She simply lay there, numb and staring out at the twinkling lights and wondering if she had any love for herself left after falling in love with a man she had no business loving to begin with.
“Melody.”
The soft voice barely drew her out of her reverie. She shivered and curled further into herself.
The hand that gripped her was hot, a sharp contrast to the chilled temperature of her skin, but he was also insistent. “Sweet Mother, Melody, what happened? Did he hurt you?”
“No …” she whispered. “He loves me. And I hate him for it.”
“You’re shivering. Come here,” Garen said. He tugged at her to get a grip and swiftly lifted her into his arms. God, the warmth of him was like heaven. Her protector. Her keeper. She clung to him, snagging her fingers on his shirt, too aware of the heat of his chest beneath it. He loved her, too. But she didn’t hate him. God, she didn’t hate him in the least.
“Jesus, Melody. What happened?” he murmured, carrying her away. She fixated on the way he’d said “Jesus,” … like the word were a sandwich, with a grape jelly ‘S’ in the center. It sounded weird enough to distract her because nobody who’d been raised in a tiny Bible Belt town like she had said “Jesus” the way he did.
He set her down on her bed and covered her with her quilt. His irritatingly adorable cowlick of pale blond hair dipped over one eye. “Tell me what happened,” he demanded.
“I don’t … we made love and then he left. That’s all.” The biggest understatement of her life. But how did she say he made her feel like she was immortal in his eyes? There was more to it than that, though. She pressed her face into the pillow and groaned, frustrated at all of it. Pissed off at herself for having these feelings to begin with.
“You can have him back,” she said finally. “I don’t want him, and I know you do. You’ve loved him forever already.” Tears welled up in her eyes, her decision becoming clear for the first time. “He’s the only one who makes you happy,” she said. “And you deserve to be happy.” And I don’t want to love him.
“Don’t you deserve to be happy, too?” he asked.
“Yes, I do, and you two … this contract is not helping.”
“What would make you happy?” He said it with such genuine concern, his voice tight and filled with emotion. When she looked at him, he looked tense, his brows clenched together with true worry.
And suddenly she wasn’t sure anymore what she wanted. She’d gone into this dead certain it was about the money and about finally giving her mother some true happiness by traveling the world together. But would that make her happy, or simply fill a void she’d had for years? What was the difference really?
“I used to know, but I don’t anymore,” she said helplessly.
He frowned and turned to leave. “You might need to figure it out, because the contract isn’t going away.”
The closer he got to the door, the deeper her despair sank into her gut. God, she didn’t want him to leave now, but his staying would be a bad idea in any circumstance.
“It would make me happy if you stayed and just held me,” she called out. Fuck that inner voice.
She wasn’t prepared for his response, however. He stopped in the doorway, his shoulders tight, but when she said the words he made a weird shift, his entire body became something else for a split second, the shape silhouetted in the light from her doorway, befo
re he turned around to face her. She knew better than to pass it off as a simple trick of light like she had the first day they’d met. In that instant she was sure she had the answer she’d wished for all along. The truth about them, bound up in a long forgotten memory that came crashing back with such force the air left her lungs. Dragons.
“All right,” he said. His eyes had an excited inner glow when he came back to her, but he quickly hid it before kicking off his shoes and sliding under the covers with her. His warm bulk engulfed her as he situated himself, finding the ideal spot for each of his long, thickly muscled limbs. His legs bent, pushing her own knees up as he tucked himself around her. He slid one arm gently beneath her head while the other wrapped around her waist, his fingers gently squeezing her naked hip. She twined her fingers through his and held them there, still buzzed and elated at her revelation. “Would you be more comfortable in a gown?” he whispered.
“No, I like this, but can you do what you did before to calm me, please? My eyes are shut, I promise.” Whatever he’d done earlier had the effect of a pharmaceutical, leaving her relaxed and care-free. Now that she wasn’t the least bit aroused, she could use the comfortable distraction of it to help her forget about Skye.
Garen released a deep breath, the warm air tickling the back of her neck.
“Sleep, Melody. I promise not to let you go.”
Chapter Thirty
Garen felt a little guilty for making such an empty promise, but at least for one night he could mean it. Once his breath took effect, her body relaxed in his embrace and her breathing slowed. Her aura faded to a soft glow, the blue of Skye’s energy making up the majority of its potency. He closed his eyes and simply enjoyed the soft weight of her pressed against him and the comforting sensation of her aura searching him out, though with less insistence than it had before. There was less of Garen’s energy diluting Skye’s, and the glimmer of a magical bond that had existed a week ago had begun to fade.
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