“You are my dream, Starr. All I have ever wanted. The bride I chased. Do you understand what this means to me?”
“Yeah.” She plunged her tongue into his mouth. “If you can think this much, I have to work harder.”
“Work harder?”
“Neither of us can believe this is real.” She stroked his hard cock. “And if I think about it too hard, I might wake up, so I want to stop thinking. I want you to lose your mind.”
He rolled over in the water, twisting with her, and tore his cock out of her clever palms. “I cannot lose my mind because it is only filled with you.”
She wrapped her thighs around his waist and canted her hips to take him.
His cock parted her sex, and he gently thrust into her.
She moaned and arched, urging him deeper. Her soft wetness encased him, squeezing him, joining with him.
Starr was chaos. Now and forever. And he was hers. So much hers.
Her chest vibrated with pleased moans. He thrust in, chasing her delicious cries.
And her softness broke and she tightened around him, shattering without a sound. Her orgasm gripped his cock and tugged hard. She went over and yanked him after her.
He unloaded his full release into her climaxing body.
She shuddered and relaxed, entangled in his limbs.
He held her close, so close, until his own shudders stopped.
A new doorway glimmered on the green wall. Their union had opened the heart chamber. He pressed their palms to the glowing green wall, and the chamber unfurled, letting them in and sealing behind them. Green sparkles zipped around the walls sheltering them so they could rest.
His world had fundamentally changed.
Starr was right that he needed not to think too hard. He needed to trust in himself, not give in to his fears or his darker urges.
She snuggled in his arms. “Are you still sad that everything had happened this way? Did you still wish that you’d stayed in Aiycaya?”
For the first time, he could honestly answer, “No.”
It was worth going through everything to have this moment right here. Other times, he had doubted that, but not now.
She tapped her fingers on his collarbone. A restless movement? Pensive, maybe.
He stroked her sinuous back. “You do not wish to rest?”
“I’m used to pulling all-nighters. And you’ve just infused me with tremendous energy.” She placed a serious kiss on his pectoral, then her contented smile flipped into a frown. “I’m so happy now that it makes me ask what I’m missing. We have to figure out a platform solution. And you have no idea what King Kadir expects you to do with the ruin? It’s a puzzle.”
An ordinary bride should be exhausted, but Starr was not ordinary. “We could visit the ruin as soon as there are warriors to convey us. Or if you are confident in your queen powers, we do not have to wait.”
“Good point.” She flexed her stubby human toes. “The Sons of Hercules got one over on me. If I’d realized early enough that the assistant had planted all those bombs, I might have been able to stop him. And I don’t want to look back on this moment and feel the same way about the All-Council. If there’s something we can do now, I want to do it.”
She was a warrior.
And so was he.
Then she yawned.
Gailen entwined with her. “We are on the brink of a great war, Starr. I will describe the puzzle to you so that you may think about it as we rest. And when the insight strikes, we will be ready to fight.”
She accepted that and went lax, falling asleep almost instantly.
So, she had been tired.
He held her a little longer.
Because this might be their last rest. If the All-Council had their way, in a short time Atlantis would no longer exist, and everything, including this castle and heart chamber, would be gone.
And that would make them both so sad, just like on the boat when they first met and Starr had been wrapped behind a film of isolation.
He would never let her be hurt like that again.
Twenty-One
Starr awoke in Gailen’s arms in the heart chamber of their castle.
It was vibrant and green, like awakening in a caterpillar’s cocoon. At any moment, she would stretch her wings and find out she was a butterfly.
She curved in his arms and faced him.
He was still asleep and so innocent, so beautiful.
But what she’d learned from last…night?…was that he was also relentless and focused on her pleasure. He must be exhausted now. She would