“Because tonight, when I make love to you, I intend to be able to use all of my fingers to coax you with, lordling. I want to run my hands through that golden hair of yours and feel it on my skin. I want to be able to stroke you and not have my pinky finger dancing about because it’s attached to the one next to it. So yeah, that’s why I’m doing this,” I said softly, making a snip through the stretch of skin between the first two joints. “Why am I wanting us here? Now?
“Think about it, if one damned kiss made the place grow like mushrooms after a thunderstorm, imagine what the hell’s going to happen once we finally do this?” Nodding toward where the Court lay on the mesas above downtown, its spires reaching up for stars it could never touch. “The first time I’m with you, I want it to be between us. No Court, no one else but you, me, and hopefully a cat with a belly full enough he won’t bother us for at least eight hours so I can do everything I’ve ever dreamed about doing to you. Just tell me… yes or no. Because I’m tired of just breathing. I want to have the taste of you on me, on my tongue, in my hair, and if you’re not ready for that, it’s okay. I can wait.”
Luckily I didn’t have my finger anywhere near the shears when Ryder twisted his hand into my hair. I let myself be pulled in close until our mouths brushed, and he whispered into my parted lips, “If you think I’m not going to say yes to you, then you’ve not been paying attention, áinle. For someone who makes his living watching the shadows, you do not see the things that are right under your nose.”
I NEVER got the last bit of skin snipped. It was everything I could do to get the salve on the first cut I’d made before Ryder hooked his fingers into my hair and pushed me down onto the couch. Something hard dug into the small of my back, probably something Newt dragged up into the cushions, but I wasn’t going to complain. Not with the stretch of Ryder’s lean body on me and the concentration I needed to pull his clothes off without tearing anything.
Since I wasn’t so great at the not tearing anything, I resigned myself to having to make sure the pants I gave him in the morning were at least clean.
“Are you sure about this, Chimera?” Ryder lay on my bed, dragged up the stairs with a bit of persuasion and a lot of kisses meant to steal his breath. They’d worked, or at least they looked like they did, judging by the rough pinkness of his lips. Naked, he was a sheath of golden shades against the black sheets, his eyes as bright and vivid as spring breaking through a dismal winter. “Because as much as I need you, it would kill me to know you’re not ready for this. For us. Because once we start this, I’m not going to let go. And you know how long our kind live.”
He wasn’t the only one who couldn’t breathe.
“Never been more sure about this in my life,” I murmured, resting on my knees at the end of the bed to drink in the sight of him. There was a fear in me so great I nearly couldn’t speak, but to appreciate the gift of Ryder in my life, there on my sheets, wasn’t something I could let go by in silence. “I can’t tell you I’m great at this. Relationships and you—you need them. So—”
“We’ll work it out, áinle,” Ryder murmured, reaching for me. “We shall definitely work it out.”
We started slow, exploring each other until all I could taste was popcorn green tea, vanilla, and Sidhe. I found a spot where he couldn’t stand my teeth dragging across his skin—a sensitive triangle along his hip and then its twin on the other side. His fingers and tongue traced my scars and tattoos, and he sighed over the marbled, puckered ribbing on my back and stroked at the ink down my thighs and hip.
He was sleek beneath me when we joined, his back glistening with sweat and his lower lip clenched between his teeth while I took my time with him. Ryder pushed up to seat me, nearly breaking my vow to prolong every enjoyable moment. So I bit the tip of his ear, burying my face in a tangle of metallic gold hair, and chuckled.
“We have all night, lordling,” I whispered, using the tip of my tongue to trace down the scallop of his ear. “You’re the one used to living forever. You’d think you’d be the one with patience.”
His link chimed once from its resting place on the milk crate I had beside the bed, then again, falling into a syncopated dance beat only a stream of messages could make. He went to grab for it, but I stopped him, lightly sinking my canines into his forearm.
“Could be important.” His plea was soft, carrying with it the weight of a Sidhe Lord with a new Court and a lot of responsibilities. “Let me at least look.”
I waited while he scrolled through, then took the thin gold bracelet from his hand, not looking at the screen. “Anyone dead? The girls are okay?”
“No,” he said, making a halfhearted grab for the link. “And yes, they’re fine. The Court is—”
“Far enough away and well enough to take care of their own shit for right now,” I told him, tossing the link toward the pile of mostly whole clothes on the floor. “Right now, it’s just us, remember?”
The slivered moons were our only company when we finally touched our own stars, hitting the zenith of our bodies’ peak after hours of teasing and love. I wasn’t sure who’d fallen first. In the end, it didn’t matter. I plunged down into the sweetness of our blood’s aria, succumbing to the enticing melody he’d offered me from the moment we first met. It was nearly too much, carrying me away from everything other than the bed I shared with a Sidhe Lord who had more heart than common sense.
Inside of me, something shifted, something unfettered I’d not known existed. It reached for Ryder’s soul, his heart, and entwined me through them. I felt him with every breath I took in, had his touch warming my skin even as his fingers left me. I wrapped my fingers around his, my palms pressing the backs of his hands down into the mattress when I took him over the edge, following close behind with every bit of darkness in me fleeing under the light he’d brought with him. Ryder clenched and pulled me in. We were tangled and wrapped around each other until we were slick against each other’s skin and I smelled of his Sidhe scent, happily drowning under his touch.
We crested, then reached for each other again, holding back sleep and the night until our bodies ached and our limbs were too heavy to move, and even then, as we collapsed onto the sweat-dampened sheets, our fingers brushed wherever we could reach of the other and I couldn’t seem to catch my breath, not caring if I ever did.
The silence around us was only broken by our heavy breathing. Then Ryder finally whispered, “I love you. I needed you to hear it. And I don’t need to hear you say it in return, but I needed me to say it.”
I traced circles across his palm, then turned over onto my stomach to peer out through the fall of black-and-purple hair covering most of my face. He did me the favor of pushing it back, tucking a large hank behind my notched ear, and then ran his fingers down my still-damp cheek.
“I think you do need to hear it.” Arguing the point, I continued, “I don’t know if what I feel is love. I’m not a poet. I’m not going to think flowers and sweets when I see you. I’m sorry for that. But what I can tell you is that I’d die for you. I’d avenge you. I’ll defend you and yours, and hell, I’d even do it for free, which says a lot, because I’m a mercenary bastard who kills monsters for a living. If you’ll have me in your life, then I want to be there. But if ever you don’t, tell me, and I won’t darken your world anymore. That’s the best kind of love I can offer you. That I’ll be here when you need me, and I’ll tell you when I think you’re full of shit.”