“He loves her without fear, without limit. It’s something to aspire to,” Lierick agreed. “Very few people would give themselves so wholly, out of fear of the inevitable heartache.”
I swallowed at his words, but I couldn’t make myself look his way.
“And is the feeling mutual?” Zier asked, though there was something more in his tone. I turned to look at the man, who must have been a decade older than Avalon. Hayle had said there was something there, but I hadn’t seen it myself, not really.
“She loves him so completely that you can’t help but believe there would be nothing left for you. But you’d be wrong; Avalon’s capacity for love is endless. If you let her, she’ll love you with just as much devotion as she loves Hayle. She will hold your heart in those hands like it’s the most precious gift she’s ever been given. It doesn’t matter if she holds one or four.”
“She’s not greedy, either. She doesn’t believe that she’s the nexus of our world. She doesn’t mind if we… care about others,” Lierick added, then grinned. “But she does seem to enjoy it if she’s pressed right in the middle.”
I knew he was thinking about Doend, when we’d all gone to bed together. I bit back the groan that bubbled up my throat. It had been the most amazing night of my life, but the regret that came with it had been nearly as intense.
Not regret that it had happened, but regret thatmorehadn’t happened. Maybe I’d missed my opportunity with the Second Line Heir, and maybe it was for the best, but I couldn’t help the yearning.
It was pitiful.
Zier was nodding, oblivious to my inner turmoil. “I might go bathe.” He pushed off the stone, peeling off his shirt and pants as he got to the water’s edge. I noticed Avalon very purposefully trying not to stare. It was almost unbearably cute.
“You would think she’d have her hands full already,” Lierick murmured softly.
I shrugged. “She calls to something inside him. Inside us all. Fate, maybe?” I didn’t fight it too hard, and maybe that was because I’d fallen in love with her across different lifetimes, or maybe it was because my soul had always known it was meant to be hers. I wasn’t so egotistical to believe that I could be the only one she affected like that.
We sat shoulder to shoulder and watched Avie and Hayle goof around in the water. Zier watched them quietly from a few feet away, floating on his back.
Lierick slid his hand to my thigh. “Fate. That seems right.” He swallowed. “Like this.”
I sighed heavily. “Like this.”
“It could all go so wrong,” he murmured.
“Terribly wrong.” A smile tugged at one side of my mouth. “Hayle would say that it would be worth it anyway. That the pain just meant you’d loved.” I still couldn’t look at him.
“And is that what this is? Love?”
I turned now, my gaze meeting his golden one. “It could be, if we let it.”
He leaned closer and brushed his lips across mine, testing if maybe this burning between us was just that, something incendiary that would set us both on fire and then flare out quickly. I knew it wasn’t, even if part of me wished it was.
I kissed him back, pressing hard, sliding my tongue across the seam of his lips until they parted. He made my heart thud in my chest.
“Come on,” he said softly, pulling me off our perch. We moved to a smaller outcropping of rocks, and he didn’t hesitate. His hands hit my chest, and he leaned forward, kissing me harder now, with more desperation. “I don’t know what will happen from this point, but I don’t want to meet the Goddesswithout knowing what it would be like to be yours,” he said against my lips.
My eyes felt too wide. “Here? Now?”
“There might not be a later, Vox.” He pulled back a little, letting me breathe.
I didn’t want to breathe, though. I wanted to be his too. I gripped his ribs, pulling him closer to me, until we were pressed so closely together, nothing could get between us: not daylight, not history, not our future. There was just me and Lierick.
He pushed his hands under my shirt, and I pulled it off. I wanted as little between us as possible while being out in the open, under the warmth of the blue sky and bright sun. I wanted to see the warm rays touch his golden skin.
Goddess, he was beautiful.
I dragged off his shirt too and continued to kiss him, even as his hands went for my pants, loosening them and sliding his hand inside my underwear. Biting back a grunt at the feel of his hand around my cock, I went to work on his own pants. I freed that monster cock and gave it a couple of exploratory strokes.
“Fuck,” Lierick breathed. We were similar heights, so when he spat on his hand and grabbed both our cocks as we thrust against each other…
“Goddess,” I choked out, making him laugh. We kissed and kissed, him holding us both tightly so our cocks slid together, making my balls ache for release. I was going to explode.
Dragging my mouth from his, I flopped my head back against the rock face. “Lierick, I’m going to come,” I groaned.
