“Of course not,” she said quickly, inching her arm up over her chest.
“Then please don’t make that face like I’ve said something unkind.” He trailed a cautious hand down her neck, her shoulder, her arm, memorizing every point and plunge until his fingertips came to rest on her wrist. “I don’t know why you would believe otherwise or why you want to hide away. Every time I look at you, I want to tell you how beautiful you are, Celeste, especially when you’re smiling and your eyes shimmer like starlight.”
“Starlight?” She bit her lip, but there was a hint of that smile he liked so much. “I’m not sure that’s a compliment coming from a knight of the god of dawn.”
“It is,” he said in earnest, not mirroring her playfulness because he needed her to know. “I’m meant to worship at the altar of the sun, but it’s this light that I would be devoted to, if you would let me.”
Celeste took his hesitant hand and placed it on her waist, and then she moved under it, the curve of her hip sliding easily against his fingers as she pulled him close. Her skin was soft even in the places where he could feel a rib or joint as he ran his hand up and down the length of her side. He had failed to ask after any kind of permission to touch these new places, but she wasn’t giving him the opportunity to speak, keeping his mouth occupied.
She hadn’t objected, so as he raised his hand up again, he cupped one of her small breasts, and she arched into his touch, nipple hardening under the caress of his fingertips. Her mouth came away from his and trailed itself down his neck. Reeve hadn’t thought he could come to any more attention, but the press of her lips to his collarbone made him worry his breeches might just tear themselves right off, and he groaned raggedly into the top of her head, more vehemently squeezing her breast.
“Is this all right?” she asked, and her hand trailed down his stomach to brush over his trapped length.
Gods, yes, it was fucking all right. It was so all right that he couldn’t remember the words to tell her, but as he swallowed the nonsense that almost dribbled itself out of his mouth, another thought occurred to him. “I think I should say, I’m not…I don’t have a lot of experience with…this.”
“That’s okay; I’ve done it lots of times,” she chirped, grinning up at him. “In fact, I’ve lost count.”
His voice hitched as her hand caressed him again. “You have?”
“Uh huh, I—” The grin snapped right off her face, and her eyes went wide as her muscles tensed. “Oh, crickets, can you forget I said that?”
“Why in the realm would I want to? I’m relieved.” He sighed and let his head drop. “One of us needs to know what they’re doing.”
Celeste chuckled as her body relaxed beneath him, but his need to reveal more truth bubbled up.
“I should really say that I don’t haveanyexperience with a woman—er, well, not withanyone.”
“Never?” Her hands came to rest on his hips. “Even though you look likethis?”
He shook his head, then squinted. “Well, there was that one time, with the succubus, but I don’t think it counts.”
“A succubus?” Celeste gasped and sat up so fast she nearly knocked her head into his. “How could that not count?”
Reeve’s hand was still cupping her breast, but he pulled it back regrettably as he slipped up onto his knees. He’d been afraid of this, but the truth was bound to come out, so he let it all erupt at once: “Okay, so, the temple had lent a few of us out to guard the Bendcrest prison, and this woman came up to me to ask after directions to the market. She was actually a succubus, but I didn’t know that at the time—that’s sort of how they work, I guess. Anyway, we were just talking, and the next thing I knew…”
Reeve cleared his throat and dropped his gaze away from Celeste’s face, not particularly wanting to admit to the embarrassment, but then his eyes fell on her breasts and they were staring right back at him, daring him to touch them again, so he dropped his gaze lower, and then he was staring at the shadow between her thighs, and that was also doing a kind of staring, daring him to bury his tongue into it. Occupying his mouth would have been a good way to avoid the conversation, but his virtue wouldn’t allow that, and he had no choice but to confess to her face after all.
“And then I found myself in one of the rooms at The Sleepy Salmon with her, and she had me completely naked.”
Celeste didn’t look at all disappointed by his failed morality. Instead, she appeared enthralled. “And then what?”
“Well, that’s the thing—nothing happened. See, she was about to get undressed, and it hit me like an arrow that I didn’t even know her name let alone anything about her. Not like…well, like with you. So I apologized for being too forward and asked her if she’d like to share a meal first, and then perhaps I could meet her parents, if she had them, and then that’s when she revealed the wings and horns and blue skin.”
“Oh, no, you had to kill her after that, didn’t you?”
“Sid was actually outside the room, but she didn’t attack, she just started apologizing for deceiving me, and then she told me I should go back to the jail because she’d been summoned to lure me away so some of the prisoners could be broken out.”
Celeste’s mouth had fallen open. There—there was the disappointment, and he shouldn’t have been surprised, he was bound to wreck something so perfect.
“You’re telling me that a succubus decided to forgo the opportunity to haveyouand instead outed her fellow infernals because you were so sweet to her?”
Was that how it had gone? Reeve shrugged.
“Well, her loss, and lucky me,” she said and grabbed his face, pulling him into another deep kiss. She slid onto her back again, bringing him along with her, and her hand found his veiled cock once more. Instead of a light brush this time, she groped with urgency and slid up the entirety of his length. “Verylucky me, it feels like.”
Celeste’s husky remark gave Reeve a surge of confidence he’d never known, even when battling evil with the certainty he couldn’t lose with the gods on his side. His breeches were unceremoniously cast off, and finally there was nothing between them. Her hand could truly wrap itself around him, her fingers gliding along his length and making him shiver. Surely she couldn’t expect much more if she were going to keep doingthat. He sucked in a short breath and grit his teeth, much too quickly being brought to bliss.
“Wait,” he managed, stilling her hand. “There are things I’m supposed to do first.”
