Energy gathered inside his body, each cell filling up to bursting as he continued slipping his tongue against her, pressing firmly against that unyielding passage. When he felt her need pushing against his brain with almost physical force, he knew she was ready.
Carefully covering his cock with slick lube, he worked the fingers of his left hand against her, slipping some inside that tight ring. He watched her carefully for any sign of discomfort, but she looked back over her shoulder with nothing but pleasure on her face.
He understood then what she needed from him. In her mind’s eye, he saw her encounter with Gabriyel. He saw and felt how he’d filled her cunny to bursting. Too, Lorren saw what she would do next with Errion. All in a circle, all completing the pieces of a puzzle that none of them could see in full, not yet, but Lorren knew his part.
Pressing the tip of his cock to her caused her to moan and arch back, lifting up from the pillows. The presentation of her faultless bottom in such a way enthralled him. Cupping her perfectly formed cheeks in his hands, he eased his way forward, his breath so controlled his chest hurt. With a shove, he buried the tip within, causing both of them to groan. Sinfully snug, the sphincter of her ass crushed his shaft, holding the bulbous head firmly within as if she would never free him.
Lorren smoothed his hands over her back, soothing her, letting her grow accustomed to the feel of him. Her gripping tightness felt wickedly good. Strangely, the beast hung back, watching with eager anticipation and not his usual screaming needs.
Bit by bit he pressed forward, relaxing Farjika as best he could, but he went only so far before she tightened up so firmly he couldn’t move forward. Not that he wanted or needed to. It wasn’t what he was doing that felt so impossibly delicious—it was the way she absolutely trusted him not to hurt her. Farjika gave herself to him completely. Lorren had never been so enmeshed with another, not even Errion, not quite like this, not with this curious electricity running through his veins, building into something so powerful he would not be able to contain it.
Farjika rose up, angling her body to better take his cock, and he slipped halfway within. She pressed her back to his chest, begging him without words to wrap his arms around her, palm her breasts, and tease her nipples between fingers and thumbs. Rolling the buds slowly brought them to hardness. Replacing his hands with her own, she encouraged his hands to seek lower.
Spanning across her tiny waist, he gripped the curve of her hips, holding her steady for a small push forward. Another incremental bit of him lodged inside. Her gasp was the sweetest sound he’d ever heard. Turning her head, she kissed him, locking her lips to his, thrusting her tongue against his.
Lower his fingertips went, teasing over her hairless mound, down to the puffy lips that hid her firm little clit. Working his right hand between those slick folds of flesh caused him to inadvertently thrust forward.
A shocked gasp expelled from Farjika, but she grasped his arms, holding him, refusing to let him move back.
“Don’t stop. We’re so close.”
To what, he didn’t know, but he held steady, letting her rock her hips and draw him so slowly within he thought he would bellow from the madness of exercising every shred of restraint he possessed.
Through the haze of lust and longing, the connection to her expanded, overtaking his awareness until they moved as one. His finger pressed harder against her clit as his strokes matched the movements of her hips. Rolling her body against his, she managed to take him entirely within, but he couldn’t thrust, not with the way she clamped around him. When she clenched and unclenched her muscles, her passage undulated against his cock, milking him, building up the power in his body until everything erupted from the tip of his cock.
To him, his ejaculation felt like liquid fire bursting forth from his balls. She must have felt the burning heat, because she yanked a pillow to her face and screamed right into its puffy depths. If not for her quick thinking, the guards would have burst in, and they would be in even worse trouble than they were now. All Lorren could do was cling to her and wait for the power to equalize.
Once the last of the spasms died away, she dropped the pillow, then eased down to the bed, taking him with her. For a long time they lay on their sides, entwined, his cock slowly withdrawing from her body.
He didn’t speak and neither did she, but they both felt different. Lorren’s only concern was that Farjika knew this would happen, wanted this to occur, but she still had no idea what this new exchange of power would do to any of them.
Chapter Twenty-Eight
Head in hand, Errion soaked in the tub. He thought the water would dampen the sound of his tears. Unfortunately, the metal walls of the bathroom only amplified the drops hitting the surface of the water. Worse, they echoed his gasping sobs.
Once, when he was young, the elder D’Buren had caught him crying over the death of his pet and admonished him that big boys didn’t cry. Lorren’s father had smacked his face so hard the shock had stopped Errion’s tears in an instant. Errion had hated him from that day forward, because ever since he’d felt uncomfortable doing what was perfectly normal. Grief brought about tears. There was nothing shameful about crying.
Then why oh why couldn’t he just let them come? Why was he sitting in the dark trying to hide his regret from not only himself but also the eyes of any jailer who might be watching?
Errion told himself he just didn’t want to appear weak before an enemy, but that felt as hollow as he did. The Diolans weren’t much of a typical enemy to keep him incarcerated in such opulence. On the few occasions when he’d traveled, he’d stayed in rented rooms that were not this fine. Beautiful furniture, plush carpets, incredible works of art—everywhere he turned, he found function and beauty combined. An envoy had assured him that anything he needed would be provided to him. There were only two exceptions—he could not leave his room and he could not have any companionship. The stoop-shouldered man was quick to assure him that Lorren would be granted the same amenities. They would be able to see each other once they reached Diola. What the man couldn’t possibly know was how much Errion feared being alone, especially now when his feelings were in such a terrible jumble.
When Errion asked after Gabriyel, the envoy turned away, dismissing him so sharply the insult cut deep. Errion did not ask about Farjika. He knew she would not be held in miserable conditions. She was the future empress, after all. Since she was the one he was accused of raping, they weren’t likely to tell him where she was or her condition anyway. His guilty conscience brought him right back to Gabriyel. That poor man who had done everything he could to save Farjika was going to end up taking the blame for all of them.
“And here I sit bawling in the tub like a child.”
But Errion honestly didn’t know what else to do. Everything he wanted, he got, usually with minimal effort. But now he couldn’t even see the people he’d fallen so deeply in love with. Admitting that he was in love with all of them had come as easy to him as admitting he preferred the color green. How strange that he and Lorren had never used those words with each other, but the feelings had been there all along. Now there were two more that Errion knew he didn’t want to be without.
In their business relationship, Lorren was the problem solver. Errion turned his mind to creating new venues for their products or further enhancements of those products. However, if anything went wrong, like the malfunction of a run of butlers, who, without warning, spewed expletives, it was Lorren who backtracked the production and found the disgruntled employee responsible. Errion had laughed his ass off and brought one of them home to purposely provoke the swear fest. As he was playing with the robot, he realized that the program that caused the vile language could be used to translate languages as well. Within a quarter turn, their butlers came with an interpreter module. One far superior to the handheld model like the one Master D’Buren had been using at the manor.
Just thinking of that overinflated windbag enraged Errion. How he’d delighted in causing h
is son harm. Given a choice between that and Errion’s absentee father, he’d take absence over abuse any day. Thinking of his father made him think of Farjika’s father, the reason why he was on a starship headed to an exotic planet he knew so little about.
What kind of a man was Drahka? Clearly, he loved his daughter. He wouldn’t have risked creating a galactic incident did he not, but was he possessive of her, or simply overly protective? Would he listen to her, or would the way she’d been found close off his ears to any explanation?
Putting himself in Drahka’s place, Errion considered how he would react if he discovered his young daughter naked, bloody and covered in restraint marks. Errion didn’t think he’d be favorable to hearing any kind of rationalization.
Errion could just picture himself telling the man that yes, he tied his lovely daughter up and then his life-long companion proceeded to torment her until he forced the captain of her guard to fuck pure sexual energy out of her. Errion imagined he’d get about halfway through the explanation before Drahka’s fist decimated the structure of his face.
Shivering, Errion stood, then stepped out of the bathwater that had grown cold. Twin wet footprints looked lonely on the charcoal gray bathmat.
Over the course of his life, he’d dealt with a few enraged fathers. The experience was never pleasant. He imagined dealing with the father of a royal woman was going to be even less so. But he was determined to try. Errion refused to let Gabriyel take the blame. He vowed to do anything to keep their group intact. Because he knew, deep down to the most honest place in his heart, he couldn’t really be what he was destined to be without Farjika, Lorren and Gabriyel by his side.
Drying himself quickly, Errion drained the tub, hung up the towel and slipped naked into bed. The sheets were amazingly soft and warmed his flesh instantly. He rolled to his side, embracing a pillow, undecided as to which of his lovers he should pretend it was. Since the bed had been covered with them before he brushed most off, he leapt out of bed, gathered several pillows and then arranged himself in the center of them. Pretending the puffy pillows were his companions wasn’t nearly as satisfying as having them with him, but the pretense did allow him to drift into a troubled sleep.
Errion wasn’t sure what woke him, but he knew Farjika was standing by his bedside before she spoke.
“I’ve come to offer you absolution.” She separated the edges of the white robe, pushed the hood back and let the fabric fall away.
Spectacularly nude, she slipped under the covers. Without comment, she tossed the pillows out of the bed. She worked her way toward him until she was able to press her warm body against his. The familiarity of her scent and the feel of her flesh soothed him. When her arms came around him, he burst into tears.
All the suppressed sorrow of his life spilled out in an uncontrollable display of grief. Consumed by sadness, he couldn’t stop the tide if he tried, so he didn’t, and Farjika didn’t berate him. She enfolded him, murmuring quietly as she kissed his neck and face, her hands rubbing over his back and shoulders. She allowed him the sheer indulgence to express what he’d never been comfortable sharing with anyone, not even Lorren.
Everything poured out, all the hurt feelings he’d stuffed down so far that no one could ever see the real Errion. Not a soul knew the scared little boy who acted tough to hide a tender heart. Nor the frightened young man who used sex to get close to people because he couldn’t bear sharing genuine intimacy, then being cast aside. Or the man who hid behind disdain to cover up the fact that he loved so deeply he frightened himself. All this came tumbling out with his tears, and Farjika nodded, already knowing, consoling him for finally accepting who he really was.
And she loved him.
Not in spite of his realization or because of it. Farjika loved him for who he was: a man with a wicked mind, a sharp tongue and a huge heart that he’d kept carefully hidden away. Errion was a man as vulnerable and special as the rest of them. A man who recognized he was greater in the sum of their group than he was apart.
“I never want to be alone again.” As the words tumbled out, he realized they might sound like he only wanted to be with them to avoid being alone, but Farjika understood what he meant.
“I don’t want to be apart from any of you either.” Her lips found his, kissing away the last of his pain.
Knowing that his face was a mess, he grabbed one of the multitudes of pillows, rubbed it across his face, blew his nose into it and tossed it off the bed.
Her gentle laughter prompted him to quip, “That’s the biggest hanky I’ve ever used.”
“They can supply you with a hundred more.”
His explosive crying jag hadn’t changed anything and yet he felt better. In the strangest way, he felt stronger, more capable of facing the trials to come. In the semi-dark, he looked over at Farjika, her gaze steady on his, her skin luminous.
He blinked rapidly to dispel the illusion, but she was still shimmering, ever so slightly, with a glittering golden light. When he stared hard, the luminosity vanished, but if he relaxed his eyes, the sparkles danced over the surface of her skin, especially around the area below her belly button.
“It’s for him, isn’t it? The energy you’re taking from each of us.”
She shrugged, spilling her hair over her shoulders. “I’m not sure. All I know is what I need.” With one hand, she pushed him to his back. “I had to release you from your grief first, to clean your energy, but I cannot wait any longer.”
Straddling his hips, she pressed her mouth to his, kissing him as if this was the last kiss anyone in the known universe would ever share. Hot and hungry, she ate at his mouth, wiping away the ravages of despair and filling him with passion. A pure ardor undiluted by fear. Openly embracing her with all that he was, Errion let her energy flow into him without reservation and fully gave his energy back. Through the passage of their mouths, the energy met, melded and balanced.
Pulling up with a stunned gasp of pleasure, she stared down at him, blinking in confusion and pride.
“What?” By the look on her face, he’d done something right for a change, and he truly wanted to know what, since he did the correct thing so rarely.
“I was able to connect our energies without accepting your climax into my body.”
Errion’s brows lifted with surprise, then waggled suggestively. “So, the other guys couldn’t give it up without engaging Mr. Happy?”
Playfully she gave his cock a little shake. “Don’t go getting a big head about it.”
“Right. If it got too big, however would it fit into that perfect little mouth of yours?” He teased his finger across her lips, loving the way she puckered and kissed the tip of his finger before pulling his digit within. “Remember a long time ago when I told you that what Lorren didn’t have the guts to make you do, I would?”
With his finger still in her mouth, she nodded, using the movement to slip his finger suggestively in and out.
“You wicked woman.”
She released his finger with a smile. “So, did you ever decide?”
His uplifted brows asked the question.
“Whether you’d come in my mouth or on my spectacular tits?”
Wincing, he slapped his hand over his face, peering out between two fingers. “Did I really say that to you?”
She tsked lightly. “You can be so vulgar.” She teased a finger across her lips, then slid it down to stroke across her breasts. “You dirty, dirty boy.”
“Did it make you wet?”
Nodding, she kissed her way down his chest. “Although you don’t need to force me, I am concerned.” Flicking her tongue over each nipple in turn, she bit down just hard enough to make him growl.
“Concerned about what?”
Rubbing her hands along the muscles of his chest and belly, she avoided direct contact with his now needy, greedy cock. “About living up to your exacting standards.”
Errion laughed as he draped strands of her hair across his stomach. “My standards are amazi
ngly low.”
Her throaty chuckle vibrated his balls. “Gabriyel said you have the oral skills of a dran’greth.” Her rich voice wafted moist heat all along his groin.
“Is that a compliment?” He offered no protest when she spread his legs wide and slipped a pillow below his bottom.
“A dran’greth is a man who caters exclusively to other men.” She looked up at him. “I watched what you did to Gabriyel so that I could learn from an expert.” Keeping her eyes on him, she took the tip of his cock into her mouth but didn’t tighten her lips. Instead, she rolled her head around in a circle, causing the most sensitive areas at the tip of his prick to brush along her lips and tongue in a lazy, tentative way.
Fingers gripping into the bed, he released a long breath of pleasure when she reversed the circle and went round and round the other direction. Unlike so many women, she didn’t immediately try to take him as deep as she could or suck so hard his eyes watered. She already knew the biggest secret: tease the head and do it wantonly while looking right into his eyes. While rolling him one way, then rolling the other, she cupped his balls into the palm of her hand, massaging them with her fingertips.
As if none of this had held him enthralled, she did the most incredible thing—she hummed. Farjika didn’t just hum a note or a pleasure moan, she hummed a tune, some song that was slow and seductive, utterly entrancing.
Errion could not count the number of times someone had performed this most intimate act upon him, but he’d never felt anything like what she made him feel. Normally an urge to grasp the back of the person’s head consumed him, but she was so compelling he didn’t dare do anything that would upset her seductive pace. He would have thought her a liar and been convinced she’d given a thousand suckjobs but for the truth he knew by his intimacy with her. Heaven help him, this was only the second time for her, but she was able to reach right into him, find what he enjoyed, then bring his greatest pleasure to life.
Dark Empress: The Onic Empire, Book 5 Page 26
