doubts or worries—release them to me.” He ran his teeth up my throat, and I shivered. He kissed my lips firmly before sweeping his tongue through my mouth. His thrust drove the air from my lungs. “I will hold all of that for you.” He started to move, his eyes on mine, so intense. “I will hold your concerns and your fears so that you can focus on kicking ass. Trust me, Jacinta.”
I sighed, arching back, wrapping my legs around him.
“Mmm,” he said, his thrusts a little harder, a little fiercer, pounding his need into me, giving me a promise of protection.
His heart within my chest thudded a steady rhythm. Something deep inside of me moved, yearned to break free. To explode outward. I swung my hips toward him, feeling my control ebb. Feeling the pleasure build.
“That’s right, baby,” he growled into my ear, striving harder, driving the exquisite bliss through me.
“Harder,” I groaned, out of breath, clutching onto him tightly. He was the only thing in the world at that moment. I lost myself in him, giving myself to him so totally that I didn’t have to think. That I couldn’t think.
My body wound tighter. The sensations rose higher until passion flooded me with a sweet release. I shuddered against him as he quaked above, panting.
He took only a moment to gather himself.
“This is the first time I’m not on call,” he said. “Nothing will interrupt us tonight. I can completely give in to this never-ending craving for you.” He lifted up between my thighs, his delicious body glistening. “Which position would you like next? Pick any one you want. We’ll get through them all before I pound that stress out of you, I think.” But he didn’t wait for an answer. He just sat on the bed and pulled me up on top of him. I wasn’t surprised to feel he was already hard again, already ready for me. “How about this one?” He kissed me deeply as he guided his hardness into me. Against my lips he murmured, “Are you ready to tell me how you feel yet?”
Just the mention of it made me constrict my arms around him. I jerked my hips, grinding against him. I yanked his head back by his hair and harshly dragged my teeth up his throat.
He shuddered. “Hmm, that’s how it’s going to be, is it?” I could hear the excitement in his words. “So be it.”
He trapped me to him, lifted me a bit, and then hammered into me, over and over, driving the pleasure deep. Inwardly smiling, outwardly grunting with the onslaught, I slipped into the feeling and said goodbye to reality. I’d deal with our situation tomorrow. Tonight I’d think of nothing else but Austin.
Fifteen
“What’s our status?” I stood in the center of the common area and popped the best truffle in the world into my mouth.
Austin had urged me to keep all the stuff in the gift basket. According to him, I could chalk it up to collecting my dues for all of the mage’s badgering, treat the gifts as participation trophies for bothering to show, or assign no emotion to them at all and immediately forget where I’d gotten them. Thanks for the goods, what was your name again?
Given that literally no one else had any reservations about keeping their gifts, each having been given one or two things perfectly suited to their interests and taste, I’d decided to compromise. I would pick and choose a few things to keep. The truffles were the first things out of the basket.
Cyra jogged out of the hallway that led to the rooms, dressed in a black pantsuit with a ruby pin on her lapel. Designed to look like a phoenix shedding flames, it was her gift from Elliot Graves: a magical memento that would help her control her fire shedding after rebirths.
His thoughtfulness was starting to get on my nerves.
Brochan emerged from the hallway in a black suit with a red pocket square. As he came closer, he gave me a once-over before minutely nodding—and then immediately tensed.
“I apologize, Miss Ironheart,” he murmured, veering to the side and turning, clasping his hands in front of him and looking straight ahead.
“For what?” I asked.
“Force of habit.”
“What’s a force of habit?”
Edgar lingered in the far corner, ready and waiting. Niamh was back by the fridge, hunting for food or beer. Everyone else was still getting ready for the day, their slow speed indicative of the danger they thought we’d run