I turned to look at him.
“That bewildered lovesick feeling you’ve already got written all over your face,” he said, motioning at me. “It doesn’t get any better. I still feel that way whenever I look at Elara.” He slapped me affectionately on the shoulder, and from him, I didn’t mind it. “I’m glad you’re back, man. Stay as long as you like. Move in here permanently, for all we care,” he said with a laugh. “You know she had that whole guest wing built for you.”
I hadn’t known that, but it did seem like something Elara would do.
“Go on, Eeyore,” he said, giving me a gentle nudge. “We’ll come get you two for dinner.”
I glanced down at my closest friend, grateful for his steady, cheerful, welcoming presence in my life. “I missed you, too,” I told him quietly, and set my hand on his shoulder before following after my wife so I could hold her while she rested.
I couldn’t ask for better friends, and I knew they were exactly what Celeste needed to mend the hole in her heart left by her former friend.
Thiswaslove, I knew it in my soul.
Assoonasthedoor clicked shut, Celeste was on me, practically climbing my body so she could kiss my mouth and unbutton the neck of my shirt.
I tutted at her as I supported her squirming body and mumbled against her lips as she kissed me. “What are you doing? You’re supposed to be resting.”
She deepened our kiss, pressing my mouth open and twisting her hands in my shirt, and I forgot what my protest was for a moment as I lost myself in her. The slide of her lips, the caress of her tongue, the smell of her in my nose. But then I came back to myself enough to realize what she was doing.
“Doveling, you need to rest. Come, let me hold you while you sleep. Today’s travel was a lot.” Not to mention her use of her magic to such an extent. My new wife was sweet and empathetic and generous with her body. She had already spent too much time and physical effort slaking this need for her that had plagued me since our first time together, taking me into her own body to stem this raging desire I’d suddenly developed.
It wasn’t that I didn’t understand physical desire or the sexual nature of romantic relationships. I’d just never seen the point of it. I’d been more or less unaffected by those needs myself. Somehow my own body had become a stranger to me, frustrating and unrelenting in its ability to haunt me within hours of finding completion with her.
Shegrowledin response and popped a thread in my shirt before her fingers managed to release the next button. As much as I wanted to insist she lie down and sleep, my body was already responding to her overtures. “Thisisrestful,” she argued, her panting breaths belying her words. “You’ve been walking around with an erection all day, and the way you looked fighting that demon made me so hot. And then you were so adorable with your friends and that sweet little boy. If I don’t have you right now, I’m going to be very grumpy.”
I very nearly laughed at her ferocity, but I kept it inside, concerned I might cause offense. If she had her own needs, then this was a different story.
She dropped back to the floor and used the leverage to try to push me toward the bed. It was with no small amusement that I acquiesced, allowing myself to be directed to her desired location at the edge of the mattress. The triumph in her eyes as I lowered myself to the bed made every second of waiting for this moment with her worth it. I delighted in her newfound ability to declare what she wanted, and the fact thatIwas what she wanted, even more so.
She was more graceful with her own clothing, stripping off her blouse and leggings until she stood bare, and releasing her wings and antlers to stand before me in all her majestic glory. No longer did she feel the need to keep her wings close to her body, instead flaring them seductively at me with a flicker of interest so obvious it stirred the air in the room. Golden hair twisted back from her face and antlers, falling over golden-skinned shoulders that were rounded with a healthier weight than they’d been when I met her. Lavender eyes surveyed my bare chest from a head held high with more confidence and ease than I ever could have imagined from the tearful darling I’d pledged myself to. I loved her.
Her beauty shone through from the inside out. As gentle and meek as a mourning dove and as fierce and protective as an angel of war, she’d adapted multiple times to difficult changes in her life. She’d shown strength and tenacity I couldn’t even dream of in persevering through multiple kinds of suffering. She was generous and kind, passionate and powerful. She was mine. I let my eyes drift past her beautiful breasts to trace the mark above her wrist that was slowly forming the tree of life, roots stretching toward her hand and branches up her arm and toward her heart.Mine.
“Lovely,” I told her in a whisper. “So lovely.”
I helped her rid my body of the rest of my clothing and lay back to watch her as she put a knee on the bed and climbed on top of me, allowing her to take whatever she wanted and basking in the radiance of her poise and spirit. The intensity of her eyes did something to my insides.
But not as much as the feeling of her taking my aching hardness in her hand and then into her own body, sinking down over me with a flare of ecstasy that I know was reflected in my own expression. I was lost to her. I washers.
The slick, hot grip of her body clenching around my length nearly sent me over the edge immediately, so I gritted my teeth and shut my eyes against the rise and fall of her breasts before me. But I could still hear her quiet moans, her panted breaths. I dug my fingers into the sheets below me, trying to anchor myself in something. Anything. Whatever I could focus on to not let this end yet.
“Victor,” she whispered, her voice colored with her own amusement. “You can touch me.” Her body stilled on my hips, but her fingertips brushed the back of my hands.
I slowly opened my eyes to take her in, like a starved man at a banquet feast, and then brushed the pads of my fingers up her thighs to her hips, up her sides to the swell of her breasts, across her shoulders and down the insides of her wings. Her reaction to each touch was fascinating. I could dwell on each area of her body for hours. But the insides of her wings made her eyes flutter closed in the most delicious way. Her tiny gasp made me lose control. I gripped her hips in both hands and pulled her down against me in a rolling motion as I drove up into her, making her mouth open in a silent scream as her muscles began to tense and flutter around my cock.
I’m yours.
I let my desperate hunger for her take control and began to thrust into her mindlessly. That insanity-causing sensation of her body clenching and tugging as she climaxed around me made me chase the feeling even harder until my lungs were burning and all I could hear was our gasping breath as I filled her again and again. This feverish intimacy served to draw out her climax, and though I hadn’t realized I’d moved, I found myself sitting upright, clutching her tightly in my arms as I drove into her as deeply as I could. The stifled cry of pleasure she made against my chest triggered my own groan as I clutched her tighter and the intensity of my orgasm overtook me like a tidal wave.
I’m forever yours.
Epilogue
Grim
Several Weeks Later
“Sheissafewiththese friends of yours?” my grandmother asks, trying to keep her doubt from her voice.
