Page 7 of Messy AF (At First #3)

seven

~ Tobias ~

T he moment I opened my eyes the following morning, I knew something had changed.

Okay, to be fair, everything in my life had changed, but this felt different.

The low-level exhaustion that had been my constant companion for weeks had vanished. The subtle nausea that always plagued me didn’t exist. For once, movement didn’t feel like wading through soup, and even my limbs felt lighter, no longer weighed down by fatigue.

Sitting up on the side of the bed, I waited for the dizziness to hit, but it never came. I pushed to my feet, bending a couple of times at the knees. My legs didn’t wobble. The muscles in my thighs and calves didn’t cramp.

Even the brain fog had been burned away in the night, that haze of mild confusion lifting, bringing both the outside world and my inner thoughts into sharper focus.

“It’s over,” I whispered out loud. My heart fluttered, and giddy laughter bubbled from my lips as relief rushed over me. “It’s really over.”

Eager to share the news with my mate, I bolted from the room and hurried down the hallway, even the simple act of jogging bringing me a special kind of joy.

While we spent every waking moment together, Warren still insisted on sleeping in the guestroom at night. He had said something about giving me space to recover, but I suspected he did it because he found it hard to be near me, especially in such an intimate way.

We still kissed and held hands. We cuddled on the sofa and embraced every chance we had. Sadly, we had also been forced to limit the extent of our intimacy. Strong emotions triggered more intense episodes of my symptoms, which meant I could barely kiss him without passing out or getting dizzy.

Anything beyond a brush of lips set my heart racing. If we kept going, I ended up either clutching my head or unconscious in his arms. Needless to say, that kind of put a damper on clothing-optional activities.

Until now.

Without knocking or waiting for an invitation, I barged through the door of the guestroom, calling my mate’s name as I leapt onto the bed.

“Wake up! Warren, it’s over. It’s actually over.” I crawled on top of him, straddling his hips through the comforter that blanketed his big frame. “Warren, did you hear me?”

“Kind of hard not to,” he answered, slow and groggy. “You’re so loud the neighbors probably heard you.”

Pushing my knees into the mattress, I bounced on top of him, shaking him, trying to get him to stir. “Warren, you’re not listening! I’m trying to tell you that it’s over. I’m better. All the side effects are gone.”

Though he still didn’t open his eyes, his hands came to rest atop my thighs, his fingers brushing up and down the bare skin. “Angel, I assure you I’m listening.”

“Really?” I challenged. “Then what did I say?”

“It’s over,” he mumbled. “You said it’s over. You said the side effects are—”

His eyes snapped open, and he stared up at me, all remnants of sleep vanishing in an instant.

“Yes.” I bobbed my head excitedly, filled with a happiness I could barely contain.

Warren shot up in the bed, the movement so fluid and swift that he went from prone to upright in less time than it took me to blink.

“You’re serious?” The tips of his fingers dug into my thighs, his grip tight and perfect. “The dizziness, the fatigue?”

“Gone. It’s all gone.”

“That’s…I…”

When words failed him, he palmed the back of my neck, pulling me in as he crushed our mouths together. He didn’t just kiss me either. He ate at me, biting and licking before plunging between my lips, every stroke of his tongue filled with hunger and desperation.

My pulse immediately shot into the red zone, my heart pounding out a hard tattoo against my ribs. I grabbed at his shoulders, my fingers biting into the hard muscles, trying to steady myself as I gasped for breath.

He had always been so careful with me, so reserved, every action a reflection of how fragile I’d been. But there was no hesitation in his touch now.

He held me roughly, his hands groping and searching. Gone was the tentative whisper of lips or the cautiously measured control. Now, he kissed me with a dark possessiveness, taking what I had been too weak to offer him before.

Now, he kissed me like he owned me.

I couldn’t breathe, couldn’t think. My head spun, not from some janky sleep potion, but with the dizziness of desire. I absorbed every touch, every growl, taking in every raw emotion until I felt drunk on him.

The hand on my thigh traveled up my torso, rubbing and caressing, fanning the flames until the fire consumed me. Warren’s fingers danced over my collarbones, then up the column of my throat, where he gripped my jaw, forcing my head to the side.

Kiss broken, I panted fast and shallow, my chest heaving and my body trembling. He nibbled along my jaw, tracing the curve with his lips, then caught my earlobe between his teeth with a low growl and tugged.

“Still okay?” he rasped.

My lungs ached, and every nerve ending sparked like a live wire, but if he needed me to burn for him, I could do that. “Still okay.”

“I want you, angel.” He scraped the tips of his fangs down the side of my neck, then retraced the path with his tongue to pacify the sting. “I want you right here. Right now.” His mouth closed around the jumping vein in my throat, sucking the skin between his lips. “Say yes.”

As if it could ever be anything else.

“Yes,” I gasped. “Yes.”

Locking an arm around my waist, he lifted me easily and ripped the comforter away, tossing it to the floor before lowering me back into his naked lap.

My hiss ended in a strangled moan when our erections slid together, and a deep, involuntary shudder racked my frame at the feel of his hard, hot body pressed against mine.

“Hurry,” I breathed.

I felt like I had been hovering on the edge all week, wound tight and stretched thin, and I couldn’t wait any longer. A steady thrum pulsed through me, my muscles vibrating with expectation, and my cock throbbed, spilling precum that smeared across the skin of my mate’s abs.

“Please, Warren.” I clutched at his shoulders, needy and frantic. “I can’t…I can’t…”

A growl rumbled in his chest, predatory and filled with dangerous promises. “Easy, angel.” Leaning back, he looked into my eyes, his stormy irises ringed with that crimson light I had come to associate with intense emotion. “Don’t I always take care of you?”

Smooth and effortless, he leaned back, his shoulders hovering a few inches from the mattress as he stretched to the side, reaching for the nightstand. He didn’t fumble clumsily in the drawer, but simply reached inside, every movement confident and precise.

Then he was back, his mouth on mine again, sucking and nibbling, swallowing down every answering moan.

Lost in him, drowning in sensations, I arched back with a quiet whimper when a slick finger slid down my crease and tapped at my entrance. He entered me slowly, pressing in to the first knuckle while he continued to distract me with hungry kisses and dark growls.

Pushing against his hand to take the digit deeper, I groaned into his mouth, eager to be closer, to feel more of him. Warren didn’t rush, though, every glide of his finger into my channel controlled and methodical, coaxing and stretching the tight muscles.

One finger became two, and the pressure built, swelling inside me until I thought I might burst from it. By the time he had three sawing in and out of my greedy hole, I couldn’t think. Fuck, I couldn’t even remember my own name anymore.

“Please, Warren,” I gasped, my breath harsh and ragged.

My cock pulsed between us, trapped and aching, the friction against his heated skin sending a jolt of desire up my spine. I needed him. I needed the release that only he could give me.

At the same time, I didn’t know if I would survive it.

I was willing to accept that risk.

Warren eased his fingers free, leaving me feeling empty, but he didn’t make me wait long. Lifting me easily from his lap, he fisted the base of his cock, holding it upright as he positioned the crown at my entrance.

“Slow,” he warned, tightening his hold when I tried to take him deeper.

He guided me over his thick length, lowering me in increments as I sank over him, and we both paused, brows pressed together and breaths merging when I bottomed out. Fuck, he was big, his shaft invading and filling me, parting the tight muscles with a delicious burn.

Once the initial intensity faded, I started to move, cautiously at first, rocking my hips in small, testing movements.

The bite of pain lessened with every stroke, the pressure subsiding to manageable levels.

Only then did I set up a steadier rhythm, rising and falling, taking him deeper on every plunge.

“You are so fucking beautiful,” Warren growled, his hands roaming my body, stoking the flames. “So soft. So perfect.”

His words, spoken in that rough, gravelly voice, only pushed me higher, dragging me right to the brink. I moved faster but with less coordination, need contracting my muscles and making me shaky and clumsy.

As always, Warren knew exactly what I needed.

Flipping our positions, he rolled me beneath him, the move so fast I didn’t even realize it had happened until I felt my back press against the mattress. Frantic and aching, I locked my legs around his hips and arched into him, chasing a high that felt just beyond my reach.

My mate matched my intensity, slamming into me with a guttural growl that echoed around the small room. This time, he didn’t hold back, setting a punishing tempo and demanding I keep pace with him.

My heart pounded, and my ears rang, a loud buzz filling my head as I felt the familiar signs of impending orgasm barreling toward me. Reaching between our sweat-slicked bodies, I fisted my cock, stroking hard and fast to the rhythm of Warren’s thrusts.

Perched on the edge, desperate to fall, I stared into his eyes. Whether seeking approval, permission, or something else, I didn’t know. He watched me, an array of emotions flickering across his face, one morphing into the other, too fast for me to name.

The light swelled, the scarlet glow flaring brighter and more intense than I had ever seen it. Then his gaze flickered to my throat, to the little hollow where my neck met my shoulder.

He didn’t speak, didn’t ask, but I instinctively understood what he wanted, and I was only too happy to give it.

Turning my head to the side, baring both my heart and my neck, I surrendered fully and willingly. His answering growl vibrated in his chest as he leaned over me, skimming his nose along the pulsing vein.

“Mine. You are mine, Tobias Hayes. Only mine.”

“Only yours.”

My eyes rolled back in my head when he struck, his sharp canines sliding through the skin with practiced ease. It didn’t hurt like I had expected. Not even a pinch. Instead, his bite sent a surge of heat washing through me that went straight to my groin.

He drank greedily with long, deep pulls on my neck, but he didn’t linger. When his mouth covered mine again, his tongue sliding past my lips, I groaned as I tasted my own blood in the kiss.

I swallowed, feeling something snap inside me, like the final missing piece of a puzzle. Then I was flying, soaring over the edge and tumbling into the void.

Unable to hold back any longer, I arched my neck and shouted Warren’s name as I detonated. Every muscle in my body tensed, and I bowed up from the bed, shaking through my climax as I painted the space between us in long ropes of cum.

Warren followed after me, pumping hard and fast, his roar of completion vibrating the windowpanes as he spilled into me, flooding my depths with his release.

We collapsed together in a tangle of limbs, Warren peppering soft kisses over my face as I gasped for air. He held me tight, steadying me, anchoring me through the aftershocks until my pulse returned to a less dangerous rhythm.

I had barely caught my breath when I felt a sharp sting, right in the center of my palm. Lifting my hand, I stared in disbelief as glittering light danced across my skin, twisting and spiraling, winding itself into an intricate pattern across my hand.

“Oh, wow,” I said, my tone hushed and reverent.

Warren held his hand up next to mine, revealing the matching tattoo on his own palm. “Forever.”

“Forever,” I echoed, grinning as I rolled into him for a kiss. “I love you, Warren.”

“I love you, too, angel.” His arm came around my shoulders, ushering me closer. “Thank you.”

My eyebrows drew together, though my smile didn’t dim. “You’re welcome, but why are you thanking me?”

He curled around me, pressing his lips to my temple with a contented sigh. “For being mine.”