Rise of the Gryphon (Belador #4)(98)

He didn’t.

Kissing her again, he unleashed the hunger he’d fought since the first time he’d touched her. She released him and gripped his shoulders with the strength of a warrior.

But she rubbed up against him, and hot blood roared through him. He swept a hand down to slide into the slick, hot moisture between her legs. The second he pushed a finger inside her she arched up, gripping him hard.

She was ready.

He suckled her breast at the same moment his fingers stroked in and out of her. His thumb moved across the nub at the center of her heat, and he could feel her coiling toward climax.

Her nails dug into his back. “Storm . . . yes . . . I . . .”

He stroked her again and grazed his teeth over her nipple. At the moment he pushed her over the edge, he lifted up to watch her first orgasm. Green eyes glowed with passion. She arched up against his hand and shrieked, chest heaving.

“Oh, my . . .” She couldn’t speak.

When her shudders slowed, he wrapped her up and rolled over with her draped over him. He ran his hand up and down her back, calming her.

She rubbed against him, not calming him in the least.

He gritted his teeth. “Careful, sweetheart. Been a while for me.”

Pushing up on his chest, hair wild all around her face, Evalle laughed. Laughed. The hellion. “That’s not like all . . . is it?”

The hellion.

She crawled up his chest and deliberately rubbed her damp opening against him.

He grabbed her hips. “Wait or I’ll forget to put on a condom.”

“Then get it.”

Damn, he did love that cocky side of her. He stretched over to his nightstand, pulled out a condom and sheathed himself. But one look at Evalle and he knew she was shaky on this part.

He brushed hair off her face. “Afraid?”

“A little, but I want this.”

“Kiss me, sweetheart.”

She smiled at the gentle order, drew a breath of confidence and proceeded to rock his world with her kiss. As she did, he reached down and used his fingers to bring her back to the place she’d been a moment ago.

So wet his fingers were drenched.

Moving her sweet lips across his cheek to his ear, she whispered, “I want you now.”

“Then take me,” he told her, turning her words back on her. “Take all of me.”

He watched her face for any fear as she lifted her hips and lowered herself down on him. No fear. Not his Evalle.

She clutched his shoulders as she pushed down onto him.

Nothing could ever feel as incredible as being inside her. When he was all the way in, he gripped her hips and started a rhythm as natural as life itself.

The look of ecstasy on her face was one he’d hold in his heart forever. She met his thrusts, every stroke urging him to explode. He drew on all the control he owned to keep from reaching his climax.

When he could feel her clenching him, he reached down and took her over the edge once again. She had her hands on his chest, arching back and calling out to him when she stepped off that cliff again. He took over, stroking harder and faster, lost in the feel of her, until he tensed and exploded, rocking into her again and again.

She was his joy.

His life.

His woman.





THIRTY-SEVEN





Evalle shook off the urge to sleep.

She couldn’t waste what time she had left with Storm. She should tell him she was leaving.

Not yet. She’d had so little in her life to celebrate that she didn’t want to give up this amazing moment with him until she had to. She’d faced her fears and walked away with more than she’d ever expected.

Her face lay against Storm’s warm chest. His muscles flexed smoothly when he moved his arm to stroke his fingers lightly across her back.

When she played with the smooth skin around his nipple, his chest muscles tightened. He touched her breast, probably expecting her to call time after what they’d done for the last three and a half hours.

She nipped his skin instead.

He groaned, a husky male sound. “You’re exhausted, sweetheart. I want to hear what happened when you left, but get some rest for now.” He kissed her hair. “We have all night.”

No, they didn’t. Might as well get this over with. “I have to leave soon.”

His fingers stilled. “Why?”

“I wouldn’t have made it back now at all if I hadn’t negotiated a deal with Kizira. She needed me to do something and I wanted to see you. She gave me four hours.” Evalle pushed up and turned to face him.

The last time she’d seen that look on Storm, he’d destroyed two Svart trolls who’d almost killed her. He spoke with the confidence of a man who backed down from nothing. “I’m not letting you go.”

“I don’t have a choice, Storm, but I do have a plan.”

“No. You’re not going back to the Medb.”

“Kizira has the power to find me anywhere right now and to teleport me away without a word.”

The curse he let loose should have turned the air bloody. “I’ll take you to VIPER lockdown. She can’t get in there.”

Bringing VIPER into this would be a mistake. Evalle shook her head. “That wouldn’t work either.”

“She can take me with you.”