Joss

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He didn’t stop. He kissed me, and this time I threw myself into it. I opened myself to it. I knew there was…more…coming after the kissing, and I welcomed it with an admittedly not-small amount of trepidation, but I knew Lucian wouldn’t rush me through it. I wanted this. I wanted to kiss him and let the kiss morph into the next thing, and the next, and let Lucian guide me where I knew I wanted to go, but was afraid of getting to.

He kissed me, and he began letting his hands wander. I lay beneath him, welcoming the hard heavy weight of his strong body above me, and the touch of darkness was gone, the shreds of reminders that had assailed me last time were gone. The memory was there, I knew what had happened and would never forget it, but I also knew Lucian wasn’t him. This wasn’t that. This was new, and beautiful, and I deeply, desperately wanted it.

I shook with want for it.

I trembled with desire. His hands skated under my T-shirt over my belly, and I lost my breath for the ache of anticipation of his touch on my flesh. When his palm skated over my bra, I murmured with appreciation. And when he traced beneath the underwire and around to the edges of the cups, I bit down on his lip and sighed. He laughed, and tugged the straps down. I arched my back, pushing my breast into his hand as he cupped me over the bra, and then, while my spine was arched, he reached up under me and freed the clasps.

I pushed him away, sat up, my eyes hot on his, and ripped off my shirt and threw the bra away, breathing hard with the ache of desire, shaking all over. I was topless in front of him, and my breasts swayed and lifted with my ragged breathing. My nipples puckered into hard thick points under his hungry gaze.

“Joss…Jesus—you are so fucking perfect.” His voice was ragged, breaking. “So beautiful.”

He reached out a hand, his fingers trembling. I bit my lip and held my breath as his palm made contact with my breast, and then I arched into his touch, moaning as his calluses scraped rough against my sensitive nipples.

“Your tits, Joss—they’re…”

I sagged back to the mattress, his touch following, his hand caressing my breast. “What, Luce? What are they? Tell me.”

“Your tits are so perfect they make me crazy.”

“My tits make you crazy?” I wasn’t sure who was in control of my mouth, but I liked her; this was the free, unburdened, unafraid Joss who could and would do and say anything, everything. “Crazy how?”

“Crazy like I want to…” He pressed his lips to my stomach. “I want to kiss them, and lick them, and worship them.”

I arched my back and brought his face between my tits. “Please, Luce. Show me.”

He fastened his lips around my nipple, and his tongue flicked the hard nub until I gasped, and then he moved to the other one and did the same, and his thumb caressed the damp, erect flesh his mouth had just left. I moaned as he worshipped my breasts with his mouth, and his hands. I cupped his head and arched into his touch and gloried in how wanted and beautiful and safe I felt under his attention.

He lifted up, gazing at me. “Joss…god. You’re so responsive.”

“You make me feel things I didn’t know were possible.” I feathered my fingers through his hair, possessive, and affectionate. “I love your long hair. Don’t cut it, okay?”

“I don’t plan on it.” He reached up and toyed with the end of one of my dreadlocks. “I love these.”

“Oh, don’t worry, those aren’t going anywhere.” I stroked one. “They remind me of my dad. He had dreads, too. Longer than mine, and thicker. I was thirteen when he took me to get these done.”

Lucian smiled, and then his gaze went serious. “Joss, I—I love a lot more about you than just your dreadlocks.”

My breath caught. “You do?”

He nodded. “I’m falling in love with you.” He breathed a sharp sigh after the words emerged, head hanging momentarily, as if saying them had been a terrifying act of bravery. “I have been, since…since the moment you looked up at me as I was carrying you up here.”

I felt myself melting. “Lucian…I’m—me too.” I owed him more than that; I swallowed hard, sucked in a deep breath, understanding for myself now why it had appeared so difficult for Lucian to say this. “I’m falling in love with you, too.”

“Would you…think less of me,” Lucian said, each word hesitant, “if I admitted that falling in love with you is fucking scary?”

I reached up and wrapped my arm around his neck and pulled him down to me into a fierce embrace, burying my nose in the side of his throat. “No, Lucian. It’s scary for me too. I don’t think less of you. More, if anything.”

We were skin to skin from the waist up, bare together, pressed together. I clung to him, and we breathed together, and I felt his heart hammering in his chest, like mine was. I pulled my face away, and he lifted up. Our eyes met, and the desire I saw in his gaze, all for me, melted me and set me on fire all at once.

A hunger for him ignited. I wanted to feel his skin under my hands. I wanted to hear him moan. I wanted to feel him touch me, and I wanted to know what his release looked like.

I brushed the pad of my thumb across his lips. “Luce…can I…can we take this a step at a time?”

“Of course, Joss. I don’t want to rush you. I don’t want to rush this. I want it to be perfect.”

I smiled up at him. “It is perfect.” I rubbed my palm over his chest. “I just, I want you to know that I want this, that I want more, but I just…I want to go slow. I want to remember it. I want to savor it. I’m not going to stop us this time, I just…”

He touched my lips. “You don’t have to explain, Joss. I’m all in, however you want, whatever you want. It’s all for you.”

I smiled at him. “No, Luce, it’s all for us.”

“The pace we take is all about you, is what I mean.”

I just breathed and gazed up at him, desire pooling inside me, courage building. I knew what I wanted, but convincing myself to just ask for it was almost as difficult as convincing myself to call Dru had been. I caressed his shoulders, his back, my heartbeat quickening as I traced my fingertips around the waist of his jeans from the small of his back to the fly, where I paused.

“I was hoping we could start over where we left off?” I whispered.

He smirked. “I’m hoping you don’t mean me with a broken nose and you crying.”

“Don’t make fun of me,” I murmured, frowning even as I fought a smile. “It’s really hard for me to ask for things.”

He lost all levity instantly. “I wasn’t making fun, Joss, just teasing. We can do whatever you want.”

I closed my eyes and breathed. “Sorry, I just—I guess my sense of humor might need work, huh?”

He laughed. “Yeah, mine too. That probably wasn’t very funny.”

“Don’t stop teasing me, okay? Your whole family makes fun of each other all the time, and you all have so much fun with it. Even when…even before Mom and Dad died, we weren’t like that. Dad was always very serious, and Mom was quiet as a mouse, and they always treated me, even as a little girl, like a miniature adult. They spoke to me like they would one of their friends. They didn’t tease, not each other, or me.”

Luce frowned. “Damn, babe, that sounds…miserable.”

I laughed. “It wasn’t, though. It was what I knew. We were serious and quiet. It was just the three of us, and we were just comfortable with each other in long silences.”

Luce nodded. “I can definitely see how we might be somewhat overwhelming to someone with your background.”

“It’s like living in a circus,” I said, laughing. “Or in a sitcom.”

Lucian flopped to his back on the mattress, laughing. “Or a sitcom about a circus.” He snickered. “Does that make Bast the ringleader? The twins would definitely be the clowns.”

I rolled toward Lucian, my breasts draping against his chest, my fingers trailing down his torso from diaphragm to navel. “Can we go back to my original statement?”

Humor drained out of him, replaced by molten desire. “About picking up where we left off?”

“Before I panicked and ran away like a coward.”

He reached up and palmed my cheek. “Don’t, Joss. You ran because you were scared and overwhelmed and upset. And I didn’t handle the situation right. I should have been more understanding, should have understood better why you were so hesitant.” His eyes didn’t leave mine, and the sincerity I saw there was breathtaking, putting a hot lump of throbbing emotion in my throat. “That situation is past, Joss. It’s over. You’re here, now.”

“We’re here, now,” I whispered.

“Exactly.” He ran a hand down the outside of my arm, and then to my bare waist; I leaned away from his body to allow him access to my breasts. “Where was it, precisely, you wanted to pick up?”

“Well…” I breathed out shakily, and reached for the fly of his jeans, unsnapping the button and then slowly lowering the zipper. “I would have to start here.”

His nostrils flared and he sucked in a sharp breath. “I see.”

I paused, after I had his fly open, took his hand in mine and pressed his palm against my breast. “Don’t stop touching me, Lucian. Please. Your touch gives me courage.”

“You need courage?”

I nodded. “I’m terrified right now.”

“You don’t have to be scared, Joss. This all about what you want.”

I exhaled tremulously as he rubbed a gentle thumb over my hardening nipple. “I am scared, but I want this. I want to touch you, but I’m still…just nervous.”

“And me touching you like this,” he said, caressing my breast, lifting its significant weight in his palm, “gives you courage to touch me the way you want to but are nervous about?”

I nodded. “Exactly.”

He pressed a kiss to my shoulder, and then to my throat, and the valley where my breasts sloped away. “Then I shall give you all the courage you need.”

“How noble of you, kind sir.”

“I live but to please, fair maiden.”

I laughed. “Well, funny enough, I am a maiden, in the historical sense.” I stopped laughing as his mouth found my nipple. “Oh…oh god…I love the way your mouth feels on my breasts. Don’t stop.” I held his head in place against me, as his mouth worked my nipple to a throbbing, aching point. “But I won’t be a maiden for much longer, will I?”

“That’s up to you, Joss,” he murmured, the words huffing against my skin. “This all happens on your timetable.”

“And if my timetable for today is just…touching…you’d be okay with that?” I asked, watching his reaction carefully.

He glanced up at me, sensing the weight in the words. “Absolutely, Joss. No rush. Whatever you want.”

I watched as his hands toyed with my tits, caressing and palming, pinching my nipples, exploring them, hefting their weight. “How can you be so patient? You’ve touched me, made me orgasm. I—I haven’t done anything for you at all. And I always thought that would give you…like, blue balls or something.”

Lucian met my eyes. “Joss…” he sighed. “In a sense, yes. I want everything with you. And there is a part of me that’s desperate to get there with you. And yes, I want you to touch me. I want to feel that with you. Your touch, it’s…it’s amazing. It’s perfect. It makes me a little dizzy, to be honest, because it feels better than anything I could have imagined was possible.”

“Lucian, don’t flatter me or try to make me feel better about things. Just tell the truth.”

He stared at me levelly for a moment. “The truth?”

I nodded. “The truth, Luce. Don’t be tactful, don’t be all understanding. Am I irritating you with my up and down and back and forth and all that? Because even now, we’re still talking because I’m scared and nervous.”

“Okay, real talk—just plain honesty? Yeah. I get worked up and then things cool off. I’m horny as hell, and I want you. I’m dying to rip your leggings off and bury my face in your pussy.” He kept his eyes on mine as he said this, his voice a low growl. “I’m dying to feel your hand on my cock again.”

I swallowed hard. “Luce—I—”

“I’m not done. You wanted the truth, here it is.” He tugged on one of my dreadlocks, his eyes burning into mine, his voice a lupine snarl. “I’m dying to bury my cock inside you, Joss. I need to feel you come apart around me. Watch you come as I fuck you senseless. Watch you take such pleasure from me as you could never have even imagined was possible.”

“Oh…oh my…”I shook all over. “That sounds…nice.”

He smirked at me. “I want all that. I need that.”

“I want to give it to you. I want it with you.”

“Then take it, Joss.” He threaded our fingers together and brought our hands to his stomach. “Take what you want. I’m here for you. I’m here with you. And yeah, I want all that, but more than anything, I want this to be right, for you. You only get one first time, Joss, and I want yours to be perfect. If you’re choosing me out of everyone in the whole world to share this with, I’m willing to wait and be as patient as I have to be, to give you a perfect experience. So if that means a mild case of blue balls as you summon the courage to take what you want, it’s a small price to pay.”

He cupped my tits, both of them at once.

“And besides,” he said. “Just getting to put my hands on these incredible, perfect tits of yours is a gift all in itself.”

I gasped as he brushed a thumb against my nipple. “They’re so sensitive. I feel like I could almost reach orgasm just from that.”

“Then let’s see if that’s possible.”

I shook my head. “No, wait.”

His hands fell away immediately, and I levered over him, pressed our palms together, leaned in, and kissed him until we were both breathless.

“First, a kiss,” I whispered, “For courage.”

“And then?” he whispered back.

I slid down so I was kneeling beside his hips. His fly was open, revealing an expanse of black cotton, stretched around a thick ridge. “And then…” I swallowed hard. “Just be patient with me.”

He tucked his hands behind his head. “We have all the time in the world, Joss.”

I smiled, and then caught my lower lip in my teeth as I turned my attention to him. To the open fly of his jeans, and the hard column behind the black cotton. I traced a fingertip down it, from where the top bulged against the elastic waistband of his underwear down to where it vanished behind denim and the teeth of the open zipper. I watched him as I did this, watched the way his jaw clenched and his eyes narrowed. I hooked my fingers in the back pockets of his jeans and tugged them down—Lucian lifted up, allowing me to draw them off and toss them off the bed. His thick, muscular thighs bunched as he flexed every muscle in his body and then forced himself to relax. His underwear were boxer-briefs, plain black. His erection was a massive tentpole against the stretchy cotton, now that he wasn’t constricted by the denim. I ran my palms up his thighs, past his hips, to his stomach, exploring his washboard abs, and then hesitating at his navel. I swallowed hard, bit my lip, and felt an eager, nervous, silly grin spreading across my face.

He met my grin with one of his own, hands folded behind his head, lying there waiting, patient, but clearly anticipating what I was about to do.

My grin spread until my cheeks ached, my heart hammering. I had a mental flashback to when I’d last touched him—I’d been too caught up in the moment to memorize what he looked like, too caught up in the wonder and fervor of the moment.

This time…this time would be different.

I held my breath, and then curled my fingers inside the elastic. Lucian’s belly sucked in and tightened as my knuckles brushed against the very top of him. I slowly pulled the elastic away from his body and tugged the undergarment downward. He flexed his hips to lift his butt off the mattress, and I ran my fingers around to his butt, scraping my nails against the hard bulge of muscle as I removed his underwear, tugging it down and down until the elastic waistband was cinched around his thighs. A swift tug, one of his legs lifting free, and then the black cotton was dropping off of his toes to the floor at the foot of his bed, and he was bare, completely naked, exposed to my gaze. I raked my eyes over his body eagerly, greedily, soaking up the masculine hardness of his physique, the broad shoulders and thick pecs, the washboard abs, the way his torso tapered to a narrow waist. Those sharp V-shaped lines angling from his abdomen to his groin.

I swallowed hard, my eyes widening, teeth catching at my lip, breathing going shallow. His…his cock—I formed the word in my mind, tasting it, liking it—was…well, beautiful. Thick, straight, pink, and beautiful. Veins stood out, the skin stretched taut. The head was bulbous. He had a thatch of hair around the base, which I suspected he trimmed.

My gaze caught and held there, at his cock. How could I look away? It was where all my attention was focused, where all my desires were attenuated. He was just breathing, just waiting, but he was tensed in anticipation.

I glanced at him, met his gaze.

He smiled at me reassuringly. “It’s all about you, Joss.”

I rested a palm on his thigh, my eyes on his as I dragged my hand upward, to his hip. He licked his lips, sucked in a deep breath and let it out slowly, as if deliberately focusing, slowing himself, restraining his impulses and instincts.

I lifted my palm from his hipbone, desire pooling between my thighs, and wrapped my fingers around his erection. He sucked in a sharp breath and held it, teeth biting down on his lower lip, brows furrowed in concentration. He swallowed hard.

I smiled, another silly, eager grin of excitement. I slid my hand downward, to the base of him, and then upward, my heartbeat ratcheting to an impossible speed. I watched my hand glide over him, enjoying the contrast of his pink, pale flesh to my darker caramel and mocha skin. He exhaled shakily, releasing the breath he’d been holding. I squeezed, and then released, using my fingers, now, to examine and play with the feel of him. Tracing the rim of his circumcision, following the veins, testing the hardness of the shaft and the springiness of the head. Rubbing the slit at the tip with my thumb. He alternately held his breath, abs tensed rock hard, and then let out shaky, focused sighs.

I met his eyes. “Are you okay? Is this difficult for you?”

He shook his head. “I’m…I’m amazing. I’m just trying to control myself. Holding back, so you have time to explore, or whatever.”

I smiled. “You feel…I really, really like touching you like this.”

“Yeah, I don’t mind this myself.”

I stroked him slowly from root to tip. “You don’t mind this?” I grinned as I said it. “It’s okay, huh?”

He growled. “Joss, the feel of your hand on my cock is actual heaven. I died and went to heaven.”

“That good?” I asked.

He closed his eyes as my hand made another slow glide, this time downward, from tip to base. “You don’t even know.”

“Well, I’m enjoying this quite a lot myself, I’ll have you know.”

His eyes flicked open and pierced me. “Say the word and I’ll make you come so hard you won’t be able to see straight.”

My heart fluttered and my thighs clenched. “What’s the word I’d have to say to get you to do that?”

His grin was feral and hungry. “Please.”

“That’s it? All I have to say is please, and you’ll give me an orgasm? Like you did last time?”

He searched me. “Joss, the last time I only used my fingers. This time, I plan on using my tongue.”

I whimpered at the thought. “Your…tongue? You’d—you’d do that? Really?”

His wolfish grin only widened. “Joss, baby—you have no idea.”

I squeezed him. “Oh…oh god.”

The idea of Lucian’s mouth between my thighs had me shaking and quivering—his fingers had felt amazing…what would it feel like to have him kissing me, down there? Heat pooled, desire making itself known as a flood of dampness between my thighs, as an ache and a tremble.

I decided to take my own advice—go one step at a time. He was clearly enjoying my touch, and had said as much. I was a virgin, but I was familiar enough with how things worked to know, mentally, at least, what would happen when Lucian reached the end of his control. He would come; he would orgasm. I knew it would happen, and that it was the goal of all this, but I was only vaguely aware of what it would look like. I wanted to know. Wanted to see. Wanted to feel it happen, watch it happen, and know I’d given him that.

Lucian was just lying there, hands behind his head, breathing slowly, evenly, deeply, watching me as I clutched his erection in one hand, thinking this through.

“You okay, Joss?” he asked.

I smiled. “Yeah…yeah. I’m just…” I shook my head, and resumed stroking his length with one hand. “I was thinking.”

“About what? You mind sharing?”

“I will,” I said, “just not yet. If I start talking, I won’t be as focused on this.” I squeezed him.

He closed his eyes briefly. “Well, I certainly wouldn’t want you to lose focus.”

I added my other hand, then. One hand atop the other, wrapped loosely around his thick cock, sliding slowly up and down. I watched him, watched his reactions and expressions as I explored him with both hands.

“Will you warn me when you’re…” I hesitated, flicking my gaze from his cock to his eyes. “When you’re almost there?”

“Of course.”

I held his gaze. “Is this okay—is it all right? I don't know how things usually go, but I just—”

He cut in. “Joss, this is more than okay. There’s no right or wrong, there’s only you, and me, and us, and what we want to do, and how we want to do it.”

“And you’re okay if I—if I just do this—” I stroked him, my eyes going to the motion to indicate what I meant, and then back to him, “until you…you know?”

“This about you, Joss. Take as long as you want. And if you want to stop before I get there, that’s fine too. I can handle it, if that’s what you want.”

I held him in both hands and leaned over him to kiss him. “No, that’s not what I want,” I murmured, my lips moving against his. “I want to take you there. I want to feel you come. I want to give you that.”

He let out a sigh of relief. “And trust me when I say I really want that too. But however you want it, whenever. Okay? Don’t worry about me.”

I kissed him again, and let myself explore his cock with one hand, and then the other, and then both again, feeling the hardness in my hands, the contrast of the iron-hard shaft wrapped in silk-soft skin. I went a little faster, feeling his cock slide between my fists, feeling his breathing quicken and his stomach tense.

“Keep going like that, and it won’t take long to get me there,” Lucian murmured.

“So the slower I go, the longer it takes?” I asked.

“Yeah…pretty much.” He groaned as I slowed again. “And if you alternate, go fast and then slow, it’s kind of like teasing me. Getting me close and then slowing down.”

“Is that bad or good?”

“Both, in a good way.”

“That’s confusing,” I said.

He laughed. “Yeah, I suppose so.” He flicked open his eyes and looked at me. “Maybe you’ll let me show you how it works, after…this.”

“Maybe I will.”

I didn’t want this to end, though. I loved the feel of his cock in my hands, the restraint on his face, the tension in his body, the fact that he was so clearly enjoying how I was making him feel with just my hands. How would he react if I wanted to see what he tasted like, what he felt like in my mouth, between my lips? I was feeling daring. His patience and restraint made me feel in control, and safe at the same time.

“I’m gonna try something,” I warned him. “Just…hold still.”

“I won’t move,” he assured me.

I stroked him once more with both hands, glanced at him, offered him a shaky, nervous smile, and then shifted forward, leaning over his body.

He understood what I intended moments before I did it. “Oh shit, Joss, you don’t have to—oh fuck…fucking hell, Joss—Jesus!”

His outburst of shocked profanity sent a thrill of pride through me.

I touched my lips to the tip of him, feeling the broad bulb of flesh against my mouth, and then I parted my lips until my jaw was stretched wide, and my mouth was filled with him. He was soft and thick against my tongue, and even with my jaw opened as wide as it could go, it was still a tight fit. And he tasted…god…amazing. Salty skin, and a musky tang of…him, of his arousal. There was wetness against my tongue, the source of the flavor, something seeping out of him. I gripped his shaft low around the base in one hand, holding him away from his body as I filled my mouth with his cock.

“Ohhhh fuck, Joss. Jesus. Fuck.” He was arched off the bed, spine arced, hips flexing, and his hands shot out from under his head to grip the comforter in knotted bunches of fabric in white-knuckled fists.

I backed away, working my jaw, watching him. “Was that okay?”

He barked a laugh. “Was it okay? Joss, did you see how I reacted?”

“You looked like…” I considered my phrasing carefully. “Like it felt so good it almost hurt.”

“Exactly.” He brushed my cheek with his palm. “You do that, Joss, I won’t last long at all.”

Daring, eager, and full of erotic zeal and pulsing arousal, I let a leering smile cross my lips. “Then I might just do it again.”

“Fuck, fuck, fuck,” he hissed, knotting his fingers in the comforter again, as I took him into my mouth.

I felt him throb between my lips, and then I felt veins against my tongue as I took more of him, fist sliding up from the root until my fingers touched my lips. The taste was unlike anything I’d experienced, and the feel of him in my mouth, knowing his most sensitive organ was at my mercy, knowing it felt so good that he couldn’t even control the words that came out of his mouth—it empowered me.

I backed away until the damp crown of his cock was at my lips again, and then, without thinking, flicked my tongue out to taste him, lapping the flat of my tongue over the slit. He jerked at the touch of my tongue, hissing another curse. His cock was wet with my saliva from tip to midway down the shaft, which was as far as I’d dared take him. He was breathing hard, now, gasping raggedly.

“Joss, god—you do that again and I’m done, honey.”

“Really?” I stroked him with both hands, smearing my saliva on his skin. “I do…this…again, and you’re done?”

I took him into my mouth once more, and this time slid my lips around him and went farther and farther until I felt him brush the back of my throat, as far as I was willing to go. He was groaning, and his hands, trembling, went to my back, sliding up my spine to my shoulders, and then, shaking, framed my head as I slid my mouth back up his cock until the softness of his crown was between my lips.

“Joss—” he groaned, his voice a hoarse rasp. “You have to stop—I’m close, Joss. I’m right there.”

I backed away, glancing up at him. “You want me to stop?”

“No! No. But—” He had to stop, breathing hard, teeth gritted, clearly focusing every ounce of control on holding back. “But if you don’t stop, you’re gonna get a mouthful, babe.”

“Oh.” I licked the tip again, tasting his essence as it leaked out of him, clear, viscous. “Yeah, I don’t know if I’m ready for that yet.”

“That’s why I’m warning you.”

I clutched him in both hands, shifting away so I could watch what was about to happen. I stroked him, then, slowly, root to tip, with both hands, and this time, I didn’t stop, or hesitate. He was arched off the bed, gasping, groaning, and his hips were flexing uncontrollably.

“Joss—god, I’m—oh god, oh god.”

I paused to rub the tip of him with my thumb. “You’re going to come, now, Lucian?”

“Yeah, god yeah.” His eyes were closed, head thrown back, jaw clenched, abs taut. “So hard.”

I ached. My thighs were clenched, my core seeping—watching him edge closer and closer, and knowing I was making him feel this way…it was a rush, sending lightning bolts of need through me. Watching him reach the verge of orgasm was…it was sending arousal through me, turning me into a shaking, needy mess of wetness between my thighs.

One touch is all it would take, I realized, to make me come—just from the intensity of giving him this.

I held it back, clung to the edge as I stroked his cock with both hands, faster now.

Lucian was thrusting into my fists, groaning wordlessly.

“I’m—fuck, Joss—I’m gonna come!”

“Now?” I asked, caressing him even more swiftly, fists sliding in a blur up and down his thick, tensed, throbbing cock.

“Oh fuck—fuck, now, Joss!” He arched, pulsing his erection through my fists, his shout morphing into a wordless snarl.

I felt him spasm, felt his cock throb, and then a stream of thick white come shot out of him to splash against his stomach, and I kept stroking, slowing down so I could soak up every arousing moment of this, watching his face tense into a rictus of release, watching his abs flex as he thrust into my fists. I clutched the crown of him with one hand and gently pulsed my fist around him in short shallow gentle movements, and he cried out again as another spurt of come burst up his torso, over his navel nearly to his diaphragm. He thrust and I caressed and stroked, and yet more thick white viscous hot semen left him, dripping over my fingers and into the curly thatch of hair around his base, and then again and again, until the backs of my fingers were coated in his come, a pool of it on his stomach and navel.

He was gasping raggedly, his body sagging as if he was suddenly boneless, his cock still throbbing hard and thick in my fists. “Holy shit, Joss.”

I grinned in pleased pride at the stunned stupid sound of his voice, at the raw ecstasy obvious in every line of his body. “That was…” I bit my lip, holding up my hand to look at his come on my fingers. “That was incredible.”

He opened his eyes. “You have no idea.” He glanced down at himself. “I’m a mess, now.”

I showed him my fingers. “So am I.”

“Sorry, I should have warned you it’d be messy.”

I shook my head. “I like it. No—I love it. Watching that, watch you come? It was…amazing.” I shuddered. “It was…hot. Arousing.”

He fixed me with a piercing stare. “You get off on watching me come, huh?”

“God, yes.” I didn’t shy away from the truth, from how he made me feel; I embraced it. “One touch, and I could explode.”

“One touch?” He reached up to tweak my nipple, sending an electric thrill through me. “Like that?”

I squeaked in surprise, and then shuddered as the thrill sizzled down to my core, igniting the pool of desire flooding me. “Yeah—a lot like that.”

He palmed my breast, and then pinched my nipple, suddenly and hard. “How about that?”

I jumped, whimpering as the pinch, as the pain and the pleasure of it left me quaking. “Yes…god yes.”

“Remember what I said?”

I blinked at him. “What you—what you said?” The pulsing hammer of my arousal was making me dizzy, clouding my mind, need replacing everything.

I needed him. I needed his touch. I needed to come.

“One word. That’s all it takes.”

I remembered, then. “But…you’re all messy.”

He tilted halfway off the bed and snagged a towel left on the floor after a shower. Dizzy, thoughts slowed as if I’d been drugged, I took the towel from him and wiped him clean, and then glanced at my hand, still wet with his drying essence. A thought struck me, and I gave into it before I chickened out—I touched my tongue to the wetness on my knuckles, and the flavor of him burst through me: salty, musky, tangy, almost-but-not-quite sweet.

“Mmmm,” I murmured. “That’s not so bad.”

“No?”

I shook my head. “Not what I was expecting.”

He pinned me with a look. “Joss, don’t ever think I expect you to—”

“If I do—when I do,” I told him, “it’ll be because I want to.” I grinned at him, biting my lip. “And believe me, I’ll want to.”

He reached for me, hooking a finger in the waist of my leggings. “Can we get back to that word you were gonna say?”

I squirmed. “The word that gives you permission to make me come so hard I won’t be able to see straight?” I asked. “That word?”

“Yes, Joss. That word.”

I stopped breathing for a moment, as we sat side by side on the bed, his eyes fierce and wild and eager, one finger curled into the elastic waistband of my leggings. One word, and he would show me things I’d never even dared dream of or fantasized about. He was waiting, and I knew he wouldn’t go any further until and unless I gave him permission.

He kept one finger hooked into the hem, leaned close to me, pressing our bodies together, caressing my breast with his palm and brushing his lips against mine. “Let me taste you, Joss,” he whispered. “Let me make you scream.”

“I’m…” Embarrassment flooded through me, making my cheeks burn. “I’m really, um…down there—”

He pulled back to meet my gaze, rolling one of my nipples under his thumb. “You’re what, down there?”

“All worked up.”

“I sure as fuck hope you’re worked up.”

I swallowed hard. “No, I mean—I’m turned on like crazy, from wanting you, and—I…um—it’s…”

He teased kisses across my cheek, down the side of my neck, to my shoulder, and then to the upper slope of my breast. “Don’t be shy, Joss. Just say it.”

“I’m wet,” I whispered. “So messy…so wet.”

He groaned, forehead resting against the swell of my chest. “Ohhh fuck, Joss—don’t tease me like this.”

I frowned at the top of his head. “Tease you? I’m warning you. You said you wanted to taste me, and I’m saying…you may not, because I’m—”

He lifted his head to look at me, and his grin was equal parts amused and aroused. “Joss, honey, please trust me when I say that’s exactly why I want to go down on you so bad right now. I can smell how turned on you are.”

He leaned into me, touched his lips to my ear. “Lay down. Trust me.”

I slid to my back, and Lucian leaned against me, teasing kisses as I squirmed to a comfortable position. “I trust you,” I whispered.

“Say it,” he murmured.

I met his gaze. “Please, Lucian.” I smirked at him. “You just wanted to hear me beg, as payback for all the back and forth from before.”

He nibbled my throat, kissed my clavicle, and then slid his tongue between my breasts. “Joss, honey, that wasn’t begging. That was just giving me permission to make you feel good.” He nipped my nipple, and I felt it throb into an aching, diamond-hard point. “I’ll show you what it’s like to beg.”

I breathed a whimpering sigh as he flicked my erect nipple with his tongue, and then slid his mouth across the valley to the other one, lips stuttering across my flesh. I arched my spine and trailed my fingers along his shoulders and through his hair, giving in to the bliss of his mouth on me, anticipating the downward slide.

He shifted down my body, cupping my tits in his hand, and kissed my ribs, and my navel, and then paused to glance up at me, dragging his fingers down my front to the waist of my leggings. I bit my lip and flexed my hips in silent permission, and he tugged the stretchy cotton downward, stripping them off in a single smooth jerk, tossing them aside, leaving me in nothing but a pair of plain white cotton underwear. He didn’t remove them immediately, like I expected him to. Instead, he nudged my hipbone with his nose and then used one finger to inch aside the gusset of my underwear, baring a slice of skin between the crease of hip and core, and his tongue slid along that exposed flesh, causing me to gasp, and tense. He ran his palms up my thighs, shifting his weight over my legs so he was kneeling between my calves, hovering over me. I stared down at him, having trouble breathing as I anticipated him stripping me naked, leaving my damp core bare to his eyes…and his mouth.

He continued to defy my expectations and anticipation, however. He kissed my stomach, again and again and again, from the curve of one side to the other, and then lower, across the elastic band of my panties, and then his mouth moved over my core without making contact with the fabric covering me. I was so wet with need, now, that I could feel the cloth sticking to my skin, and I knew how that must look—the white cotton would be nearly see-through, plastered against the plump lips of my core. I knew the word he would use, but I couldn’t quite bring myself to use it, even in my own mind.

Lucian’s gaze raked over me, from my face and my eyes to my breasts, to my core, and I saw the moment he saw how wet I was. “Shit, Joss—you’re fucking soaked,” he groaned.

“I told you.”

His thumb brushed the soaked cotton, and I jerked at the contact. “It’s sexy, Joss. You don’t even know what it does to me to see you this turned on, this wet.”

“Really?”

“Abso-fucking-lutely,” he growled.

His fingers tugged the sides of my underwear down, exposing my hipbones, and he kissed each of them. And then, instead of pulling them the rest of the way down, he kept kissing, moving his lips down my thigh and around inside, pushing my thighs apart as he did so, until his lips were dancing across the tender flesh of my innermost thigh, his cheek brushing against my core over the cotton. I felt his breath on me, cooling dampness, making me gasp sharply, and then his lips were sliding over my other thigh and his teeth were grazing and nipping. His hovered his mouth over my core, and I tensed all over, aching, breathless—he hooked his index finger in the leg of my panties and tugged the gusset aside to bare my core. Momentarily bare, I quit breathing entirely, waiting, waiting, waiting, watching for the moment he put his mouth on me.

He extended his tongue…and I flinched and my lungs squeezed and my heart stuttered as he touched his tongue to me, sliding up the seam where my nether lips met.

I whimpered at the wet warmth, the teasing slide.

And then it was gone and he was letting the underwear cover me again, and I was wild with need, aching, desire pooling through me, making me wetter than I already was. I wanted that. I wanted him to do that again. To strip me naked and put his mouth on me, his tongue.

God, I wanted it.

“Luce…please.”

“See, if I wanted to hear you beg, that’s how I’d do it. Tease you, really tease you. You’d go crazy if I held out long enough.”

“Don’t, Lucian. Please don’t.”

“No?”

I brushed a lock of hair away from his face, tucked it behind his ear, and shook my head. “Don’t tease me. Not this time.” I flexed my hips, biting my lip. “I’m already begging. Please, Lucian. Do that again.”

He repeated the action, pulling aside my underwear and licking me, once. “Like that?”

I groaned. “More, Luce. You know what I want. Please.”

He grinned at me. “You want me to lick your pussy.”

I laughed in aroused embarrassment at his filthy words. “Yes, god, yes.”

“It’d be really hot to hear you ask me to do that.”

“Haven’t I, already?”

He kissed the insides of my thighs again, and I let my legs fall apart, wanting more. “I want the words, Joss. I want to hear that beautiful, innocent mouth of yours talking dirty to me.”

“My mouth wasn’t so innocent a few minutes ago,” I reminded him.

He shifted up, to my navel again, and kissed along the hem of my underwear. “True.”

“I don’t like that word,” I lied, to cover my embarrassment.

He just grinned at me. “You’re lying, Joss.”

“God, how do you know?”

“I can just tell when you’re lying.” He tugged the elastic down so the upper swell of my core was exposed. “You’re just embarrassed to say it.”

“Damn you.”

He laughed. “Try it, Joss. Ask me to lick your pussy.”

I stared down at him, his fingers in the waistband of my panties, preparing to draw them off me. “Lick me, Lucian. Put your mouth on me…” I got the words out, then, finally. “Lick my pussy. Make me come so hard I can’t see straight.”

He groaned and slid my underwear down to my thighs, exposing my core—my pussy. I lifted my butt off the mattress, and he tugged them all the way off of me, and now, once again, I was naked with Lucian. This time, I wasn’t afraid. I was eager. I was beyond ready, shaking with arousal as he stared with obvious and greedy appreciation at my core.

“So beautiful,” he murmured. “Just as beautiful and perfect as the rest of you.”

I ached, god, I ached. Arousal was a throbbing drum inside me, a volcanic pressure consuming me. I felt like if Lucian didn’t make me come soon, I would lose my mind.

He was still teasing me, kissing my hipbone, my thigh, my navel.

“Lucian—” I breathed, my voice nearly a snarl. “Please.”

He pressed his palms to the insides of my thighs, caressing, and I let my eyes close at the sudden tenderness in that caress, and then, while my eyes were closed, head thrown back, he pushed them farther apart and his mouth slid along the crease where thigh, hip, and core all met, and I whimpered. I opened my eyes and lifted my head to watch, not wanting to miss a single moment.

I didn’t wait long, after that. A moment of hesitation, his eyes meeting mine, and then he covered my seam with his mouth, and I lost my mind. The heat of his mouth, the pressure of his lips, his tongue sliding wet and strong into my opening—I threw my head back and moaned, a wild, wanton sound. He groaned, and I felt his tongue slither between the lips of my core, and then glide upward—my breath caught, lightning searing through me as his tongue circled around my clit. My groan was ragged then, and I couldn’t help clutching in desperation at his head.

“Don’t stop—oh god, Luce, god, please…don’t stop!”

He grunted a negative, and then his lips suctioned around my clit, and his tongue flicked against it, and I whimpered, trying to contain a rising need to scream as the pleasure built inside me. I felt him drag his palms down my stomach to my hips, and then I felt a finger gliding through my damp lips inside me, penetrating me, and just that finger felt like so much, so thick, such an intrusion, that I felt a moment of panic trying to imagine actual sex. But that worry was blasted away as he drew that finger out and then slid it back in, curling it just so, massaging inside me, careful, gentle, even as his mouth and tongue worked in alternation, licking, suckling, circling around my clit, building the pressure of ecstasy inside me to frenzy.

I moaned, and whimpered, and my hips began to flex, and my thighs started to quake. “Lucian!” I heard myself breathe his name, a raw, desperate exhalation.

It only prompted him to drive the wild pressure of need to a crescendo; he slid a second finger inside me, stretching me, and I cried out at the burning ache, and then his tongue flicked and fluttered against my clit and the burning pain of being stretched by his fingers vanished into an inferno of pleasure. I felt myself teetering on the edge, clutching at him, and my hips were flexing, my ass lifting off the bed, breasts swaying.

“Oh god, oh my god, Luce, please, yes—” I heard myself say.

I was outside myself, hearing and feeling my reactions, but in no kind of control.

Lucian worked his fingers in and out of me, mimicking sex, stretching me, and his tongue flicked against my aching, throbbing clit, and everything inside me built and built and built into a mountainous weight of pressure and heat and need and exquisite, agonizing ecstasy. I was going to explode, detonate like never before. I would come apart, and it was going to be such a furiously intense explosion I would have been afraid of it, if I only didn’t need it so fucking badly.

There was nothing else in that moment, nothing in the entire universe except the wild, desperate need to reach orgasm.

“Oh—oh god—oh my fucking god!” I heard myself say, the words a whimper, and then a wail.

I was gone, utterly lost. He was driving me to it, now, thrashing my clit with his tongue, two fingers slicking noisily between the spasming walls of my pussy.

And then…

I came apart.

And I screamed. This time, my scream was one of release, of helpless, violent orgasm. I writhed against him, weeping, screaming in choking, gasping wails as I was seized by wave after wave of raw intensity, through which his tongue and lips and fingers worked constantly, pushing me higher and higher, until the crescendo broke and I was sobbing, hips thrusting madly, grinding my pussy against his face with crazed abandon.

The waves only slowly and gradually subsided, and the intensity became too much—I couldn’t take any more. I caught at his face. “Luce, I—I—stop, you need to stop—I can’t handle any more.”

He lifted up, and I saw the wet evidence of my orgasm smeared on his face.

I pulled him toward me, and he lay on the bed beside me as I gasped, whimpering occasionally as aftershocks shot through me. When I was capable of coherent movement, I reached over and wiped at his face with my palm.

“You’re messy again,” I said.

He licked his lips. “Best kind of messy.”

I shrugged a shoulder. “I dunno…I kind of liked the mess we made of you earlier.”

He smirked, and then gently, carefully swiped a finger through my opening, making me flinch and gasp. He brought the finger to my lips. “Taste yourself, Joss.”

I touched a finger to his mouth, to his lips, still glistening, and leaned in. “I’d rather taste it on you.”

I kissed him, licking at his lips, and tasted myself on his mouth, the smoky musk of my essence. The kiss shifted, then, morphing from a teasing taste of my juices on his lips into something more.

Something heated, something deep.

Something wild.

Our bodies pressed together, and I felt his thigh between mine, his hands on my ass, cupping and kneading possessively, and I felt his cock hardening against my hip, driving against my belly. His hands were everywhere, and so were mine, carving at his muscular bicep, trailing down his waist, clawing at his ass. We were lost to the kiss, groaning as we exchanged control, him taking the kiss deeper, and then letting me claim his mouth, his tongue.

God, I was crazy, aching again already.

The feel of his cock against my hip was maddening.

I clutched at him, then, needing to feel him in my hands again, needing the evidence of his desire.

I was going to be addicted to this—to the wonder and glory of his cock, the pulse of it in my hands, the way he lost control as I brought him to the edge—I could even see myself needing to taste him, to feel him in my mouth, to feel him so desperate, so needy for what only I could give him.

But…there was more.

His fingers inside me had introduced a new element to all this. The intrusion of them, the stretch, even the slight burn, the ache of it. I needed that again…

I needed more.

I needed to be closer to Lucian, to feel him all around me, inside me, above me.

I broke the kiss, my palm on his jaw, our bodies tangled together. “Lucian…I need you.”

“I’m here, Joss,” he breathed. “You’ve got me.”

I met his eyes, clutching his cock in one hand, and rolled to my back. “No. Luce…I need you.”

“Joss…” He searched my eyes with his.

I ran my fingertips down his spine, to his ass, cupping the bubble of hard muscle. “Luce, I want this. I want it. I want you, I want us.”

“Now?”

“Yes, now.”

He leaned in and touched my lips with his, and then groaned when I squeezed his cock. “I need to get a condom.”

“You have some?”

He rolled away from me to the bedside table, opened the drawer, and pulled out a new, unopened box. “Perhaps somewhat anticipatory, but I went and got some before Brock and I left to get you. It was the desperate act of a very hopeful man.”

I laughed. “I’m glad you did.”

He opened the box, withdrew a string of square packets, and ripped one free. I watched as he tore the foil open and took out a ring of latex.

I sat up, reached out and took it from him, toying with it, figuring it out. “Let me do it?”

He knelt in front of me, setting the string and the box on the table, and he waited as I gently pressed the ring to the crown of his cock, rolling it down gently with both hands until it was snugged at the base.

I smiled at him, pleased with myself. “That was fun.”

“Never had anyone else do it for me before,” he said.

I didn’t like the way that phrase sat inside me—more accurately, at the insinuation of having done this before. I knew he had, but I didn’t want to think of it. I was jealous, I realized. Somehow, Lucian had become mine.

He saw something in my expression. “What?” he asked.

I shrugged, smiling at him. “I just…I got all jealous, when you said that.”

He frowned. “Oh. Sorry, I didn’t think—”

I shook my head. “It’s fine. I just want you to know, I’m jealous of you.” I reached for him, wrapping a hand around his waist, resting my fingers on the small of his back. “You’re mine now. That’s what I was thinking.”

He leaned close, kissing the corner of my mouth. “That goes both ways, Joss.” He kissed my lips, shifting so we were facing each other, sitting up, and his hands brushed my dreadlocks behind my shoulders so they didn’t obscure my breasts. “I’m yours—and you’re mine.”

I smiled into the kiss. “I like the sound of that.”

“Yeah?” He backed away, our eyes locking.

“There’s nothing I want more than to belong to you, Lucian. To belong with you.”

He smirked at me. “There’s nothing you want more?”

“I want you to make love to me.” I wrinkled my nose at him. “Is that phrase cheesy, or passé, or whatever?”

He cupped my face in both of his hands, eyes searching me. “I just want you to be absolutely sure it’s what you want.”

I withdrew from his touch, lying on my back, catching at his hand. “I’ve never been more sure of anything in my life, Lucian.”