Helpless to do otherwise, Jade arched into him, her mouth opening on a silent cry. She buried her hands in his hair, holding him there for a long, glorious moment. A faint warning sounded at the back of her consciousness, a spark of panic that kindled as heat and want flared through her and she lost track of herself. Her whole world concentrated itself down to Lucius, and the ways he was touching her, the things he was making her feel.
Was this, then, what other women found with their lovers? Was this the path to madness? If so, she needed to back off, gear down, let things level. But even as she was aware of the fear and the thought, both were lost to the pressure growing within her, the need to have her hands and mouth on every part of him, to make him feel the same obsessive need that gripped her. Before she could make the move, though, he moved to kiss his way down her body, leaving her no choice but to caress whatever part of him she could reach, and absorb the feelings detonating within. Pleasure slammed into her, through her, great waves of it building and growing, holding her hostage to each new sensation. Then he moved back up her body and she was surprised to realize that he was naked now, that they both were.
The glide of skin against skin was viciously erotic as he slid up her body to kiss her mouth once again. She tasted the faint salt from her own skin, the sharp tang of his arousal, and the combination of the two. Sinking into him, letting the rest of the world fall away, she gave herself over to the gossamer pleasure he’d brought her, and the sharp need to have him inside her. Wrapping her legs around him, she opened to him, shifting until they were almost, but not quite, joined male to female, hard to soft.
He went still above her, in her arms. But he didn’t thrust home. Instead he stayed there, poised and unmoving.
Jade opened her eyes to find him staring down at her, his hazel eyes hot and borderline wild. But when their gazes met, his expression eased. He touched her face, drawing a finger down her cheek to her chin, then tipping her mouth up to meet his in a kiss. When the kiss ended, he whispered, “There you are.”
Then, before she could respond—if she’d even known how to respond—he shifted, aligning their bodies more surely, leaned in to kiss her long and deep . . . and slid into her. And as he did so, she understood what he’d been waiting for. Not for her to give in or give up, but for her to return to him and be in the moment, with him. With them.
No longer lost in the layers of pleasure, she acutely felt his penetration, felt her inner channel stretching to accept him, tightening around him in a squeeze of welcome that wrung a groan from deep within his chest. The sound of it vibrated through her, making her neurons hum and spark, and making her intensely aware of his size within and without, and the carefully leashed strength that pulsed through him as he hooked his arms behind her, loosely gripped her shoulders, and used the leverage to hold her in place when he began to move.
She should protest, she knew, should assert herself as a partner in their sex, giving back equally rather than allowing herself to be dominated, pinned down, taken. And she would protest, she assured herself. In a minute. But one minute turned to several, then to time untold as he moved over her, inside her, giving her pleasure and taking it in return. Sweat slicked his spine and sides, causing her hands to slip as she touched him, stroked him, her hips pistoning in aching counterpoint to his strokes as heat built to a roar. His tempo increased; she clung to him, buried her face in the crook of his neck, and took. She wasn’t giving anymore, wasn’t thinking about his pleasure; she was beyond that, gone past herself to a mindless place that beat with an ungrammatical chant of, “More, harder, yes, oh, yes, there!” Gods. She didn’t know her own name, didn’t care about anything happening beyond the hard grasp of his arms and the expanding sphere of her own pleasure, which had gone sharp, growing teeth, needs, and demands. “Yes, like that. Please.”
She was begging and didn’t care. He was saying things too, but she could barely hear him over the hammering pounding of the blood in her veins and his body into hers, and the broken gasps of pleasure that streamed from her. Ohyesohyesohyes! Clinging to him, hanging on to him with the knowledge that she’d be lost if she let go, she cried out as the first orgasmic contraction seized her, making her whole body rigid and vising her inner muscles around his thick, heavy length.
He gave a guttural roar that brought her even higher as he thrust and thrust again. Then he seated himself to the hilt within her, pressing hard against her most sensitive spots within and without, bowed his head, and let himself go. His muscles locked rigor-tight as he bowed into her, held her against him, and shuddered his release. Hips flexing, he pressed himself into her harder still, once and again, in an automatic reflex that protracted the echoes of her pleasure.
They stayed locked together, holding hard on to each other, for a long, long time.
Eventually, though, the heat faded to languor and reality returned. And that reality had Jade’s hands staying locked onto his shoulders, and her face remaining pressed against his throat . . . because she didn’t have a clue what to do next, what to say. She would’ve liked to keep things light and playful, as she’d meant to in the very beginning, but somewhere between desire and domination, things had turned serious.
Lucius let out a long, satisfied breath, muttered something about crushing her, and sort of flopped off to one side. Part of her would’ve been relieved if he’d landed facedown and fallen immediately unconscious, as one of her unlamented exes had habitually done after far more lukewarm sex than the room rocking that had just occurred. Lucius, though, propped himself up on one elbow and gazed at her, his expression far more intense than she would’ve preferred. She wasn’t sure what he read there; his expression was guarded and his voice gave away nothing of his inner thoughts when he said, “You okay?”
It was the sort of thing lovers said to each other when they didn’t know what else to say. In this case, though, she knew he meant it, that he truly wanted to know where her head was at in the aftermath of . . . well, in the aftermath. But she didn’t know where her head was at, wasn’t really sure if she was okay or not. The sex had been . . . amazing. They’d connected, pleased each other. But whereas her magic had kindled, flowing within her, his magic hadn’t. There had been no hint of the whirling, tugging sensation she’d experienced right before their transition to Xibalba, and again when she’d been swept into the barrier in his wake. He’d given no sign of sensing anything beyond very, very good sex. Which means that was all it was for him, she thought on a long, slow twist of disappointment.
“I’m—” She broke off, gut icing at what sounded like a cry of pain from outside. “Did you hear that?”
Seconds later it came again, and this time there was no mistaking the sound of a woman’s scream. It was muffled by distance, but carried terror and pain. Adrenaline jolted through Jade. She was moving even before the motion sensors guarding their perimeter went off with a loud whoop of alarm.
“Shit!” Lucius scrambled off the bed and hit the floor hard, yanking on his clothes as he ran. He grabbed her folded clothes from a chair and chucked the shirt and jeans in her direction. “Hurry.” He disappeared into the sitting room; moments later, she heard the snick of the lockbox latches and the metallic clicks of clips being slapped home into autopistols.