Page 66 of Sparrow

“Fuck. Arden.”

I stop talking, then. I kiss her deeply, thrusting my tongue into her mouth as I slide in and out of her, my pace slow and patient. I want to soak her in until I’ll never forget the feel of her. Never stop remembering the way she surrounds me and holds me.

I’m patient until the pressure in my back begins to build and I know I can’t wait anymore. And now I move more quickly, my thrusts deeper and harder as I chase the release I need. She meets me thrust for thrust, angling her body to take me deeper and biting my lower lip as she gets closer to her own release. She’s quiet too, but her eyes on me in an intense golden stare that makes me think I might be losing my mind.

The orgasm flies down my spine and through my pelvis and I explode up into her, the intensity taking my breath away. Moments later her body shudders and then contracts, following me over the edge, and she curls around me like a feral thing, sinking her teeth into the flesh of my shoulder.

I want to scream. I want to call her name out to the moon like some sort of wild animal.

But instead I bury my face in her neck and hold her as I fill her up, trying desperately to record every moment of this, from the way she feels to the smell of her neck to the breath of her voice against my temple as she chants my name.

When I wake in the morning I’m on my back and she’s asleep next to me, her head on my shoulders and her breath soft in my ear. And the sun is up.

I close my eyes, trying to drag us back into the dark of the night, where we don’t have to worry about the world around us or its expectations. But I know as I do it that it’s no good.

I’m not magic, and I never have been.

Though if I was, I can’t imagine creating anything better than the tiny girl lying next to me.

When I open my eyes again, though, Mars is standing over us, a wry smile on his face, and I jerk in surprise.

“We’re sleeping,” I say, knowing that I sound cranky.

“So I see,” he says, his smile widening. “But it’s time for you to get up. We have work to do.”

The magic flees the room in the face of this hard logic, and I glare at him. “You couldn’t have waited until we woke up to tell me that?”

This brings a bark of laughter from the man. “Orion, I’ve known you long enough to know that if I wait until you wake up naturally, I’ll be waiting until 2 every afternoon. Let her sleep if you like, but I need you in the shop.”

He disappears as quickly as he appeared, and only then do I remember what Arden and I did last night.

And the fact that neither of us is wearing pants.

I look down, horrified, and am relieved to see that we’re both fully covered by the blanket she put over me last night, and breathe a sigh of relief.

When I look at her, I find that she’s not asleep at all. She’s fully awake, her eyes wide open.

And they’re full of both laughter and mischief.

The little minx heard everything Mars said, and probably clocked my sudden reaction that we were naked under this blanket.

And she pretended to sleep through all of it.

Mars

I’m in the middle of changing a set of spark plugs when Arden’s face appears right next to me under the hood.

I jump in surprise and hit my head, which sends her into peals of laughter. I rub my head and grin at her, remembering when that would have triggered a number of heartfelt apologies and offers to leave the house before she causes more trouble.

I’ll take the sore head if it means I get laughter now instead of apologies.

“Did you actually need something or did you just come to laugh at me?” I finally ask.

She stops laughing, but the grin doesn’t melt off her face, and that’s new, too.

“I’m heading into town. I have some things to do.”

“Okay.” I’m not going to stop her from going into town, and it’s second nature now to let her do whatever she wants, but a split second later, I change my mind. “Wait.”