Page 26 of Until the End of Ever (To the Cruel Gods #2)

KLEOS

I couldn’t stop staring. I would have rather died than move a muscle and ruin this.

Sometime last night, Lucian had removed and carefully folded his clothes on the bedside table before climbing into bed next to me.

One of his arms was thrown over my waist, pulling me right against his chest. I could feel his heartbeat, nice and slow, right against mine, which drummed so hard it thumped in my ears.

Lucian looked younger, less like a posh Machiavellian know-it-all, and as devastatingly gorgeous as usual.

It came as a surprise to me that he was also very warm. And his smell . I was going to have to demand a bottle of the body wash he’d made to archive this perfect scent.

“Rise and shine!” a voice called, from what sounded like far away, followed by a knock on the door.

Except the knock seemed muffled. I blushed, guessing Lucian must have silenced the room, making sounds from within imperceptible to those outside, and those coming from without less intense—a trick I never quite got down. I didn’t even notice him doing it.

Thank all the gods for Lucian and his insufferably consistent excellence. I flushed, remembering all the noises he wrenched out of me. I didn’t even stop to think that we were in his parents’ house.

“Five more minutes,” Lucian grumbled, eyes still closed, his arm pressing me harder against his chest.

Great, he had to add adorable to his endless list of attractive qualities. Unfair, really.

“I know it’s early for you, Luce, but you did agree to take Elias to his test,” Cassiopea called, low behind the sound barrier.

Lucian grunted, pointedly refusing to open his eyes as he rolled over, taking me with him. I chuckled, landing on top of him.

“I’m not made for mornings,” he grumbled, in the closest imitation of grumpiness that he could manage.

“ No .” I feigned surprise. “Never noticed.”

“Cheeky witch.” He cracked one eye open with a smile. “You know, I can think of a thing or two that might make mornings more appealing.”

He shifted slightly, and all of a sudden, I was right against a hot, hard length, nestled against my stomach.

It was embarrassingly sudden and intense: without any notice, I was soaking the panties I’d fallen asleep in.

It was my turn to groan. “Your mother said you’re supposed to take Elias to a test?”

“Mmhmm.” His hand cupped my face, then slowly made its way down to my neck, my arm, the side of my breasts, causing shivers in its wake.

“—she made it sound like we were late?”

“Potentially.” Lucian was fully awake, those silver-gray eyes fixed on me. “But I’ll tell you a secret.”

In one smooth move, he turned, switching our positions until my back was pressed against the mattress while he hovered over me. I half yelped, half laughed.

“The president’s my best friend,” he whispered, slowly running his hand along my torso, then my underwear. “He'll understand when I explain we were otherwise engaged.”

My walls clenched in anticipation as I watched him peel the fabric from me, sliding along my legs. Then his fingers were right back inside me, his thumb pressed where I most needed him. I lifted my hips, biting my lower lip.

Lucian tilted his head. “Are you going to run and hide later today?”

The question made me narrow my eyes. That again.

I didn’t run . Not really. He told me what a bond with him meant, making it abundantly clear that it wasn’t something he wanted, and I needed a minute to lick my wounded ego.

Then just yesterday—or earlier this morning—he warned me all over again when.

He made it sound like I was the one pumping the brakes at each corner when that was his move.

“Are you ?” I countered.

The dick laughed .

Sick and tired of letting him toy with me, demand my word, my agreement, my orgasms , and just letting him take it all, I sat up, freeing his cock from his white boxer briefs, and brought my mouth to the tip before he could take charge again.

I grinned as he sucked in a breath.

He had me at his mercy last night, and this morning it was my turn.

I took my time, running my tongue along his considerable length, flicking it, as my hands moved up and down.

I cupped his balls as my mouth took him in as much as I could, then sucked.

I would have smiled in satisfaction if my lips weren’t currently otherwise engaged.

“Kleos—” he said, somewhat calmly. “We’re on a schedule this morning, love. And I very much would like to make you come.”

The jerk wanted to be on top again. I didn’t move my eyes from his as I worked the length out of my mouth only long enough to say, “Nope.”

Then I went back to work. It was a matter of pride at this point. He couldn’t drive me as insane, as desperate as he did without me doing the same to him.

When Lucian’s fist tightened around my hair, I let him as I moved faster, sensing just how close he was by the way he couldn’t keep himself from moving his hips in fast shallow thrusts I matched with enthusiasm.

“I’m going to come, you damnable witch.” Lucian’s voice was deeper, darker than usual. “I’m going to come inside your mouth again. Is that what you want?”

I answered by sucking him in my throat. I knew he liked that.

“Fuck! You—you—” He couldn’t find a word strong enough, apparently. At least, not until he was grunting, bucking, and spilling himself down my throat again.

I waited until he was completely spent before easing his length out of my mouth.

“I, what?” I prompted, pleased as punch after a job very well done.

“You menace. You marvel. Take your pick.” He chuckled, tipping my chin forward. His thumb brushed my lips as he cocked an eyebrow. “Is this how you plan to settle every argument?”

I batted my lashes innocently. “Depends. Will it work?”

“Absolutely, always,” he retorted, lowering himself on all four, right above me.

I knew what he was up to when his gaze dipped to my bare crotch.

He was supposed to get Elias to school. I was supposed to tell him to go.

I didn’t. “And here I thought we weren’t supposed to use words like ‘always’ and ‘ever.’”

“ You aren’t, trouble. I, on the other hand, know exactly what I’m talking about.”

I decided that violence was the answer, and tossed the nearest pillow right at his head.

Lucian might be older, but he only had four years on me, not four hundred. He didn’t get to act like he was a wise sage.

Naturally, the dick moved fast enough to evade the projectile, all the while lifting my legs up.

“If you get to spout nonsense while naked, so do—” I. I meant to say I. Except he curved two fingers inside my folds, and what came out of me was closer to a moan.

“So very wet,” he noted, thumb circling my clit, as his fingers moved right where I needed them. “And no. The difference is, I mean my nonsense, Valesco.”

This time, grabbing his pillow, I swatter his shoulder with it. “So do I—argh!”

Within instants, his fingers were gone, replaced by his full length, completely seated inside me in one smooth move. I let go of the pillow. He smirked, knowing he’d won, lifting my legs higher.

The angle of each thrust was precisely calculated to drive me insane.

Frankly, it was a miracle I managed not to completely lose it the third time he hit my G-spot.

By sheer force of will, all while screaming bloody murder, I lasted perhaps two minutes.

Lucian kept fucking me through my first orgasm, slow and steady, unrelentingly aiming for the battered, sensitive nub inside me, and before I knew what was happening, I was clinging to him, screaming, and losing focus a second time.

At that point, he anchored himself to the bed frame and started to pound me into the mattress. It occurred to me that he’d been holding back until I’d flooded and clenched around his cock twice. Now, he chased his own pleasure.

I scratched his shoulders in my desperation to hold on. I screamed nonsense, demanding more, and perhaps purposely yelling something not unlike forever, until he shut me up with his mouth.

I was fairly certain I blacked out, only coming to as my body yet again started to convulse underneath his.

Somehow, I survived.

Lucian, the picture of health and sanity, barely winded, scooped me up into his arms and brought me to the en suite, lowering me into an empty tub before filling it with delicious warmth.

I only regained my senses when he was lathering soft foam onto my skin. “Elias—don’t you have to go?”

“No,” he replied, completely engrossed in his task.

I thought he wasn’t going to elaborate, as he waited until he’d washed my entire back before saying, “ We have to go. I talked to Ronan yesterday. We need help—fresh ideas, an outside perspective. There are a lot of very clever minds in the university. Young kids, used to learning, thinking, theorizing. I asked him to prepare a think tank for our situation.”

I sat up, frowning. “You’re sure that’s wise? To let a bunch of kids know?—”

“We’ll present it as a theoretical problem. It is a school, after all.”

I let the idea run through my mind for a moment, and slowly nodded. It couldn’t hurt. “So shouldn’t we get going?”

“I can cast a chrono-spell, you know. One of my earliest skills. I’ve always been one to stay asleep until the last possible minute.” Lucian leered at me. “Mother wisely woke us up at ten. We’re expected at one.”

I gasped. “A chrono-spell. That’s a thing?”

He snapped his fingers, and the blue ghost of a clock floated above his fingers, showing eleven fifty-three.

“ Kronubeatus ,” he told me, waving his hand to let the mist vanish.

“I’m familiar with it, so I just think it, and the time appears in my head.

That’s how I visualize it—like Cassius’s clock.

It’ll come to you in whatever form is the most natural. ”

“ Kronubeatus ,” I repeated slowly, releasing a small amount of energy. My clock was numeral, the golden numbers floating in front of my eyes, in the same script as the display on my phone. “Neat. Did you create it?”

“Gods, no. I found it in a particularly dusty Latin spellbook. It must be centuries old. I’d wager it fell out of fashion with the invention of the watch—or phones.”

“Handy all the same.”

“You can set an alarm,” he said, moving on to washing my hair. “ Kronogium . Be cautious with the level of power you give that one—it could make you hear drums in your head for a half hour and give you a hell of a migraine. But necessary, in my case, when I had to get up for the Guard.”

“You should have been given a night shift.”

“There are no protectors taking night shifts, only runners and inquisitors.”

I frowned. “Don’t most demons and whatever else protectors hunt operate mostly at night?”

“Precisely. It’s always easier to catch us evil dark dwellers during the day.” He said it with amusement, but I grimaced all the same, displeased by the unfairness of it all.

“There should be night protectors. Maybe there would be more unders in the Guard, then.”

Lucian chuckled as he rinsed my hair, gently summoning water up from the bath to wash off all the soap. “And likely precisely why the position doesn’t exist. You’re all clean, love. Hop out, it’s my turn.”

I looked up at his bare broad shoulders, reluctant to move. “I could return the favor. It was nice. You washing me.”

His smile showed all his teeth. “If you start touching me, we’re going to get dirty all over again.”

That made me want to leave even less.

“Insatiable,” he teased, reading me like an open book. “But we truly do have to get going.”

I pouted, reluctantly making myself stand. “ Fine .”

I could feel Lucian’s eyes on my naked form, taking in every inch, as though he hadn’t touched, and tasted, and seen it all before. Then his mouth was on mine, in one sudden, harsh, hard, possessive kiss that was over all too soon.

Lucian rarely seemed serious, relying on his amused affect to hide most of his thoughts, but now those gray eyes bored into mine, searching them, all lightness gone. “So we’re doing this. You’re not running this time.”

“I’m not running unless you chase me away,” I countered, still refusing to interpret my retreat on Sunday as my own doing.

He drew a line. I merely accepted it.

“I never chased you away.”

“ Learn to value your soul, ” I echoed, lowering my voice to mimic his. “ This is serious. And permanent. You made it clear you wanted neither serious or permanent with me. Which is fine. But a girl can only take so much rejection before she needs some space."

Lucian threw his head back. “May the gods spare me from stubborn witches. I was warning you. ”

“You do that a lot,” I muttered, frustrated. “Maybe pay attention to what I say instead. I like you, stubborn ass.”

He grunted, his arms circling my waist and pulling me close. But he let go. “All right. Out of here, naughty little witch, before I lock us in for the rest of the day. Wear something absolutely boring, ideally hiding every single inch of your skin, or we’ll never get anything done today.”

Armed with a fluffy towel, I made my way to the guest wardrobe, opening it, in search of the skimpiest article of clothing allowable in public Cassiopeia stored.