Page 9

“I do not care what comes after; I have seen the dragons on the wind of morning.”

—Ursula K. Le Guin, The Farthest Shore

Such a simple request.

And yet, Ben’s entire body felt lightning-struck.

He wanted her.

He wanted her more than anything in this world.

In this universe.

Across time and space, there had never been, and never would be, another.

Only her.

With a mind of their own, his hands lifted slowly, his fingertips starting from her small wrists, barely glancing as they traveled up her bare arms.

He watched his hands as they went, felt the sparks that crackled in their wake all across her silky skin.

Raising goosebumps. Making her tremble.

She was mesmerized and paralyzed between the span of his hands, shivering under his barely-there touch, like a woman bespelled in truth.

Enthralled by him.

The power he held over her at once humbled and enflamed him. He wanted more. He wanted her so addicted and obsessed she couldn’t draw air unless it was his breath that fed her. His scent that infused her with life.

Slowly, his hands arrived at her shoulders, traveled up the long, graceful column of her neck to her face. He cupped her with both hands, her head so small and fragile in his calloused palms.

“This has to be the slowest kiss in the history of kisses,” she whispered, staring unblinkingly up at him as he leaned down to her.

“If you don’t take it soon, I might have to come get it myself.”

Ben smiled with his eyes.

He couldn’t help it. Despite how aroused he was by just her nearness, her scent, the softness of her skin, he felt playful too.

Rarely did he feel this way with her past incarnations. She’d always demanded and taken from him, though he willingly gave her all. There’d always been a seething darkness within her. A deep-rooted fury and pain that she transferred to him. He’d gladly shared her burden.

But…

Whether she intended to or not, she’d hurt him, body, heart and soul.

Yet now, even her threats amused him, for there was only joy in her voice, in her eyes. He knew without a doubt that even when she took, she’d always give back in equal measure.

He was safe with this version of her.

The best version of her.

“If I kiss you, Lizzy mine, I want something in return,” he said, lightly stroking the blades of her cheekbones with his thumbs, full of wonder at the smooth ivory of her skin, yet petal soft at the same time.

“I thought you were giving me a gift,” she reminded him. “You didn’t mention it would cost me.”

“The kiss is free,” he assured her. “All of me is free to you. You can have whatever you want of me, however you want it.”

Her hands did some wandering of their own at that, her eyes glinting with an intense new light, despite the solar eclipse of her pupils. They started at his waist, then traveled slowly up his abdomen and chest, making him lose his breath.

Lose his mind.

Finally, they wound around his neck, though she had to stand on tiptoe to link her fingers loosely together at his nape, for he was over a head taller than her even in her high heels.

“Name it, then, Dr. D’Angelo,” she said, pulling on him until their mouths were a hair’s breadth apart.

“I grow impatient.”

Her lashes fluttered down, eyes homing in on his mouth.

“I want you so much,” she murmured helplessly.

He gazed down into her lovely face, wondering how much to say. If this was the right time to say it.

She did not know him in this life. She didn’t remember. And when she did…

His Lizzy, this innocent, pure, well-loved version of her, would struggle with the past. With what she’d done and the lives she’d changed.

It haunted him still, the final moments before he lost her thirty years ago.

He could have sworn he almost reached her. If she had just stretched out her hand, any part of her. If only she’d wanted to be reached.

Saved.

She’d chosen certain death to save them all instead. To encapsulate and absorb her darker self and take them both beyond the human realm.

She’d chosen to leave him.

Why hadn’t she fought harder? He loved all of her, always, even the darkness and the pain.

“Don’t be afraid,” he finally said.

She raised her eyes to look into his again.

“I’m not. For some reason, warrior angel and Immortals aside, none of this worries me. On the contrary, things finally make sense. I was right—dragons do exist.”

At this, she beamed at him, effervescent with joy.

“That’s not what I mean,” he said gently.

“Don’t be afraid of what is between us. That’s all I ask. Let yourself feel…everything. The good and the bad.”

She blinked up at him.

“Bad? Are you telling me you’re a poor kisser, Benjamin?”

He couldn’t help but smile again, this time with a slightly dangerous glint in his eyes.

“Don’t be afraid to hurt me when the time comes,” he said. “It will be worth it. I believe in you.”

At this, her eyes grew doubtful, so he distracted her with a soft press of lips against lips, making her gasp and open against him.

“As to what kind of kisser I am, you be the judge,” he rasped against her mouth—

Before taking her fully, voluptuously, slowly undulating his tongue inside her wet, welcoming warmth.

~ * ~ * ~ * ~ * ~ * ~ * ~ * ~

Oh, the man could kiss!

Every coherent thought flew out of Lizzy’s head like a flock of startled birds. They might never return again if he kept this up.

Firm yet soft lips on hers. Sleek tongue mating with her own, mirroring so blatantly the act of sex Lizzy could have sworn he was already inside her, thrusting ardently between her thighs.

He tasted fresh and sweet, yet ripe with sin. Like decadent dark chocolate melted to a smooth cream sprinkled with salt.

She might have climbed his body like a frisky monkey, she didn’t know. She just knew that, one moment, she was stretching up to him on tiptoes, and the next she had her legs wrapped around his waist, her ankles hooked tightly against the small of his back, right above the rise of the round, muscular globes of his ass.

Her best friend Meg always said that men with powerful buttocks possessed powerful thrusts. They were likely well developed in their nether regions, front and back. It was why Meg had always been an ass woman, and her fetish became contagious.

Because now that Lizzy could literally rest her ankles on the sturdy curve of his ass like he was built just so she could put her feet there, she was an ass woman for life.

She plastered her entire front to his as tightly as she could. Her boobs felt heavy and sensitive mashed up against the granite hardness of his pecs. It didn’t sound comfortable when she thought about it, but nothing could tear her away.

That’s what her boobs were made for, after all, to yield against the rugged terrain of his magnificent chest.

The core of her was notched exactly where it should be. Riding and grinding on the head of his dragon-sized cock. A part of her was nervous about their fit (and yes, she was definitely getting ahead of herself making assumptions about where this would go). But a bigger part of her was excited to find out.

And to try, try again if things didn’t work perfectly the first time. Until she broke him in, or vice versa.

He was fully clothed, and so was she. Her dress was tangled around her thighs, and his steel pipe of an erection was trapped against his stomach. But even through all those layers, she felt the inexorable hardness of him, full and demanding, thick and long.

She ground down on him, rocking her hips, moaning into his mouth at how deliciously good it felt.

He answered by deepening their kiss, one hand holding her lower body against him, carrying all of her weight, the other fisting in her hair, keeping her where he wanted her.

Distantly, she was aware of him carrying her off the rooftop and down the stairs. His strides rocked them together naturally, grinding his hardness where she needed him most.

Whimpering against him, she began to shake, her body already unraveling, on the verge of flying apart.

He moved faster then, and before she knew it, they’d arrived at the door to a hotel room. Whether his or hers, she didn’t care. She was only aware that they were on a bed now, and she was gloriously pinned beneath his big body.

The kiss never broke, not for a single second. He was thrusting slowly against her, the clothes that still separated them bedamned. It didn’t matter. Her clit throbbed and swelled and her breath released in a long, shuddering swoosh as her body quaked in the throes of a gentle climax, like waves rushing against a sandy shore.

His kiss gentled too as her orgasm ebbed to a warm, electric tingle throughout her body, making her skin hypersensitive. He lapped and nibbled at her lips now, then sprinkled tiny kisses over her cheeks and eyes and jaw.

“Oh,” she said inarticulately.

As if the pleasure had been an unexpected delight. A magical spell only he could cast over her.

“Thank you very much,” she managed to get out between deep, satisfied sighs.

“Best birthday kiss ever.”

His quiet laugh rumbled through his body and into hers. She felt more than heard it.

“I’m not done.”

Oh .

Her voice evaporated on that particular “oh,” despite her mouth opening to speak it.

Slowly, like a great leonine beast, he knelt over her and began to undo the buttons of his shirt one by one.

She scooted back as much as she was able so her head was propped up by a mountain of pillows to better watch the show.

With a roll of his broad shoulders and a casual shrug, the shirt obediently fell off of him, but not before caressing his arms and back like a jealous lover.

Gracious.

Lizzy didn’t know quite where to look. She’d never seen such primal male magnificence displayed so blatantly before her. Close enough to touch. Close enough that she felt the tantalizing heat of his body. She’d never even seen anything like him on TV or in magazines.

He was unreal .

The breadth and depth of his shoulders and chest defied description. Like he was carved from stone and steel, but covered with satiny golden skin dusted with soft, terribly manly hair.

Lizzy had never been one to gravitate toward hairy men (not that Ben was by any means a bear). She always thought she liked the smoothness of Asian men, for example, while preferring the shape of Latin men.

Ben was something else. Something indescribable.

Whatever the case, she absolutely adored all of his hair—from the tousled long waves on his head, to the thick tufts in his armpits, to the light dusting across his impressive pectorals, to the narrowing line that bisected the numerous quadrants of his abdomen.

A mysterious line that disappeared into the waistband of his slacks.

She licked her lips, wanting to follow it down.

His beastly erection jutted out from his groin, tenting his pants. She could clearly see a darker area at the head of him—the wetness of his seed.

She licked her lips again, wanting to taste it. Wondering if he was salty, spicy or sweet. Probably all of the above. And she knew, without a doubt, that she would love the taste of him. She wouldn’t be able to get enough.

Never enough.

He unbuttoned his slacks enough to give his erection more breathing room, but he didn’t remove his pants entirely.

And glory days! He wasn’t wearing underwear!

She could see the narrow line of dark golden hair fan out into a thicker fleece that was hidden in the shadows of his gaping slacks.

“Don’t stop,” she whispered desperately when he didn’t finish undressing.

“I won’t.”

She was still staring at the shadowed V of his groin so she didn’t look at his face, but she heard the smile in his voice.

Just as leisurely, as if he had all the time in the world, he began to tug the white dress off her body, untangling it from her legs, easing it out from under her butt, and finally pulling it over her head, then tossing it somewhere over his shoulder.

She saw it flutter to the ground like a white flag of surrender.

The heat in his eyes as he looked down at her ratcheted to a whole new level of intensity. And though his movements were still slow and languid, she saw the impatience and burgeoning need building in his eyes, in the subtle clench of his jaw.

She’d never in her existence felt so unequivocally desired as when Ben held her captive in his sights. Even her well-worn Fruit of the Loom bra and panties didn’t detract from it. She wasn’t even embarrassed that she wasn’t wearing more enticing lingerie (she did pack the one set she owned, a purchase made during a moment of madness during a Victoria’s Secret sale).

He made her feel like a goddess with his gaze alone.

“Take them off,” he commanded roughly, his voice deeper and huskier than she’d ever heard it.

Uhn.

She could get off on just hearing him talk. Everything about this man turned her on to heretofore unimagined levels.

Lizzy didn’t think she was a particularly sexual person, but right here, right now, she was discovering a whole new side of herself.

He gave her just enough wiggle room to hook her fingers under the cotton waistband of her underwear and shimmy it down her thighs. He helped her the rest of the way by whisking it right off of her as if it was flimsy tissue paper.

Under the intensity of his perusal, it might as well have been.

She arched her back to get at the hooks of her bra next, and the moment that was done, he flicked the last of her covering away.

The heat in his eyes roared to volcanic levels. Though his pupils almost entirely swallowed the light blue-green ring of his irises, somehow the effect only made them burn brighter. As if his aquamarine eyes glowed from the inside out.

She didn’t even think about covering herself as he blatantly and thoroughly stared down at her, taking her in. She could see the blazing desire he held in check, and it made her bold. Gave her confidence.

She didn’t worry about her smallish B-cup boobs (C on her period) or her unkempt bush, because he clearly found her excessively arousing to look at, if the way his erection jutted and kicked against his trousers was any indication.

Like it had a mind of its own.

Like a stallion trying to kick his way out of his pen to get to a mare in heat.

Her analogies needed work. Where did all these lurid thoughts come from?

She shook a little with a suppressed giggle. As turned on as she was, as desperate for his sex as she was, she was somehow perfectly at ease too.

He made her that way. He gave her the space to just be her goofy self.

An answering amusement glinted in his eyes, mingling gloriously with his desire and need.

“Now,” he practically growled.

She rather suspected that he added a throaty rumble to the word on purpose, to tease her.

Ignite her.

“I can kiss you properly.”

Lordy!

Did that mean that the past ten minutes… or half hour of kissing was only warm up?

He was liable to kill her with lust if things continued at this rate.

“Get to it then, Dr. Dragon,” she spurred him on with a smile.

“Kiss me everywhere.”

So, he did.

With the same infinite patience and slow thoroughness, he kissed his way from her lips, down her throat, and paid homage to each of her meager breasts. There, he lingered, making sure he gave equal attention to both of her sensitive nipples, sucking on them softly, gently nipping and lapping.

Until they grew to hard little buds and somehow became invisibly linked to her clitoris. Because every time he blew on them and licked and sucked, she felt it down below. Making her channel flood with wetness, slicking the skin between her thighs.

More than that, somehow, those naughty little buds became clitorises themselves. Or, at least, it felt that way. Three clits on her body being loved on by a masterful man.

A diabolical man.

He was driving her insane.

Another soft wave of ecstasy washed unexpectedly over her, making her flush hot from the center of her body to every extremity.

As she shuddered and sighed, he kept on “kissing.”

While she deplored his leaving her swollen, sensitive breasts, her stomach and ribs enjoyed his meticulous attention too. The way he dipped the tip of his tongue into her belly button…

Who knew belly buttons could be attached to a woman’s vagina?

Lizzy certainly never knew. But clearly, hers was.

Because the tongue-fucking he gave her navel felt like he was thrusting into her elsewhere. Where she needed him the most.

Her empty, now overflowing core pulsed demandingly. Wanting something thick and hard to fill her. Wanting something hot and long to squeeze.

“Ben…”

Her hands clawed into his soft, luxurious mane as he licked and kissed his way to her pussy. Her thighs splayed wide to give him better access. There was not an ounce of modesty left in her. She didn’t stop to think about her wanton behavior; she simply opened and begged for his entry.

His big, calloused hands held her still as he plundered and pleasured, though she couldn’t have moved if the room was on fire.

At last, he was right there .

His mouth made love to her pussy the way he’d made love to her lips earlier. Softly sucking at first, plumping her folds. But then, he became demanding, his tongue laving her seam and licking deeper and deeper inside with each pass.

Until he was thrusting into her with measured undulations, his tongue firm and sleek.

And…long?

Lizzy gasped as she felt him reach places she never would have guessed he could reach. And honestly, never realized she possessed inside of her. It was anatomically impossible.

For a human man.

But he wasn’t quite human, was he. He said before that he could transform any part of his body into Beast form. Did that mean…?

The way he kept thrusting against that spot inside her made her lose her train of thought. And she really lost it when he added his thumb to her clit, strumming it lightly like the most delicate instrument.

Before she knew it, another tidal wave of euphoria swept her under, this one bigger than the first two. Making her shake and quake, making her leak more wetness and tingle all over as if tiny tongues of flames were licking across her skin.

Noises she’d never made before in her life came tumbling out of her throat. Animalistic sounds. Desperate begging sounds.

“Please please please please please…”

She was literally begging, though she wasn’t even conscious of it. She simply thrashed her head back and forth across the satin pillows like a mad woman. Her hands pulled at his hair, gripping tight.

Somehow, he freed himself from her clutches easily. He laved at her throbbing clit as she came down from her crescendo, letting her orgasm slowly ebb through her, before moving back up her body, kissing leisurely as he went.

And when his mouth made it to her own again, she grabbed his head with both hands and plundered him the way he’d plundered her, dueling their tongues together, plunging deep. Tasting him and tasting herself. It was the most addictive combination.

Belatedly, she realized she was sobbing, actually crying against his mouth, her salty tears mixed with his delicious sweetness.

“I want I want I want I want…”

She was blubbering a litany of half-baked thoughts. And so desperate, so needy, she was crying like a lost little girl about it.

She wasn’t even embarrassed. She was beyond that.

She wanted and needed and craved and demanded.

She wrapped her legs tightly around his still clothed hips, using her heels to try to kick those confounded trousers off his magnificent ass.

He pressed down on her with the weight of his body then, and she only realized as he did so how much he’d held off of her before. She was good and pinned beneath him. She couldn’t move.

Finally, he broke their kiss and levered slightly away from her, allowing him to look down into her lust-crazed eyes.

“I know what you want,” he husked low.

One of his hands cupped her face, his thumb brushing idly across her cheekbone, over and over in a gentle caress.

“You shall have it,” he promised. “You shall have all of me.”

She beamed hopefully up at him.

“But not tonight.”

Her face immediately fell.

She must have looked funny, because he smiled crookedly at her, though she could see shadows in his eyes at the same time.

She didn’t like those shadows. Who put them there?

“Give me more time,” he said gently. “Give us more time, sweetheart. It would…it would hurt me if you don’t feel the same.”

She didn’t like the sound of that at all.

“I don’t want to hurt you, Ben,” she said staunchly, as if her conviction in her words could stop any such thing from happening.

His smile turned wry and a little sad.

“I know, baby. I know.”

Maybe it was the lulling deepness of his voice. Or it could also be the three transformative yet relaxing orgasms he gave her. She let out a mewling yawn though she tried to keep it inside. She didn’t want this night to end.

He kissed her lips one last time, just a brief affectionate peck, before turning them onto their sides and pulling her into the warm, protective cradle of his body.

“Sleep now, birthday girl,” he murmured beside her ear.

“I’ll be here when you wake up.”

“Promise?” she mumbled like a little girl in truth.

“Mmm,” was his throaty, rumbly reply.

“Goodnight, Dr. Dragon,” she said. “Thank you for the birthday present. Best day ever.”

A soft laugh shook through him, and by extension, through her.

She loved feeling his laughs.

“Goodnight, Lizzy mine,” he replied.

“See you in dreams.”

And, she did.

It was the baritone or bass toned humming that teased her awake.

Lizzy slowly blinked her eyes open, mulling over whether his voice was baritone or bass. She felt like he could reach into the deepest of deep when he wanted to, when he growled or purred. But his voice also contained the smoothness of the low end of a baritone, like satin over steel.

She simply lay there in their comfy bed (and it was theirs) watching and listening to him hum a gorgeous, soothing melody by the window, the dawning light behind him wreathing him in a golden glow, blurring his features.

That was her male right there. She knew it to be true to the roots of her soul.

Even though she didn’t feel entirely herself just now.

There was a strange darkness and weight inside of her. Making her feel heavy. Angry and sad. It wasn’t something Lizzy ever felt before. She was too well-loved to feel so burdened.

Yet, looking at him holding a precious bundle securely in his arms, slightly rocking, humming low, there was also an irrepressible joy bubbling within her, impatient to burst forth.

He turned slightly toward her, though she still couldn’t see his face clearly.

“How did you sleep, my love? The ill kept you late. You must take better care of yourself.”

“You know I never get sick,” she said.

And it sounded like something she often said to reassure him, for he worried about her when she was out there doctoring alone while he worked long shifts at the stone mason’s.

“Even so,” he said.

“You should have woken me before…” she trailed off, looking pointedly at the bundle in his arms.

Before the babe required her papa’s undivided attention , went unsaid.

Lizzy didn’t think she was capable of it, but for some reason, she felt just a tinge of jealousy at the infant. “Papa” might love her even more than Lizzy, and that kind of chafed.

Then, she shook herself internally.

What the heck?

Never in her life had she ever begrudged the love and attention given to another from someone she admired.

Case in point, her dad. She knew without a doubt that she was unconditionally loved by Mom and Dad. But she also knew that before they were Mom and Dad, they were Serena Lin and David Winters. Woman and man.

Her parents loved each other first and foremost. Because they were soulmates. Their love was infinite, while Lizzy was lucky enough to be loved for a lifetime by such generous, kind hearted people.

But just now, she knew she felt jealous of the babe he held. The emotion was both foreign to her and fundamentally a part of her.

This was a strange dream. Unlike any she’d had before.

He smiled softly at her, though she couldn’t make out his eyes, only the curve of his lips.

“You were tired, sweetheart. I wanted you to rest.”

“Well, I didn’t want to rest if I could have gotten some toe-curling lovin’,” she complained beneath her breath.

But he heard her anyway, for a resonant laugh rumbled out of his chest.

“I will make it up to you when Titi naps, I promise.”

Titi .

She knew that name.

It was strange to hear a specific name mentioned in her dream, but there it was.

In fact, she even knew that Titi was short for Ninti.

He gave their daughter that name.

Lady of Light.

He called Ninti the light of their lives.

But he was her light.

Lizzy’s light.

He’d always been and always would be.

She wanted and needed and craved him desperately.

Obsessively.

Seethingly.

The strange darkness inside of her grew along with an increasing sense of panic that she would someday lose him.

She couldn’t! He was her person! The way Dad was for Mom.

“Shhh,” he murmured.

Somehow, he was there beside her, sitting on their bed. She hadn’t even seen him move. His fingers stroked the hair back from her forehead while he still cradled the babe in the crook of his other arm.

“I’m here, love. You’ll never lose me.”

How did he know what she thought and feared? Could he hear her thoughts?

“Is this a dream?” she whispered, a sneaking suspicion spreading through her veins like ice.

“No, love,” he said.

“This is a memory…”