“No, Maeve…” Rowan leaned across the table. He still didn’t touch me, but his eyes were wide with concern. “That must’ve been horrible. What do you need?”
What do you need…
If I’d been talking to Corbin or Arthur, they’d be flipping to solution-mode, trying to figure out what the dream meant. Flynn would be making some kind of joke to distract me from the memory. But Rowan knew that laughter couldn’t erase the horror. He only wanted to help me find a way to cope.
Rowan had been through something so terrible, so utterly horrific, it had shaped him into a person who instantly recognized the slivers of that same pain in others, and he tried to give them what he’d never been given. But right now, I didn’t need anything… except Rowan.
I wanted to give him a little of what he needed right back.
I slid out of my chair and walked around the island. Rowan stared up at me, his eyes large, almost frightened, but desperate to help take away the burden I carried.
“I needyou,” I said, and pressed my lips to his.
I expected Rowan to jerk away, but he didn’t. At first, he completely froze, his body stiffening as the warmth of his lips flowed into me. His fear made me bold. I wrapped my arms around his neck, sinking against him, parting his lips and sliding my tongue inside.
He moaned against me as piece by piece the tension in his body unraveled, and he sank into the kiss. His own tonguewound around mine – tentatively at first, and then he became exploratory, softly probing deeper.
So different from Corbin, so gentle and kind. I breathed in Rowan’s unique scent – fresh bread and bright herbs, smells of home and hearth, of earth and embers.
I tangled my fingers in Rowan’s dreadlocks, fanning them out around us, letting them become a curtain that hid our pain. I watched his face as he deepened this kiss and his own eyes flickered open. They saw me watching and the panic leapt into his body, stiffening him, clamping his lips shut.
But I wasn’t going to let Rowan off that easy. I kept kissing him, stroking his face, playing with his hair, pouring everything I had into convincing him that Ididwant to be with him.
Slowly, the tension eased from Rowan’s shoulders. He shuddered against me as he raised a shaking hand to my cheek, his fingers lightly tracing my skin, filled with wonder and awe. Heat rose up in my body, responding to his tenderness, eager and waiting for Rowan to unwrap me like a birthday present he’d waited all year for.
I shuffled forward, straddling Rowan’s chair, pinning him between the chair and the island. Panic flashed in Rowan’s eyes, but it turned to desire as I reached down and placed my hand over his crotch. Under his jeans he was hard, and even without seeing him I could tell that the naked dream I’d had about him was anatomically accurate. Rowan made Corbin look like a woodpecker.
The ache crept across my stomach again, pulsing between my legs, begging for release. I worked my fingers along Rowan’s belt, pulling out the loop, popping the button of his jeans, and tugging on the zipper.
I want to feel him in my hand, stroke him until he loses control, until he stops believing that he isn’t worthy of this.
My heart raced as my fingers grazed the side of his cock, and Rowan shuddered. “Please, Maeve, you can’t, we shouldn’t, if you’ve chosen Corbin…”
“I’m not making a decisions about the coven tonight,” I whisper back. “But right now, Rowan, I choose you. Not for your powers, but because of your heart.”
What the hell am I doing?
I’d literallyjustcome from sleeping with another guy and here I was, making out with Rowan, trailing my fingers over his flour-dusted torso, ripping his pants off so he could take me in a manly fashion.
What I’m doing is driving it out.
All the grief. All the fear.
This was exactly why I came to Briarwood. All I needed to do drive out the grief was this beautiful boy with pain in his eyes and his enormous, glorious cock.
Rowan’s fingers walked up my spine, leaving a trail of shivers across my skin. He buried his face into the side of my neck, nibbling and groaning into my collarbone as I pulled his cock out halfway and wrapped my hand around it.
I stroked him slowly, using the pre-cum on his head as lubrication as I slid my hand along his shaft, feeling the slight curve of it. Rowan’s eyes burned into mine, open the whole time as though he wanted to commit every second we had together to memory.
His hands slid down my shoulders, pushing away the silky robe. It glided down my arms, revealing the tops of my breasts. Rowan reached for them, drawing them out one at a time, his face revenant, worshipful.
He bent down and placed his lips over my nipple, his touch so soft, so light.
A moan escaped my throat and I leaned back and tightened my fingers around his cock. Rowan’s tongue glided across mybud, which was already hard as a pebble. He suckled lightly, sending shivers through my chest.
He moved his lips to the other nipple, licking and sucking with the same aching gentleness, while using his fingers to play with the first. A trail of white flour granules extended across my chest, a swirl of glistening stars in the Milky Way. I dropped Rowan’s cock, unable to keep my grip on it when my body hummed with so much electricity.
Rowan lifted me with surprising ease. I let my arms hang limp and the robe slid completely off me, pooling on the floor at our feet. Rowan’s mouth formed a silent O as his eyes swept over me.
