“You don’t have to tell me.” I take another sip. “I have to ask, since when was your Nexus like that? You seemed different and almost like my Nexus when Onyx’s father tried to kill me outside the academy,” I question.
He flicks my nose. “We aren’t being serious tonight.”
“And you say I’m secretive,” I mutter, but I can’t help but smile at him.
“You already know the answer to that, Gwen.” He moves on quickly. “I like seeing you smile; it makes you so enchanting I can’t look away.”
I smile brighter at him, but then the barman interrupts, taking payment and giving Aleksander his second beer. We drink everything before Aleksander slides off his stool and wraps his hands around my hips and lifts me off the stool. My body burns at the contact as he lowers me down, only an inch of space between us. “Now, I promised you dancing. I like this song.”
I don’t recognise the song or the heavy beat as he leads me downstairs, straight onto the dance floor. There must be two hundred people around us, but I don’t notice them because Alek is all I see. He pulls me to him, pressing my body against his, and he moves, and damn, he can really move. My Nexus preens in my mind, rubbing around like a cat pressing against the wallsof my mind as I dance with him and feel very inexperienced at it in comparison. He clings to my body with his hands, touching my waist, my hips, my back and making me burn with need. He never leaves much distance between us. I love it.
I lose myself in him, in the music, and for a long time, it feels like I’m free. Like the world has faded, along with all the responsibility I’m swallowed in. I lean my head on his shoulder after a while, a light sweat gleaming all over my skin, and then I meet his eyes. Alek presses his nose against mine before pulling back. I thought he might kiss me…but he doesn’t. I shake my head at him and step back before walking away. The back of the room is full of people in booths, and I eventually find one at the back, cloaked in shadows. Alek follows me, pulling the thick curtain closed behind him.
“What’s wrong?” he asks, worried. I don’t sit, choosing to stand next to the wall, my heart racing. “You could have kissed me, and you didn’t.” I sigh.
“That’s what is worrying you?” He steps closer. “Do you have any idea what kissing you is like? It feels like a slope, one that is going to end up with me deep inside you in the middle of a club.”
“Sometimes I feel like you’re not into me.” My breath comes out hard and fast. “And would that slope be so bad? I want you, and I don’t want to hide that truth anymore.”
“Into you.” My cheeks heat as he presses against me, looking down at me as I arch my body into his. “I want us to talk. A long, complicated conversation about our past. When we firstactuallymet. The things that you do not remember, but as time goes on, I’m tempted to say fuck it all and just be with you.”
His hands brush against my breasts, over my hard nipples, and a moan slips out of my mouth. His hand eventually slides up to my neck, and I arch my head to look into his eyes. Fiery desire burns in them, and I can’t look away. His hand tightens on my neck. “No, Gwen. I’m notinto you, I’m fucking obsessed. Iwant you to be breathless under me, begging for more with every second that passes, and watching it slide in and out, both of us endlessly chasing oblivion.”
“Then let’s chase.” I breathe, touching his chest. I move my hand down his chest, to his tight trousers and the hard length of him I can see before I even feel him. I stroke him once, and he groans. I know he wants us to have more time, but I just want him. I’ve wanted Aleksander so long now, and we never seem to have enough time. “Don’t push me away. I want you, mate.”
“Fuck it.” He slams his lips onto mine, and the world blurs away until it's just us. Until there’s no music humming against my skin anymore or the distant sounds of other people dancing, enjoying themselves a moment away. I should be embarrassed, I should want this to stop when we are not alone, but I don’t. I can only feel Aleksander vibrating against my soul, because it’s just him. It’s just him inside my head, in my soul, connected to me in a deeper way than any mortal connection. We began in the stars and we are destined to be one.
His big hands roam across my body until he gets to the edges of my skirt, and he pulls back. There is a question in his eyes, one that doesn’t need words. “Don’t you dare stop, Aleksander.”
“Gwenieve, there isn’t a God who could stop me from claiming you. There is just you and me.” He tugs at the edge of my skirt, pushing it up a little bit at a time. “Do you know how often I’ve fallen asleep dreaming of you, what you will look like under me? What every inch of you tastes like? I’ve dreamt of you, begged my dreams to stop haunting me with visions of you that I couldn’t have. Now? I don’t want to stop until you’re wrapped around me, Gwen.”
“There’s a lot of people just outside that curtain,” I whisper, not stopping him as he pushes my skirt further up, his eyes taking in my every reaction. “Someone could walk in.”
“Then they die for seeing what is mine.” He growls, pulling me tighter against him, closing any space that possibly could be left between us. There’s no hesitation in his eyes, and it’s everything I didn’t know I needed to see. Aleksander wants me, accepts me for who I am, and he has never once betrayed me. Lust and desire are one thing that is easy between us right now, but trust? We have earnt it, I think, and this, right now, is our reward. I can’t believe that once I never trusted him, that I thought he was dangerous and terrifying and everything that I didn’t want. But the truth was, I did want him. I’ve always wanted him. Now I get to have him, which almost seems unbelievable except for the fact he is rock hard against my stomach, and he isn’t pushing me away.
Alek picks me up so easily, like I weigh nothing, and sits me on the edge of the circular table inside the booth. He slowly pushes me back so I’m lying under the hanging glass light, which is red and dim, just illuminating the booth enough so he can see me. I prop myself up on my elbows, watching him as his eyes run up me, my hair falling over my shoulders.
“I like you like this,” he admits, tugging his bottom lip between his teeth as he undoes the buttons of his shirt until it hangs loose over his shoulders.
I arch an eyebrow as I run my eyes down his chest, down his abs, and down some more. “I like it when you take off your trousers.” His lips twitch in amusement, and I smile back at him.
“Not yet.” He pushes my skirt up, his hands stroking up my thighs, heat spreading all the way through me, making my head dizzy with need for him. It’s crazy how much you can want someone and burn for them for such a long time. When they finally touch you, it feels like an inferno. I’m going to explode from Aleksander touching me, and we have barely just begun.
He stares down at me, seeing that I’m wearing no underwear underneath this dress as he finally rolls it up to my waist. Hemust be able to see how much I want him, how he hasn’t even touched me yet and the evidence is clear, right before his eyes. A low growl hums out of his throat as he takes me in, every inch of me, and I almost want to blush. A shy part of me wants to hide from him, but when he looks up, straight into my eyes, I relax completely. “You’re beautiful, my mate. Spread out on this table, only mine to have. Just how I like you.” His tone changes, slipping into a more commanding tone I recognise from when he commanded my moves in class, when he was my tutor and I had to do what he told me to do. “Don’t move.”
I shiver as he leans over the edge of the table, over me, his eyes locked with mine and daring me to challenge him. He roughly pulls my legs apart, and I gasp.
“Aleksander,” I breathe, half-begging, half-desperate and maddening by the second. He knows exactly what he is doing to me as he smirks.
“I like it when you say my full name. I never told you that because I know what you’re like. If I told you that you calling me by my name makes me nearly come, you’d be doing it all of the time in every inappropriate situation.” I damn well will be now. “Every time you say it, it’s like you’re teasing me. Fuck, it kills me. Do I drive you to madness too, Gwen?” I nod my head as his thumbs run up the apex of my thighs. He’s so close to my core, and I feel like begging him to move his hands. He doesn’t. His hands just resting on either side of my core, not touching me, but so, so close.
“Mateis worse. When you call me your mate, I lose it,” he explains so calmly as my heart races. “I want you to call memateas you come on my fingers.”
I nod once, unable to even get the words out of my mouth. He’s so demanding. Controlling. I don’t know what I expected him to be like, but I’m a little surprised he’s like this. I groan as he presses one kiss to my thigh and to the other. A low growlechoes out of my throat. “I am not appreciative of all the teasing. You’re mean.”
“Unfortunately for you, I love teasing. Now behave…” He is back to that commanding voice, and Gods, I love it. He presses his hand down on my stomach to stop me from getting up and kissing him, teasing him right back. “And I might reward you.”
He runs his fingers up my wet slit in one smooth movement that nearly has me toppling over the edge into an orgasm. He doesn’t make me wait long, his thumb moving to my clit and running one circle around it. Waves of pleasure ache through me and radiate down my spine. Gods above, I want him inside me. Alek doesn’t let up from the soft, slow pressure he gives me, never letting it turn to something more, just relentless in his torture. “I want more.”
