From the backs of his hands, scales continued up his outer arms, connecting to the lines behind his shoulders. As Dusk stripped with unabashed grace – his silk cobalt thong coming down also – Layla saw how those midnight ridges curled in over his hips, diving to his groin and ending just shy of his cock. Which was well-proportioned and quite aroused, the same blue-grey as his inner thighs.
Dusk caught her gaze, holding it with a riveting presence. It was the first time Layla had seen him fully nude and blushing furiously, she turned away. But she could feel his body as he moved close, not touching her but lifting his hands to the white tux jacket and sliding it from her shoulders. She could feel the deep passion of his touch as his fingers slipped across her collarbones, gathering his jacket from her skin. Standing behind her, he laid the jacket carefully down on the chaise, before his hands slipped to her waist.
With a slow glide, his hands eased up over her hips, palming her sides as he gathered the fabric of her top and slid his hands up beneath it. Pleasure washed through Layla at his touch. His pleasure; her pleasure – the pleasure of the slow, deft slide of Dusk’s smooth hands up her skin. Layla didn’t know where she stopped and he began as she smelled oranges and rainwater in the cavernous night. Dusk’s energy held hers with a smooth ripple and Layla sighed, letting it sweep her as he slid her shirt slowly up. Slipping his thumbs beneath the built-in bra, he eased his hands up the outside of her breasts.
And then her arms raised, her top coming up and off, shed to the floor.
Dusk’s hands smoothed back down her arms, cupping her breasts gently and making her sigh before sliding down beneath the band of her yoga pants. Palming her skin, he slid his hands down, shedding her pants to the floor and helping her step out of them, along with her black flats. Easing up, he let her feel the sleek deliciousness of his skin, the ridged hardness of his serrated scales, and the firm hardness of other things against her body. Palming her waist again, his hands so hot now yet gentle with strength, he slid his fingers slowly down inside the band of her lace thong.
Corralling her with one hand at her hip, his other hand continued its glide down and in, stroking over her low belly. His fingers pressed deep, massaging her, before he slid them down over her mons. Gliding his fingers down, his middle finger slid sweetly into her cleft, though he didn’t enter her with his fingers, just cupped her close.
Moulding his hand to her sex and his body to her back, he breathed by her neck, pouring a deep rumble of passion through Layla. She cried out softly; instantly throbbing and wet. With a soft smile and a sweet rub of his fingers, he kissed her neck gently, then moved his other hand from her hip – sliding her thong down and letting it fall to her feet.
Holding her hip and corralling her close, he began to stroke her slowly with his fingers between her legs. Layla’s breath caught as she surrendered to it, leaning back into him and winding her hands up around his neck. He continued to stroke her, slipping his fingers over her sweetly; exploring every lip and crevasse, though still without entering her. Breathing hard and fast now, Layla sighed as he found her clitoris, as he teased it with sweet, slow strokes. Sliding his hand up form her hip, he cradled her ribs, then her breast; rolling her nipple gently between his fingertips as he stroked her slowly below.
His fingers were so deft. Layla gasped with pleasure in his arms, undulating, feeling him so close. No lover she had ever been with had known what he was doing as much as this, and she undulated hard in his arms as he heightened her pleasure with his hands, knowing how far to take her but arresting it just shy of completion. Layla cried out, needing him, needing release, feeling how wet she was below as she shuddered against him in delicious agony. With a soft smile at her neck, Dusk kissed her gently – and then stroked her with one last lovely glide before turning her in his arms.
Breathing hard in the misty enclosure, power and sexual heat rushed through Layla as she came to face her bound lover. Looking up, she saw a beautiful mystery in his dark sapphire eyes as he gathered her close. Their bodies eased together beneath the blossoms and starlight, enormous blooms unfurling around them in the midnight hour with an intoxicating scent. Inhaling, Dusk’s eyes closed as he set his forehead to Layla’s, and she was aware of a deep, thrumming vibration that moved through his body as he breathed.
There was no rush here tonight; there was no hurry. Dusk meant to take his time with her tonight and Layla found herself absorbed in his lower-than-sound sensations, feeling them carry waves of his emotions to her. Fear, calm, passion; awe. Her body thrilled where her bare breasts touched his sculpted chest, her hips pressed close to his with his hands cradling her low back.
Breathing deeply, serenely, Dusk’s lips moved to her ear.
“I feel you,” he murmured. “Ever since we were bound together. I feel you like a hot desert sky in my body; like a deep midnight canyon in my mind. I feel sand and wind, and the currents of the dark earth moving inside you. I feel the slow eons of time and the fast fury of the sand-funnel. You’re like music inside my body, Layla. I feel what you are… and it holds me so fast.”
Layla’s breath stopped; her heart skipped a beat. Intoxicated by the moment, she moved close. Smooth as satin, Dusk’s skin slipped over hers, touching from groin to chest. With a sigh, his strong arms clasped her closer – her heart pounding from the deep ripples passing through him. Layla passed her lips over his chest, feeling that amazing sensation of their togetherness.
“What do you think I am?” She asked.
“Incredible,” he breathed. “You are incredible, Layla Price. And I am so lucky… to be bound to you.”
Setting his smooth lips to her shoulder, Dusk kissed her, gently. Tears rose in Layla’s eyes and her heart clenched, feeling this gift of solace and love he gave her tonight. No matter their relationship by day, no matter how they had to be in the coming weeks, she was grateful for him. A hard lump rose in her throat and she slid her hands up to cup his jaw.
“I love you, Dusk Arlohaim,” she breathed.
“I love you, too, Layla Price,” he breathed as he pulled back, gazing deep into her eyes.
And then he kissed her.
His lips pressed against hers; soft and slow, opening her body to his vibrations. Layla opened her lips and her heart at the same time, letting him take control with his soft licks and rumbling pleasure. His skin slid over hers as they kissed, impossibly smooth; his hardness pressed against her hip, ready and full. His hands gripped her, so sure, so certain – and so loving.
It was everything Layla wanted, everything she needed tonight. As she surrendered to Dusk’s kiss beneath the starlit dome, she suddenly felt whole. With strong hands, he guided her gently down beside the pool, his thrumming passion sweeping her. And as she lay back beneath him on the firm stone, Layla finally released her tension from the past weeks. She released everything as she wound her legs up around his muscled hips, feeling tiny ridges of midnight scale press intoxicatingly into her tenderest flesh.
For a moment, they paused together. Gazing up into his face, seeing Dusk’s eyes burn hot like stars, so impossibly bright, Layla felt infinity. An endless pleasure rolled through her as he breathed, his slow thrumming shuddering everything inside her. She felt suddenly like she wasn’t upon the earth but somewhere in the stars, feeling the wild, slow dance of the universe.
And then he pressed inside her – filling her with that slow, thrumming pleasure.
Filling her to the brim with the sound and feel of underground rivers and ageless time and diamond-bright stars, Dusk penetrated Layla with the passions of the unseen cosmos. She cried out, arching against him, feeling time pause as they breathed together at the height of his thrust, feeling infinity expand around them in an endless unfurling. Dusk gazed down at her and she saw him feel their Bind, his eyes sparking impossibly bright as a wash of light poured through his body. Layla felt it too; a slow pulse of gold and diamond energy that bound them together from the seat of their beings – luminous and wild.
With a deep mystery, Dusk began to move to that slow rhythm. Layla’s breath caught as she stared up at him, feeling him. He was moving, but it wasn’t so much him that was moving as it was the cosmos moving him; moving them both. She fell into that dark passion, that endless churn, and as he drove deeper inside her, she felt her magic become unbound. Coiling up from the deeps with glittering diamond-gold eyes and a wave of slow fire, it made them both shudder. Dusk thrust harder as Layla gripped his hips with her thighs – winding herself around his strong body as they both cried out in deep pleasure.
Dusk gasped as he fell to his elbows. Cupping a strong hand behind Layla’s neck, he trapped her to his chest as he fucked her deeper, harder; slower. Layla cried out as she bit his chest, passion coring her as Dusk flooded her with his vibrations, losing himself to the pleasure of the earth. They fucked hard, and deep, Dusk growling with sub-basso tremors as he thrust into her again and again, changing the position of his hips to drive himself in with a rolling thrust that undulated his entire body. The uncoiling of his Dragon drove him, and Layla felt it expand like some massive thing, filling the crystal bath-house and driving far into the earth. As Layla cried out to feel him so massive and strong inside her and all around her, Dusk roared from the seat of his being.
From the seat of his power.
Thunder shuddered the bath-house; the thunder of the mountains. Thunder shuddered the night around them; the thunder of stars going supernova. Thunder shuddered everything inside Layla and her Dragon was suddenly roaring, pushing them both. She rode Dusk’s power and he rode hers, slamming into her deep and hard until their climax exploded out in a powerful wave of energy. Crystals full of diamond-gold fire burst out into the air around them, scattering across the stone as Layla screamed with pleasure, biting Dusk’s shoulder and convulsing as he thrust deep inside her one final time – releasing at last.
With a gasp, he came crashing down, trapping her beneath his body as he shuddered – on and on and on. Layla laughed. She couldn’t help it. Inside her mind were only stars, and inside her body was only pleasure, and inside her heart was only love, so big and expansive and warm with golden-bright light. It was bliss; pure bliss. As Layla laughed, with a rumble and a cough, Dusk laughed, too.
