Page 76 of Saved By Starlight
“Read it again!” Lele begs, grabbing the book and swiping back to the beginning. I’ve read it four times already, but I can’t resist a kid who’s hungry for stories.
“One more time, and that’s it.” That’s what I said last time, but this time, I mean it.
Lyro sighs from the corner of the kids’ room, but his pigment tells me his impatience is tempered with a lot of happiness. I flash him an apologetic grin.
“I’ll make it up to you.”
“I know you will.” The hot promise in his voice makes my nipples tight. They’re so sensitive now that I’m pregnant again, and Lyro’s been taking full advantage.
Distracted by the thought of what’s coming later, I can barely concentrate on reading the book, and I keep forgetting to add in all the voices and snippets of song I usually do. Thankfully, Lele knows it by heart and reminds me when I accidentally skip something.
We tuck the kids in together. Lele’s Frathik musculature means she’s too heavy for me to carry even though she’s only three, but Lyro lifts her easily to the top bunk.
“I can climb, Daddy,” she protests. “I’m big!”
“I know, but you’ll always be my hatchling,” he says, tucking her into the furs. He does the same for Lennon, and we kiss them both goodnight.
The second we’re outside the door, he hoists me into his arms, carrying me through the door across the hall. This section of passageway is new, part of our expansion of the existing city under the mountain.
It’s grown by leaps and bounds since we became the Jara and Alara because we’ve welcomed Frathiks and other displaced people to settle here, many of them rescued from captivity by Nik and Delphie and their team. We’ve added family housing and underground gardens, hotels and markets, schools and fighting pits. We’ve made it a place people can live, not just train or mine.
Our city has a name now, too.
Ly’suri, capital of Usuri. The Irran capital cities are always named for their kings.
Our city. Our home. The place our children will grow up, wanted and loved.
Lyro deposits me in the furs on my knees and crawls in behind me, stripping me of my sveli and fitting his body to mine. He traps me in his lap with an arm banded under my breasts, the other possessively cradling my lower belly, even though I’m not showing yet.
He runs his teeth along my neck. “You smell so good, I want to eat you, pet.”
I give a shaky laugh as goosebumps erupt over my skin. His hand on my belly creeps lower until he’s cupping between my legs, his finger dipping experimentally into my folds.
“So slick for me already.” He finds my clit and rubs the side of it, teasing me and making my core clutch in anticipation. “You owe me one for every time I had to listen to that frixing story instead of being inside you.”
Five times?!“You love that story,” I protest, already breathless as he increases the speed and friction against my clit.
“You love coming on my hand,” he shoots back.
“Not five times in a row, though!”
“Exactly,” he purrs, diabolical in his focus. No stroke of his fingers is wasted. It’s like he’s competing to see how fast he can get me there, and goddess, he knows how to get me there.
The first one happens so quickly, I think my soul might leave my body. The second one goes on and on, cracking me open. I have to rest back against him during the third, which takes forever and is tiny, a ghost of an orgasm.
“That’s it, I don’t have any more,” I tell him, sweaty and brainless, after he tips water into my mouth.
“You owe me,” is all he says.
The fourth one takes forever and when it comes, whenIcome, it hurts so good. He doesn’t give me a rest this time, just keeps going. I think I’m going to die if I come again.
“I can’t do another one. I can’t.”
“You can,” he hisses in my ear, my dark shadow. My patient, scheming king. He slips his middle fingers inside me so the heel of his hand grinds against my clit, the blunt pleasure punishingly intense. “One more time, and that’s it.”
Oh, he did not just lie to me using my own words. It’s never just one more time with him.
“I hate you,” I tell him as I start to come apart. I’m not sure how, because I’m already in pieces. “I hate what you do to me.”
He laughs. “I know what you really mean. I love you, too.”
Then he gives me what he promised and takes what he’s owed.
