She didn’t want to say more, but with her body urging her in the way it was, andhisbody doing whatitwas, Alashiya knew it wasn’t the responsible thing to ignore the elephant in the room — even if she was the only one who could see it.
“And if you’re asking when the last time I had a partner was, then—” She cleared her throat and maintained eye contact with the hard line of his clavicle. “I had two boyfriends and we did— things. But I’ve not— I’ve been waiting to…”
Warm fingers firmly cupped her jaw. They tilted her head back and up, forcing her to look into the dragon’s incredulous gaze. The movement made the sides of her robe slip until they rested on the upper swells of her breasts.
Taevas’s gaze darted across her features when he rasped, “You’re avirgin?”
“Is that a problem?” she demanded, stiffening her spine.
Taevas looked like he was trying to piece together a particularly challenging puzzle in the dark. “It’s not aproblem,”he answered after an amount of time that suggested it was, in fact, aproblem.He looked pensive. Uneasy, even. “I’m more concerned with thewhyof it.”
Feeling altogether exposed, she huffed, “I don’t see why that’s any of your business.”
She thought the mood had been pretty thoroughly slaughtered there on the kitchen counter, but Taevas didn’t seem to agree. Despite the almighty frown that pulled at his mouth, his hands began to travel again. They slipped into the folds of her robe to slowly expose her chest an inch at a time.
“I heartily disagree,naine,”he rumbled in that deep, stirring bass. “As the man who intends to have, at minimum, his fingers inside you by the end of this night, I believe it is very much my business.”
Mood’s definitely not dead,she thought, painfully aware of the whisper-soft drag of his fingertips against the curve of her breasts. The image of Taevas’s night-dark fingers sliding between her thighs made her cunt clench with the echo of the previous night’s orgasm.
Compared to her flushed skin, the summer air felt cool on her suddenly bare chest. Taevas’s gaze dropped. He hissed something low as he skimmed the very tips of his fingers over her puckering nipples.
A string of muttered words, unknown to her, were finished with a growled demand. “Tell me. If it’s dislike that made you avoid it, I need to know. If it’s past experiences, I need to know. If it’s because you were saving it for—” He sucked in a deep breath, the muscles of his powerful jaw flexing hard. “I really fuckingneedto know.”
Was it the fact that it’d been nearly a century since another person had touched her with desire that made even the simpleaction of his thumb brushing the peak of her nipple painfully erotic or was it justhim?
Not knowing what to do with her hands, she dropped them to the edge of the counter, which she clutched so hard her blunt nails sank into the gritty particle board on the underside. “I wasn’t exactlysavingit. It just didn’t happen when there were other people my age still around, and then there were only rangers, and I thought, well, if I’ve waited this long, I might as well try to make it mean something and—Oh!”
Taevas cupped her breasts. They nearly overflowed even his large hands. “There is no good or bad reason to do or not do something with your body,” he said, thumbs stroking her sensitive skin with exquisite slowness. “But I need to know your boundaries, my Shiya. I need to know what you will and won’t allow, because if it was my choice, I’d give you everything.”
He hovered his lips over hers, stroking back and forth in the suggestion of a kiss. For someone who was so hard-looking, the dragon was shockingly tender with her. His hands were firm but gentle as he slowly rolled her nipples between his fingers and thumbs, and when he kissed her, it was the most delicate, sipping kind.
It was easy to get swept under the spell. It might not have been if he was terribly demanding, if he grabbed and pinched and thrust his tongue into her mouth. There was passion in that and a certain thrill when she considered it, butthis…Alashiya couldn’t escape the feeling that she was being molded in expert hands. She didn’t want to.
She couldn’t say what else she wanted from him, but she knew without a doubt in that moment that she needed to know what it was to beadmired.
Alashiya forced one hand away from the edge of the counter. Placing it on the thick cords of his neck, she traced the throbbing pulse she discovered. His hitched breath stuttered against her lips.
He’s leaving at the first opportunity. I’ll never see him again. Imay never even get another commission. Shouldn’t I take the chance while I have it?
All things wither. This moment was fleeting; the lushness of sensation was ephemeral. Perhaps she wasn’t quite ready to take the final step, but what harm would it be to explore him,them,in the moments she’d been granted?
“I want you to touch me,” she whispered.
One of Taevas’s hands slid into her damp hair. “Thank you, gods.”
To be kissed by a dragon,reallykissed, was to be devoured. Alashiya discovered this when Taevas tilted her head back and set upon her like a starving man, his lips and teeth and tongue meeting her own in a luscious dance. All thoughts of the future were swept away as sensations took their place.
Her attention bounced back and forth between their mouths, the scent and taste andfeelof him, and the way sparks of electricity sizzled beneath her skin whenever he slowly pinched and rolled her nipple. Pressure built low in her stomach with each firm turn.
Just when the feeling bordered on true discomfort, he switched to the other side, starting the process all over again until her breasts felt heavy and hot and too sensitive. She made a small sound in her throat when his fingers finally slid away to tickle the deep valley between her breasts.
Separating their mouths with a lingering, restrained nip of his fangs, Taevas grated, “I’ve seen the divine in these breasts. Gods help me, I’ll never be the same again. I want to lay my head here and die a happy death.”
She’d always viewed her heavy chest as more of a nuisance than anything, but when he looked at her like that, she suddenly didn’t care about back pain or sewing in extra support in her clothing.
Taevas grabbed her hand from his neck and gave it a lingering kiss. Giving her a molten look over the ridge of her knuckles, he ordered, “Lean back for me.”
Under that violet gaze, self-consciousness didn’t exist for her. She didn’t hesitate to do as he asked. Alashiya placed her trembling hands behind her, heedless of the dozens of jars and containers arrayed against the wall, and arched her back.
