“I love you,” I murmur to her. I don’t know that she can hear me, and I don’t know that I will be able to say it to her while she is awake. I have never said those words to anybody before. I did not think I was capable of feeling love in this way.
Tap. Tap. Tap.
I wake up, surprising myself with the realization that I was asleep. I must have dropped off with her beside me. Someone is tapping at the door.
“Can you get that, please?”
Ella pads out of bed in her panties and opens the door, still half asleep. Aiden is at the door. He looks faintly surprised as she opens it, then turns around and comes back to bed, crawling back under the covers with me.
“We were going to talk about what happens next,” he says. “I wanted to get your opinion on some things…”
“Sure. Come in. Close the door.”
Aiden steps into the room. There’s a chair by the door, which is where he sits. Ella has more or less disappeared under the blankets by this point.
“Doctor says you should be out of action for a few more weeks,” he says. “I want to send you and Ella somewhere very safe, somewhere you will be under guard, but not underground. I was going to ask if you would be open to that.”
“Can Ethel come?” The question comes from under the blankets.
“Yes. This isn’t something we’ll be doing right away. I need to stabilize the Red situation, but once it’s more under control, I want to send the two of you away.”
“I don’t want to go away.” Ella pokes her head out from under the blankets. “I want all of us together. It’s the only thing that feels right, or safe.”
I am inclined to agree. “She’s right.”
“Having us all in the same place makes it easier for us to be wiped out. It might be better if the three of us set up separate homes, and perhaps Ella could be shared between them…”
“Ew,” Ella gasps. “I’m not going to be sent from one place to another like… no. The people who don’t like us could kill us in three different places if they want to. I think we should build a castle and just be done with it.”
“A castle?”
“Yes. That’s what people used to do, and for good reason. Let’s live in a castle. You’ve got built-in defenses and you can station an army there, and you can have a whole world basically in there. Castles used to have vendors and blacksmiths, and soldiers and all sorts of people. Everyone who was necessary.”
Aiden initially asked the question with a sort of patient indulgence, but as Ella gives a short monologue about castles, I can see the wheels in his head starting to turn. It’s a good idea. Our original home was designed with that philosophy somewhat in mind, but we could really go all out if we wanted.
“What are you guys talking about?” Luke appears in the doorway, opening the door without asking. Rude little shit.
“Castles,” Aiden says.
“You don’t have to lie to me,” he says, offended. “Just say it’s private.”
“We’re actually talking about castles,” Ella says. I slide my arm around her, then down between her legs, cupping her sex. She falls silent as my fingers lightly squeeze her pussy. I use that grip to snug her back against my body.
She lets out a small moan. Aiden’s eyes snap to her in a moment, and Luke’s ears practically perk up. I let my middle finger slide along her underwear-clad slit and circle her clit lightly.
“Is there anything else?” I ask Aiden.
“No,” he says. “Not for the moment. We’ll leave you two alone.”
He gets up and practically ushers Luke out, shutting the door behind them. I like that they’re giving me some time alone with Ella. One of the benefits of everybody feeling guilty about everything is that I, being the one most shot at the current time, take priority.
I also take my time with Ella, slowly pleasuring her through her underwear, circling and stroking and teasing until she is arching her ass back against me, practically begging to be fucked. I am going to have to disappoint her on that score.
“I cannot exert myself,” I tell her. “But I can make you come.”
I slide under her panties and my fingertips dance over her clit, slide down her soaking slit, and push inside her waiting body. The tight grip of her pussy around two of my thick digits is enough to make my cock so hard it hurts. This is going to be painful for me, but I will enjoy it nevertheless.
The first orgasm is not difficult to tease out of her. She is already so wound up, so desperate for release. The erotic energy drawssome of the stress and strangeness of the last twenty-four hours from her. This manipulation of her body is a way to suck some of the metaphysical poison out and reclaim her for myself.
