Laurell Hamilton - Kiss The Dead

“Then we fuck, so you can feed.”

“Or we mouth-fuck; with the ardeur I can do that, and I enjoy it, too.”

He had a moment of indecision so plain on his face it was almost painful, but then he said, “We’ll see how we feel when we get there.”

I agreed, and we went back to our game of deep-throat bondage, because you don’t need ropes and chains for it to be bondage, just to be held and not be able to get away. This game had that in spades.

When we’d done it as long as my throat could take it, even with the ardeur , Nicky said, “I want to fuck you again. I love that I’m on your short list of the men you don’t make wear a condom.”

It hadn’t been a front-of-the-head decision; he was just with me when I was with Micah and Nathaniel and Sin so much, and they were on my fluid-bonded list, too, so… it had been a recent change to not make Nicky put on that extra layer of protection. I was on the pill, and I was a carrier for lycanthropy so I couldn’t catch that even if the rough sex bled me, but I still made most of the other men wear condoms, just in case. I remembered the moment I hadn’t made Nicky put one on; Nathaniel and Sin had both been there, but Micah had been out of town. It had just seemed natural, but his mentioning it like that made me think about it. I wasn’t always good when I thought about things. I tended to start tearing at my relationships, as if I were trying to break free of some sort of trap. Did I still see love as a trap? Was I still that unhealthy, that once a man reminded me how much he meant to me, I had to fight my way free of it until I destroyed everything? Wasn’t that what I was doing with Sin? Was I about to do the same with Nicky?

“I can’t hear your thoughts, only feel your emotions, but I don’t like that look. It’s never good. What did I say wrong?”

I looked up at him. His hair was still slicked back from his face, leaving it bare and wonderful. His body was naked and covered in water, so lickable and yummy. I could still feel the happy ache of him in my throat. He’d been at my side for two years. What did he have to do to prove himself? What did anyone have to do to prove themselves to me? Some of the men in my life would have said a hell of a lot.

I realized that the ardeur had receded again. Once I’d been at its mercy, but not now. I controlled the ardeur so well that I had to remind myself to feed sometimes. If I didn’t feed, my ability to heal was compromised, and I would eventually begin to draw energy off Nathaniel and Damian first, and then move on to Jean-Claude and Richard, but only after Nathaniel and Damian were dead. Jean-Claude had explained that metaphysical math to me when my control got this good, because I’d thought control meant victory. I’d forgotten the ardeur was like your stomach; just because you could teach yourself not to want to eat didn’t mean your body didn’t need the food.

I still needed to feed, but it wasn’t the overwhelming control-stealing thing it had been. I had more choices now. I couldn’t blame the ardeur for the sex I was having. The ardeur put some of the men on my plate, but what I did with them was me now. I tried to decide how I felt about that.

“Anita?” Nicky made it a question. His face was closing down, drawing away from me, putting his defenses back in place. He’d been made into a sociopath, which meant some of the emotions were in there. I didn’t want him to put them away again. I liked the glimpses I got of his heart.

“Fuck me,” I said it softly.

“What?” he asked, like he was having trouble hearing above the pounding water.

“Fuck me,” I said, louder.

A smile curled the edges of his mouth, and filled his face with an almost disturbing happiness. There was always the sense that there was darkness inside Nicky that he got to let out thanks to me, but it was still in there, and it always wants out, the dark. It can be controlled, harnessed even, but in the end it just wants to come out and play dark games.

He let me see the happy monster inside him. It had nothing to do with his beast; what I saw in his face wasn’t animal, it was all human, just most people didn’t like to admit it. Nicky didn’t mind. Nathaniel didn’t mind. Dev didn’t mind. And because they didn’t mind, I was beginning not to mind either.

“Fuck me,” I said, again.

He didn’t make me ask again.

NICKY PICKED ME up again, and I wrapped myself around him like a monkey, legs at his waist, and arms around those wide shoulders. He pushed me up against the wall out of the way of the water, while it pounded, hot and steamy, behind us, spraying on the back of his body only when he moved back far enough to try for the hardest, deepest thrust he could get from this angle.

Not every man could do good wall sex. You had to be long enough, and strong enough, and have stamina, not just the regular sex kind, but legs, arms, hips, in a way that regular intercourse didn’t demand. He found a hard, fast rhythm, going in and out of me, so that I didn’t have time to enjoy one wave of pleasure, before he was thrusting into me again, and one sensation led to the next so fast, so completely that I lost track of everything but the pounding of his hips, his body thrusting into mine. He was going so hard and fast that my body began to bump and scrape against the wall. The tiles were smooth, but it was still a near-bruising rhythm, and I loved it. My eyes started to close, and I had to fight the pleasure to keep my arms and legs tight around him. His hands were on my thighs and hips, but I had to work in this position, too. I had to hold on, and as the pleasure built, that became harder and harder to do. I wanted to give myself over to the feel of his body in mine, the strength of his hands holding me against the wall, the feel of my body rubbing against the wall from the power of his body shoving me against it.

His voice came thin with strain, growling, with effort. “Feed when I go, Anita. I won’t have another time in me.”

That he admitted it said just how much effort even Nicky was having to expend to do wall sex this forcefully.

“Yes,” I said, and my voice sounded breathier than his did.

“Is that yes, yes, great sex, or you heard me?” he asked, in that deep, exercise-rich voice.

“Yes, I heard you,” I gasped.

His hips hesitated for a second, and then he went back to that fast, pounding rhythm. I fought between the amazing sensations of him fucking me, and holding on to him, helping him fuck me against the slick cool/warmth of the tiles.

His body shuddered, hesitated, and he gasped, “Soon, real soon.”

“Heard you,” I whispered, or maybe I shouted above the pounding water, the heat of it, and the cool brush of the tiles as my back rocked up and down on them. I couldn’t tell anymore, it was all I could do to keep my grip at his shoulders and waist.

I realized that I’d put the ardeur away again, that it had just been me and Nicky against the wall. I had to raise the ardeur again, had to call it, and suddenly I was all heat and need, and Nicky cried out, “Oh, God, that feels…” Whatever he was about to say was lost between one thrust and the next, but he went in one long, solid thrust between my legs. His body shuddered against me, inside me, as he pinned me to the wall, and I fed.

I fed on the feel of him inside me, the spill of him inside me. I fed on the strength of his hands on my thigh and hip. I fed on the feel of him in my arms, the feel of my legs around his waist. I fed on his eyes closed, head slightly back, and being able to see his face bare and lost to the moment of release. I fed on all of him, and the power rush poured over my skin in a wave of heat like nothing I’d ever felt before.