by Selena Scott
There weren’t images or memories, but somehow she was inside his life. She felt a childlike, intense love for someone. A father. She felt a full-bodied missing feeling for a mother who wasn’t there. She felt his fear when he’d realized how different he was from everyone else. She felt confusion and power as he grappled with his first prophecies. She felt him growing, noticing girls; she felt him making friends, annoying people and getting a kick out of it. She felt worry as he started to learn more and more about the fates of people he loved. She felt the low, constant hum of outrage at injustices of the world he lived in. She felt him gear up for battle. What battle she had no idea. But she felt his fear, determination, courage. She felt what it felt like to protect his friends. To fight and fall. She felt him soaring through the air in a way she could barely comprehend or imagine. She felt pain, frustration, and fear and more fear. She felt his pain. And then she felt determination again. She felt calm. She recognized her own energy entering the scene for him. She felt how she made him feel. Calm. Happy. Impossibly aroused. Safe. Protective.
Her eyes fluttered open and she focused on the here and now again. “Never anger,” she whispered. “You never really feel anger, do you?”
He said nothing, and through their linked hands she could feel him decide to answer honestly. “I don’t know.”
“Holy SHIT!” Mel stood up and traced her hands through her hair. She wandered briefly. She stumbled away from him and toward the bedroom. Falling backwards she landed on the bed. “HOLY SHIT!!!!!”
“What?” he chuckled, tumbling onto the bed next to her and playing with her hair again. “What are you holy shitting about?”
She rolled over so that they lay on their sides facing each other. “Holy shit, am I in love with you?” she asked him, half exclamation, half genuine question.
He laughed and painted the ends of her hair over her forehead, down along the line of her nose. “I don’t know,” he said again. “But,” he tossed her hair aside and went on all fours over top of her. “How about I kiss you and you kiss me and we just kinda see what happens?”
“Yeah,” she said, her feelings whipping out of her chest like a flag in the wind. She’d never know how clearly he could feel what she was feeling. That she was throwing it out into the world like heat from an open oven. That most people never threw any feeling into the world with that much vigor. “Yeah, let’s try that.”
CHAPTER SEVEN
O lowered his mouth to Mel’s and simultaneously lost and found himself in one fell swoop. He was here, but he was also there, under himself, he was her. She was a part of him. Warm and fragrant and copper-colored. She opened her mouth to his and he discovered a flavor that marked him forever. Tattooed him.
The weak little air conditioning unit in the window sprayed a cold line of air over them but O barely felt it as his skin began to heat. How could such a little woman have so much to touch? His hands were everywhere, stroking and pressing over the curves of her side, the length of her leg. His tongue met hers at the same second he took her legs and clasped them around his waist.
“Thank fuck I already have my shirt off,” he murmured against her mouth as her hands began to trace his back in certain strokes. She wasn’t shy. She was as questing and curious for him as he was for her.
“Yeah, mine. Get mine. Get this fucking thing off of me!” Mel gave a frustrated war cry as she tried to pull her sundress over her head. It tangled in her hair as she wiggled underneath him.
O laughed and gave up touching her delectable legs just long enough to help tug her free. Tossing her dress aside, O was almost torn between looking and touching. But he instantly decided on doing both. Rearing back on his heels, he knelt over her, placing one of her bare feet on his shoulder. He ran his hand down the length of her leg, digging in at the thigh as his eyes raked over her.
Her sky blue lacy bra strained over the generous curves of her breasts and O’s mouth watered at the sight. She was breathing fast, her hair spun out over the bed like a volcano of coppery lava. The sun, almost down now, gave one last slant through the window and turned her gorgeous body a light red color. Like she was on fire. Like she was made of fire. Like she was his fire.
She reached up for him at the same time he fell back over her, the two of them rolling together. They rolled right off the bed, landing halfway on the floor. They laughed and kept rolling all the way off.
O relished the feel of her bare skin against his. He tugged at his shorts so that he could be completely naked. He needed to be completely naked. He needed to be wildly open to her. He didn’t want to hide anything. He wanted her to know everything.
***
Mel gasped and moaned as his mouth clamped onto her throat. They rolled over again and she was laying over his chest, her hair making a curtain around them. She spread her legs over his waist and she felt the hard rod of his erect cock against her wetness. She felt her heat fold around him and she pushed back on him. The only thing between them now was her underwear. She was both frantic and wildly calm. She knew, without a doubt in her heart, that she was supposed to be doing this. This exact thing. That it was the only sane reaction to the feelings exploding in her.
She pushed back more and felt the steely, silky skin of the head of his cock brush against her inner thigh. Suddenly she was pushing up off him and sprinting into the bathroom. She grabbed her bathroom bag and ripped it nearly in two. Lipstick, moisturizer, toothpaste, Q-tips went flinging to all corners of the room. She searched through the rubble for a condom.
Mel came sprinting back into the room with it held high above her head like a champion carrying a trophy. O laughed and came to his knees before her. He took the condom from her and tossed it on the bed behind them. She opened her mouth to protest. Because she was pretty sure they needed that now. Right now.
But the words froze in her mouth as he picked her leg up and tossed it over his shoulder. She was open to him, exposed and so wet she could feel it start to drip down her thighs.
O leaned in and pressed his nose to her panties. “Nothing better. Literally not a fucking thing,” he grinned up at her but she didn’t have time to smile back. Not before he’d yanked her panties to one side and tasted her.
Men had gone down on her before. But this was not like that. Mel was instantly up on her toes. O grasped her from behind, steadying her with his arms but completely unsteadying her with his mouth. His tongue was inside her, then he was suckling her. Swallowing her whole. Mel’s entire existence narrowed down to the place his tongue was circling insistently.
O dropped even lower, so that he was almost under her. It was like he couldn’t get close enough. He groaned into her pussy. His mouth working and working. She could feel him in every place he was touching her but she could also feel him everywhere else. Like he was expanding to fill the entire room. To surround her in every way.
Mel threw her head back, looked toward the ceiling, but she saw nothing. All she could do was feel. Feel and feel. As her nerves tightened on a string and snapped. She came like she was being set free. Like she was finally able to explode into the sky the way she’d always wanted to. And she flew. She flew like forever could be hers.
***
O knew a lot. He’d had a lot of experiences. And even more than that, he’d experienced a lot through other people. Part and parcel with the job of being an oracle. Sometimes he could just look at someone and their whole life would come rushing over him like a stiff wind.
But he’d never, in all his experiences, known something like this existed. Something like Mel sweating, relaxed and spread out in his arms as she smiled up through a shaft of dying sunlight.
“Holy god in heaven,” she hummed to herself. “If that was head, I think I’ve been doing it wrong.” She cracked an eye and looked up at him for one vibrating second.
“Your turn!” she yelled and launched up around his neck.
He laughed with delight and arousal as she pushed him back, running one hand over his chest while the
other hand searched on the bed for the condom.
He groaned as her wet pussy pressed onto his lower stomach. His hips thrust up into the air. He couldn’t help himself. He’d never seen anything more beautiful in his entire life than her gorgeous, unique, off-center face panting in the twilight. Her hair was a mess, spilling over her shoulders and giving him peeks of her copper gold nipples through the tumble over her chest. That was too tempting. Not even a monk could resist that.
O reared up as he heard her tear the condom. He sucked one of her nipples into his mouth and then the other.
“No fair,” she moaned as she tilted her head back and let him ravage her. “You’re distracting me. I didn’t distract you.”
The tips of her hair dangled back and tickled the head of his cock. That was too much. He might be an oracle, hell, he might be a dragon shifter, but he was still just a man.
He ripped his mouth away from her nipple and clamped it firmly to her mouth. Her lush, fuckable lips were smashed under his. He moaned into her and grabbed her ass tightly. She was so soft everywhere.
In a move he greatly admired, she didn’t break the kiss, but reached behind her own back and sheathed him with the condom. He gritted his teeth at the feeling of her strong, competent hands against him.
He lifted her hips and poised her over top of his cock. He positioned them perfectly, ready to take her in one thrust. But she gripped him by the shoulders and rolled with surprising strength. And then he was on top, with her grinning and panting below him. His cock slid through her wetness and her eyes half closed in ecstasy. But something told him that she’d been on to something, so he braced an arm under her ass and rolled them again.
She laughed and moaned as they rolled halfway into the living room and she rolled them again. He did the same and they landed in a sweaty heap, arms tangled, her leg thrown over his hip as they lay half on their sides. She sprawled on his chest and dug her fingers into his shoulders as she pressed herself close and closer to him.
O brushed the hair off her forehead. But then he tangled his fingers in it and made a fist, dragging her face up so he could see every expression she made as he took her. Her eyes were open, her lips parted.
O pressed the head of his cock into her. Just an inch. Before he braced one hand over her ass, gave her hair a sharp tug and thrust into her to the hilt.
Mel screamed and he felt her nails rake across his skin but her eyes stayed open, aware and pinned to his. A faint smile of pleasure crossed her face and she pressed herself into him even further.
She was handling it well, but meanwhile O was destroyed. “Never felt anything so good,” he groaned, undone. “So tight, good lord, so tight.”
He felt her wetness all the way onto his thighs as he pulled out slightly just to thrust back in.
“It’s you,” she panted, working her hips along with him. “You’re so big. God, you’re so big.”
They both started working their hips in earnest, pushing against the ground just to get closer to each other. Soon their haphazard position wasn’t letting them get close enough.
O dragged her against him and rolled on top of her, one hand loosely around her neck and the other dragging up her side. He thrust, thrust, thrust into her as she moaned. Her back arched, pushing her gorgeous breasts into his line of sight and he fell on them. Sucking one ripe berry into his mouth and then the other. She was a feast.
He felt her body begin to tighten against his, and her pussy began to clench him. She was rising. He could feel her orgasm coming almost as if it were his own.
But she didn’t wait for it. Instead she rolled him over and halfway into the couch. He lay with his back against it as she rode his lap, leaning her hands back on the ground behind them.
She was a sight to behold, and it was a testament to how hot they looked together, that O couldn’t drag his eyes away from where they were joined. He watched his cock disappear inside the sweetest pussy he’d ever known and he lost his mind.
O grabbed her hips and stood in one swift motion. He needed a couch, a bed, a chair. He needed to slam her down and really fuck her. But then she was just pressed against him, her legs around his hips and everything soft and ripe just smashed against him the way it was supposed to be. He widened his stance and bounced her on his cock. Mel screamed out, gripping his shoulders tightly and throwing her head back.
“So deep,” she gasped. “You’re so deep.” He felt her quiver around him. He knew he wasn’t making it anywhere else. They weren’t making it to a bed or a couch or a countertop. They were about to come. Now.
Grabbing her tightly, so tightly he knew he might have to reckon with the marks he was leaving, he slammed his cock into her. Over and over. He felt her tighten and explode around him. Her moans were erotic music in his ears as the liquid heat of her pussy tightened around his cock and dragged him to the edge.
He tensed, a statue of straining, ecstatic pleasure. He bit down on her shoulder and came harder than he ever had in his life.
CHAPTER EIGHT
When the fog cleared and his heart started beating again, O realized that they were laying in a tangle of sweaty limbs and jumping heartbeats on the living room floor. Not wanting to crush her, O scooped her up and stumbled to the bed. He tossed her on like a sack of potatoes and jumped on beside her, making the mattress bounce her a full 6 inches in the air.
She turned and grinned at him. One of her hands automatically reached out and traced the scars on his side. He felt his mirth dim a little bit. It was a really good thing that he’d forgotten about them for this long. It meant that she was good for him. She was helping him forget his pain, little by little. But it didn’t mean he wanted to explain them. Tell her how he got them.
She opened her mouth and he braced for the question. But instead she shocked the shit out of him.
“So. You’re a dragon, huh?”
For the first time in his life, O found himself utterly speechless. He opened his mouth and closed it. Opened it and closed it. Kept it closed, thought really hard. Opened it. And closed it.
“You look like a fish opening and closing your mouth like that,” she said. “And not one of the cool tropical ones. You look like a trout.”
“How the flying fuck did you know that?” he exclaimed.
“Because I’ve been fishing before, duh. It’s an American pastime.”
“No, not about me looking like a fish. About me being a dragon.”
“Oh,” she brushed some of his shaggy hair out of his eyes. “You showed me.”
“When?!”
“When you came like a freight train, lost all control of your body and mind and poured just about every moment of your life straight into my brain.” She shivered a little at the memory, a wicked grin playing over her face. “It was cool, kind of what I imagine doing drugs to feel like.”
O flopped backwards. “Are you a witch?” he asked her, raising his head up off the bed. “How the hell did you make me do that?”
“Nope,” she solemnly shook her head. “There’s only one mythical creature in this bed right now.”
“Is that, like, a house rule of yours?” he grinned at her. He needed something to do with his hands. He felt like he was coming out of his skin. He sat up and rearranged them on the bed so that she was in between his legs and he had hair to braid in his hands.
He gently, precisely, sectioned her hair and started an intricate braid. “So, in homage to a question you recently asked me, why the hell aren’t you freaking out right now?” he asked her, genuinely mystified that she hadn’t gone jetting out the door the moment she realized she was dealing with a hybrid man/dragon.
She shrugged and tried to look back at him, but he kept her head in place with the braid. This thing was complicated, and he wasn’t going to let her mess it up now.
“I don’t know. Maybe if you’d tried to explain it to me with words, then I would have freaked out. But seeing it like that, there’s no arguing. There’s no way to lie about it. It just i
s.”
“But the dragon thing doesn’t bother you? I mean, it’s not like I’m half leopard or bear or something. Something of your world.”
She paused and he thought she was pressing her hand into her eyes. But she didn’t leave him hanging for long. “I mean, you’re right. This is insane. I’m not gonna lie. It’s a lot to wrap my head around. But I think the lingering relaxation effects of the orgasms are easing the passage of the information.”
O couldn’t see her face, but he knew she was grinning.
“Okay!” she clapped her hands together. “Here’s what we’re gonna do. Speed questions. I need information. I have a million questions. And I want straight answers.”
“Fair enough.”
“Okay, where to start. Where to start.”
“How about you start with my childhood and work up from there. Then we can get to the mommy issues and take a hard turn into the usual. A nerd in school, could never get a date. Acne. The works. Oh! And I hope you’ll ask about how I lost my virginity, then we’ll really be cooking with gas. By the end of this question and answer sesh, there’s nothing you won’t know about my sordid past.”
“O?”
“Yeah?”
“Shut up and let me think for a second.”
“Again, fair enough.”
He could feel her grin again and it put him at ease. She wanted to be here with him. She was just trying to get a grasp on all of it. For a woman whose life had been turned on its ass in the last twelve hours, he had to figure she was doing pretty well.
“Okay, I guess we should start with the whole dragon thing.”
“What about it?”
“What color are you when you’re a dragon?”
O’s hands relaxed on the braids and he threw his head back and laughed. “THAT’S the first thing you want to know about me being a dragon? Not how or how often or when or where? You want to know what color I am.”
