Marjorie Liu - Within the Flames

“Eddie,” she whispered raggedly, sagging against the seat. “Take me someplace where there’s a bed, please.”

He laughed, but it turned into a groan when her hand found his penis again. Her fingers kneaded his shaft in light movements that stole every coherent thought from his head.

Lyssa leaned over the gearshift and licked him. Her tongue was so hot. Eddie couldn’t breathe.

“Did you mean it? About not leaving San Francisco?” His voice was hoarse, and broken.

Her smile turned serious. “Yes. Was that. . should I have asked you first?”

“No.” Eddie thought for a moment about what to say next. It was difficult, given that she was still touching him. “If you want to stay in a hotel, I—”

She started laughing and clapped her hand over her mouth.

“Okay,” he said, smiling. “I’ll take you to my place.”

Lyssa was surprised when Eddie drove to the waterfront and parked in the underground lot of what had to be a very expensive apartment building.

“You’re rich?” she said to him.

Eddie shrugged as if embarrassed and rubbed the back of his neck. “I get paid well. It’s nice.”

She smiled, shaking her head.

They stood close, holding hands, as the elevator took them up the fifteenth floor. Lyssa was suddenly too nervous to look at him, but she kept her cheek pressed against his shoulder, her other hand buried in his sweatshirt. His body radiated heat. So did hers, she realized. The air around them shimmered with it, like an oven.

“Are we going to set off fire alarms?” she asked, with real concern.

“Uh,” he said, and laughed. “I hope not.”

His apartment was a roomy studio with large windows that overlooked the Bay Bridge. Tidy, without much furniture. Just a bed, a couple soft chairs, and a small table near the kitchen.

“I’m not here a lot,” he said.

“Do you travel all the time?”

“I’m gone a week or two or a month, typically. But sometimes I need that. . room. The one I told you about. Where I can burn.”

Lyssa nodded, chewing the inside of her cheek. “I don’t know. . how I fit into your life, exactly. Being with me won’t be easy, you know. Your friends. .”

Eddie had been standing by the door, watching her, but he crossed the distance in moments. He didn’t touch her, but instead he loomed, holding her gaze with a dangerous intensity that made her feel like she was the only person in the world who mattered.

“If they can’t accept you,” he said quietly, “they are not my friends.”

Lyssa backed away. “Don’t say that. My father lost all his friends because he felt the same way. It hurt him, and my mother.”

“But it didn’t damage the two of them together, did it?”

“No,” she said, after a moment. “No, it didn’t. They loved each other very much.”

Eddie’s eyes softened. “Would you believe me if I said I loved you?”

Her breath caught. “If you say it. . I’ll believe.”

“I love you,” he whispered, in a low, rough voice. “I love you.”

I love you. Words that resonated, and flowed. Words that she had been feeling, and holding in her own heart, afraid to think them because it was more than she had imagined ever feeling. More than she had imagined anyone feeling about her.

But she did believe him. He was too much in her blood, not to believe.

Lyssa swallowed hard, burning up with a fever.

“You know. . there’s this thing about shape-shifters,” she said, slowly. “We sort of. . stick with one person for our entire lives. So it means something when we love. We don’t. . take that lightly.” She raised a trembling hand to touch his cheek. “When I’m with you. . everything inside me says yes. ”

Eddie captured her hand. “Is that instinct or love?”

Lyssa smiled. “It’s like. . feeling as though every sappy love song I’ve ever heard is my theme song.”

His nose crinkled, and he laughed. “Choose one.”

She tangled her fingers in his sweatshirt. “Take off your clothes, and maybe I will.”

His cheeks turned red, but he stripped. Lyssa stood back, biting back a smile that felt full and rich, and heavy with her heart.

Eddie’s body was lean and broad with muscle, and he had an erection. Her scratch marks on his chest were healing, and only caused her a moment’s consternation.

Giving her a bold look, he said, “A song, please.”

Lyssa hesitated, thinking about her arm — and then pulled her sweatshirt over her head, and tossed it at him. “ ‘Can’t Help Falling in Love.’ ”

His smile warmed though his eyes darkened with hunger. She noticed that he did not look at her breasts or dragon scales. Just her eyes.

“I want to hear you say it, Lyssa.”

“I love you,” she told him. “I love you, and it’s not instinct. It’s me. It’s my heart. My heart loves you, and I don’t how it happened. But it did, and it’s crazy. You’re crazy to love me. ”

“If you’re not the one for me, then I am crazy.” Eddie took a deep breath and hooked his fingers beneath the waistband of her sweats. “May I?”

She laughed and covered his hands — her right hand, so careful — helping him push the sweats down off her hips. He knelt as he undressed her, trailing kisses against her stomach. Lyssa closed her eyes, savoring the heat of his mouth.

He drew her to the bed. The late afternoon light cast a soft glow over their skins as they made love. Nothing mattered but his touch and smile and kiss, and she strained against him, wanting so badly to take him into her body.

“Lyssa,” he gasped, as she guided him to the right spot.

“Please,” she begged, breathless.

His eyes darkened, and he grabbed her hip, pushing into her slowly. Lyssa gasped as her body stretched around him. Eddie made a similar sound, squeezing shut his eyes as a tremor wracked him.

“You’re so tight,” he whispered. “Am I hurting you?”

“No,” she breathed, arching her hips so that he had no choice but to sink deeper. “Hard and fast, Eddie. Please.”

He groaned and thrust forward. Lyssa felt a sharp pain, but that disappeared in moments. He pulled out, then thrust again, and again, grinding into her with hard, long strokes. She clung to him, matching his rhythm, heat racing through her body into his. Smoke rose from his back, fire licking across his skin. Lyssa covered those flames with her hands — human and dragon — drawing them into herself as her muscles tightened around him.

His large hand covered her breast, squeezing, and he gathered up her leg and hitched it higher, deepening his penetration. His thrusts quickened. Lyssa gasped his name — losing control as a wild, cresting pleasure exploded through her body in one long, throbbing wave.

Eddie came with her, crying out and covering her mouth in a soul-deep kiss as his hips jerked and thrust, nearly sending her over the edge a second time.

He collapsed on top of her, both of them tangled and sweating, breathing so hard Lyssa was afraid their lungs would burst. The sheets were smoking around them.

We almost set the bed on fire. It was too ridiculous — and wonderful.

She started to giggle. A foreign sound. It had been ten years since she’d made a noise like that, but it bubbled out of her from a place of pure joy. Eddie lifted his head, staring, and she pointed at the smoke, breath hitching as she struggled not to laugh. He grinned and began laughing with her.

Their laughter faded, though, as they stared into each other’s eyes.

“I’m scared,” she told him, softly. “Love didn’t save my parents.”

“You’re such a downer. They loved each other. Focus on that.” Eddie bit his lip until it bled. “Kiss me, Lyssa.”