But he’s wrong, because in this moment I know, without a shadow of doubt, that nothing is over, it’s all just begun.
ChapterThirty-Six
Apair of thick, muscular, leather-clad thighs rest against the outside of each of mine. A hard chest presses against my back, and I realize that I’m not sitting in a chair anymore, I’m sitting on Tarek. He has one arm banded around my waist while the other is bent over my chest so that his fingers can trace gently across my face. Riall is crouched between my thighs, his hands slowly rubbing up and down in languid lazy strokes that I feel…everywhere. Curio is running a blissfully cool rag over every inch of my exposed skin, which is a lot because my towel is bunched up on my hips and just barely covering my cunt, while the top has loosened so much that it’s threatening to slide down. I’m pretty sure Tarek’s arm is the only thing that’s keeping it from dropping to my waist.
My breaths start to come faster, but I don’t know if that’s because I’m coming down from the pain or because of their proximity.
“You’re okay, we’ve got you,” Tarek rumbles, the scruff on his jaw teasing the shell of my ear as he does.
A shiver works through me, but thankfully it’s passed off as a reaction to the antivenom currently soaking through my system. I don’t know what to say or if I even want to say anything. I wait for panic to trickle through me, to signal that it’s time to run, but it never comes. I force myself to think through all the reasons it’d be foolish to cross the lines each of us are balancing on like a tightrope. I don’t know them. I don’t even fully know myself at this point. They’re frustratingly imperious and cryptic, bossy even. Each one of them is depraved—then again, so am I—I don’t know if I can hold that against them completely. They left me that first night, just walked away and resigned me to fight the monsters on my own.
But they’re here now.
I wait for all of the damning evidence I’ve been collecting to bolster my resolve, to dock me to the reality of why getting closer to them is a horrible idea that could never work. But the time I’ve spent with them, what I’ve witnessed and learned, all of it has poked too many holes in my reasons for them to bear the weight of any true protest. Where once my justifications were solid stone, thick and immovable, now they feel like sand in my palms. It’s like I’m watching the pummeled grains of my excuses slip through my fingers to reveal possibilities I couldn’t, or wouldn’t, see before.
Instead of feeling uneasy or threatened as each Scorpion holds or caresses or comforts me, I feel safe, tranquil. I feel so relaxed and comfortable that I could easily close my eyes and drift off to sleep right here and now. It’s been a long morning. I cut down a group of sailors, survived fettik venom, and now I’m cocooned against large, hard bodies, watching the thick impenetrable walls I’ve worked tirelessly to fortify around myself slowly crumble to nothing. If anyone deserves a nap, it’s me. But as Riall’s palms stroke back up the tops of my thighs, the thought of sleep is rapidly replaced with notions of other things.
Warmth travels from the tips of his fingers to settle at my core. I grow wet as the strokes, caresses, and embraces become all that I can focus on. A small whimper tickles up my throat, but I swallow it down as I try and fail to pull myself together. The fettik venom has run its course; however, a different trio of Scorpions are now to blame for the burn currently building in me. I don’t know what I want to do about it, about them.
I could spread my thighs further, offering Riall better access to the intimate parts of me. It would take the barest hint of pressure to guide Tarek’s arm from my waist and settle his fingers over my clit instead. His other hand could easily be redirected from my face to my breast, and if I demanded it, I know Curio would be all too eager to let me taste his lips. It would be no hard feat to turn the comfort they’re currently offering into so much more, but can I do it? Can I push for more from them when I don’t know what I’m willing to give in return? Handing over my body is the easy part; it’s what they might want afterward that troubles me.
As though Tarek can hear my tumultuous thoughts, his hand drops from my face. I hold my breath, all at once eager and tentative about where I want it to settle.
Is he going to make the decision for me?
Will I let him?
Long, thick fingers wrap around my throat, administering the barest hint of pressure as the short stubble of Tarek’s chin scrapes deliciously across the crook of my neck.
“I can practically hear the debate going on in your head right now, Little Dagger,” he tells me, the faintest trace of some blossom I can’t identify mixing with the rich scent of leather and steel that is all Tarek.
I gasp as he nips the lobe of my ear, his teeth sinking in just hard enough to enhance the pleasure. Riall’s languorous strokes up my legs shift, and I feel the slightest kiss of his thumbs as they dip deeper down my inner thighs. His palms slowly rise higher, the sensation whispering a silent promise against my skin as they do. Tarek nuzzles my neck and cheek, and goose bumps rise on my arms. Curio looks on, his pupils now drowning out the hickory tone of his irises until all I can see is the faintest ring of warm brown.
“I can feel your need,” Tarek purrs. “But I can also feel your hesitation.”
I try not to squirm in his hold, but his grasp of my unspoken thoughts and feelings is unsettling.
“We don’t want what isn’t fully and freely offered, and make no mistake, we wantallof you, Auset. If I peel this towel from your body right now, we can give you what you’re craving. We can have you so thoroughly wrung out with pleasure that you’ll lose count of how many times you come, how many times you scream our names, and how many times we’ll have you begging for more. But…” He pauses to trace his lips around the shell of my ear, the light touch teasing me so thoroughly that a pulsing ache starts between my thighs. “I know I’d rather do all of it when I’m certain that you won’t wake up after and try to rationalize or convince yourself it didn’t mean what it did.”
“It’s all or nothing,” Riall agrees, his thumbs inching tantalizingly closer to the lips of my pussy.
Can he feel how hot and wet I am?
“I’ll show you what it means to be one of us—whenyou’re one of us,” Curio concurs, licking his lips and dropping his eyes down my body like he’s already marking the path he’ll take when they finally get what they want.
My chest rises and falls rapidly with need. It’s hard to think past the haze of desire that’s coursing through me, but I know they’re right. I shouldn’t be talking myself into leaping off the cliff, hoping that the rocks below don’t break me beyond saving. If this is right, then I should dive off headfirst because I know I won’t fall, I’ll fly. Still, a small part of me hates that they’re telling me no. It’s just so typically arrogant of them, even though, in this instance, their argument is sound.
Fucking Scorpions.
“Now,” Tarek continues as he runs the tip of his nose up the side of my neck.
Now he’s just being a shit.
“Curio left a set of rinds for you on your bed. Go put them on,” he orders, and it’s exactly what I need to snap out of my lust-filled daze, because now I’m back to wanting to punch him in the face.
“Any particular reason for yourcommand?” I snip, and I can feel his quiet laugh not only in my ear, but against my back.
“One of our contacts has some information. We’ll be meeting them to see what it is,” he answers smoothly, but I hold my breath at his words.
