Page 33 of Bottoms Up (Mythic Beast #4)

Silver

Back at the hotel, I was so exhausted I sat while I showered — but Julian didn’t let me crawl into bed until he’d slaked his own needs with my body.

He didn’t draw it out, but he also didn’t bother being gentle.

He bent me over the edge of the mattress, ignoring my entreaties about being too tired.

He held me down with one hand, used the other to lube my asshole with clinical practicality rather than finesse, and then shoved himself in.

Hard, fast, and efficient. Brute possession.

There was no stretch, no seduction — just the sharp burn of being opened, stretched wide with barely any prep. I yelped, then screamed. My knees buckled.

But he didn’t slow down. Not for a second. He just held me down and used me like a toy he expected to perform regardless of condition. A possession being reminded of its place. Its job.

He wasn’t especially cruel, but he was ruthless . Efficient. He had a cock to bury and a hole that belonged to him, and he didn’t care about my wishes.

He wanted my ass, and our arrangement was sex-on-demand.

This was the demand.

He can go for hours, but thankfully, he didn’t on this night. Fifteen minutes? Twenty? I don’t know.

He grunted when he came, cock buried in my ass, balls tight against me.

One hand on the back of my neck, a bruising grip on my hip — keeping me bent, pinned, stretched wide around that monstrous cock as thick, cool pulses painted my insides.

He stayed in place for a breathless moment at the end, as if the very act of filling me was the end goal, and I suppose it was.

When he finally pulled out, I was shaking. Raw. Needy .

He popped me on the ass, stood me up, flicked my hard cock with enough force I gasped.

“Look at me.”

I met his gaze, and he lowered his voice as much as he’s able. “No orgasm for naughty toys who think they get a pass on their duties just because they’re tired.” He flicked my dick again. “Touch yourself, and I’ll bind your wrists and belt the rebellion out of you.”

And then the motherfucker proceeded to wet a washcloth and clean my thighs, pussy, and asshole — knowing he was just further fanning the flames of my arousal. My cunt empty, my dick throbbing.

Finally, he plugged my ass, tucked me in, and sat in a chair across the room, watching something on his phone with headphones. Making sure I didn’t masturbate.

I still slept like the dead.

The following day, I went with Benji to an oasis area outside of town, which meant Atlas came, too. It’d been a ghost town themed attraction, but the people Benji bought into it with had torn everything down and were building a resort.

It was surreal, seeing so many green growing things in the middle of the desert, surrounding the natural springs. An actual oasis.

Afterward, we hiked up a ridge that may or may not have had a name, and the views were magnificent. We made it back to the hotel thirty minutes after Julian rose — a little later than the day before, but still earlier than expected.

We had tickets for a show that night, and afterward, the three of us walked the Strip like tourists — arm in arm at times, and always flanked by Atlas and his never-blinking calm.

Our completely unscripted dives into shops, weaving through crowds on the sidewalks, and stops out-of-the-blue for threesome selfies in front of iconic spots probably created a nightmare scenario for the security team, but they handled it like pros.

It felt good. Us , like that. Laughing. Julian and Benji finding their own rhythm, bonding over wine pairings, sarcastic jabs, and shared curiosity about rooftop engineering. I kept catching myself smiling.

We got in late. I was a little drunk, skin warm from walking the Strip, too many lights still flashing behind my eyelids.

But once again, Julian didn’t let me fall asleep untouched.

The second I was naked, he lifted me, walked to the bed, sat me on the edge of the mattress, pushed my knees up around my ears, and drove into my pussy like he’d been wanting to do it all night. Like he knew I was wet for him. Wanting him. Slick and pulsing.

Julian always knows.

My thighs were still sore from the climb, my feet hurt from walking the Strip in heels, but my body opened for him on instinct, like it belonged to him.

I didn’t even realize I was moaning until he ordered, “Come, little Silver. Come on my cock.”

And I did. Just like that. My pussy obeying before my brain processed the order. My cunt clenched around him, fluttering, spasming, pulling him deeper. Sounds tore out of me — gasps, moans, grunts.

Every nerve ending felt raw. My body shook. Trembled.

He fucked me through it, riding every twitch of my body like he owned it.

When the orgasm faded, he pulled out, gripped his cock, and a half-dozen rough strokes later, he came across my stomach in thick, cool spurts.

And he cleaned me up, tucked me in, and held me until I fell asleep.

* * * *

Silver

The next morning, Benji took me to the Valley of Fire and we hiked all freaking day, but the park more than lived up to its name, with jagged cliffs the color of oxidized blood, ancient petroglyphs cut into sandstone, slot canyons that shimmered with reflected heat, and wind-carved arches perched above dust-silent paths.

The most amazing scenery — wild, radiant, alive — and I’d never seen the desert as any of those things before.

I’m not a fan of arid places. I much prefer waterfalls and healthy forests, but Benji showed me a side of the desert I hadn’t seen before. This magical place had its own pulse, and Benji knew how to read it.

“You love him,” he said while we sat and drank from our water bottles on top of a place we probably weren’t supposed to be.

The views were stunning, though, and we’d been careful not to cause damage.

One of the many things I love about Benji is that he’s taken the time to learn how to care for the land while we explore it.

“I do.” I took a swig with even more salt than normal, to account for all the sweat pouring off me.

“And I’ve thought a lot about my humanity while watching him gain powers and abilities.

” Julian had gone through something of a crash course in managing all that power, his power, once it wasn’t being drained from him.

“If we do this, I want us to be turned by the same vampire.”

Was that going to be a problem? Was he close to a vampire he wanted to be his sire?

“I’d assumed it would be Marco, if I do it.” I hadn’t actually brought it up to him, and that was probably important, but I’d been visualizing my future possibilities as him turning me all along.

“The vampires who feed from…” he shrugged.

“Marco feeds off of lust as well as blood, but he comes from a line of vampires who feed from strong emotions and feelings, so there’s a chance you’d end up feeding off of fear, or anger, or who knows what else.

As far as I know, you aren’t likely to have to deal with any of that if you’re bitten by Zander, who feeds off blood without all the other complications.

We used to think Zander was a lot stronger than Marco, but now we know the fucker can hide his power. ”

Another swig, and he shook his head. “No, it isn’t that he’s hiding it, because I don’t think Marco is this huge powerhouse all the time. He beat the old dude, thank goodness, but only with all the other heavy hitters powering him up with lust energy. He needs forewarning to charge up.”

“Maybe on one of our vacations, we can spend some time around Zander, so I can meet him?”

“Yes. I’ve wanted to take you glacier climbing again, so that can work.”

He looked out over the valley, the sun glinting off the rocks, the lake. “I just… I want us to be turned by the same vampire, so we’ll be vampire siblings for eternity, or however long we make it, but also so we can go through those first decades together, learning control and shit.”

The whole learning control thing terrified me, mostly because Julian’s one of the strongest, most in-control people I know, and he hadn’t been able to pass those tests. Also, I knew how brutal the test is, now.

But Benji would probably break records, he’d figure it out so fast. “You have more control than anyone I know. It’ll be a piece of cake for you.”

“Me?” He snorted and bumped my shoulder with his.

“Fuck, Jules. You know your body so well. It isn’t like most of us, where we spent most of our lives thinking we were our body.

You understood from the start that your body is, like, the vehicle you drive in this reality, this world.

You have to deal with the body you ended up with, but it isn’t who you are. ”

I considered that a few seconds and realized he was right.

“Okay, yeah. I knew my soul wasn’t a gender early on.

Elementary school, maybe? I didn’t know what a soul was, I didn’t have the vocabulary yet, but I knew that the me inside my body wasn’t intersex.

My body is intersex, but whatever is inside me is genderless. ”

I blew out a breath and chuckled. “Then I grew up and realized, if I want to have carnal fun with this body, I had to figure out what kind of sex worked for me.”

“I guess I know more about your sex life than most big brothers, but I won’t apologize for it.”

God, he’d been so fucking nosy when I was a teen. I’d been way-beyond-pissed at him back then, but he’d just been trying to make sure I was safe. It drove me crazy at the time, but I understood now.

I shrugged. “I like being fucked by men.”

He chuckled. “Amongst other things.”

“Don’t be crude.”

The truth was, the thoughts of being turned still scared the hell out of me.

Not just the blood, or the pain, or the possibility of losing myself — though those were real.

It was everything that came after.

I didn’t know where I’d land in the hierarchy. Whether I’d have any real power or be everyone’s bitch.