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I felt my whole body tighten and rise up against him. The arch of my back made Kalcedon groan into me. He drew his lips down to trace my jaw. A high, quiet noise escaped me as the heat of his mouth slipped down my neck to my collarbone.

“Kalcedon?” I asked. He didn’t answer. His lips pressed kisses, slow and light, across to the other side of my neck and up to my ear. “Do you—also?”

“Love you?” His voice was low and muffled against my skin. I felt the reverberation of it against my pulse.

“Yes?” I had to ask, breathlessly.

He laughed and buried his face against my shoulder.

“It’s alright, if you don’t,” I said with a quiet fear.

An exasperated sigh left Kalcedon’s mouth. He propped himself up over me, his face inches from my own.

“You utter fool.”

“What?”

“You don’t know if I love you?”

“You didn’t say it back.”

“My God, Meda. I’d rather stop breathing than live in a world without you, and you don’t know if I love you?”

“Can you just answer the question?” I begged. My emotions were rising up uncomfortably inside me. I knew what he was saying, but the longer he dragged it out the more I needed the simple confirmation, not poetic, just factual, of those three words.

Kalcedon’s fingers gripped the back of my head tightly. His other hand, intertwined with mine, squeezed as he pressed his weight down into me. My body flooded with his power.

“Yes,” Kalcedon whispered hoarsely. “Yes, I love you; I’ve loved you for years, which you might have had the decency to notice, if you didn’t always have your nose buried in a book.”

His mouth found mine again. I needed more of him. I wanted to burn. Emboldened by his words, I grasped my free hand into his shirt and pulled it up, scraping my knuckles along the smooth line of his back. Kalcedon hurriedly rose and dragged it over his head. My hands were on him, exploring, drinking in the feel of his magic.

His were restless, pulling at my dress as if now that he’d realized clothing was optional, he needed it gone. I did, too. I wanted no barriers between us. My hips lifted to hitch the skirt past them. Kalcedon pulled me up as I sat; took the dress from me as I worked it past my shoulders and over my mass of hair.

His hands wrapped around my back, his fingers sliding possessively over soft skin, over the plush of my stomach and the angles of my shoulders. He palmed one breast, breath hitching as his thumb caressed the peaked nipple; pushed me down and raked his hands slowly over the expanse of me, naked but for the cloth covering my groin.

“Come,” I said, and hooked an ankle around his leg. I needed his body against mine, not his eyes. I didn’t care whether he wanted to look at me. I felt no need to be seen.

Kalcedon obeyed, lowering his body against mine until, glorious euphoria, our chests met, full awareness of his skin against mine, his body hard and burning with a heat that could only come from touch. His hand slipped between us and traced down me; slipped between my widened legs. Pleasure flooded my brain, every nerve awake and screaming, as the pads of his fingers traced the delicate cloth covering my sex.

His other fist gripped me by the hair.

His hands were shaking.

“What am I supposed to do?” Kalcedon asked. His voice sounded surer than the rest of him.

“Whatever you want,” I breathed, eyes half-closed as I drank in the intoxicating sear of his flesh against mine.

“But I’ve never done this,” he whispered, almost a hiss.

“Never?”

“No,” Kalcedon said. “Tell me how to make you feel good.”

“You already are,” I said, but there was more to it than this; or at least, I knew there could be. “And you take these off,” I added, dragging a hand from his skin momentarily to trace the hem of my underthings.

Kalcedon rolled just to the side so he could maneuver. Slowly, reverently, his hand slid down the curve of my hip, parting skin from fabric. As he dragged my underclothes down, his hand stayed firmly pressed to my skin, married tight to my thigh.

I reached for his hand. He followed my pull until his palm rested between the heat of my legs. His fingers skimmed the wet curls covering my entrance. Kalcedon’s breath caught audibly. Leaning down, his mouth hungrily found mine. I pulled his finger towards my clitoris, but found him less easy to guide now. His hands moved of their own accord, curious and exploring, carefully stroking every swollen fold of my slick core. He groaned as he slid one finger into me, his forehead pressed to mine as each heavy breath played over my skin.