Page 132 of Star Bringer
Instead of kissing me like I requested, she nips at the sensitive skin where my neck meets my shoulder, and my entire body spins out of my control. My knees tremble, my hands clench, and for several impossible seconds, my lungs forget how to breathe.
She does it again, and the tremble becomes a full-blown shake. It’s all I can do to stay upright as pleasure courses through my body.
“Do you trust me?” she whispers, once again smoothing her hands over my shoulders.
With my life.The words tremble on my lips, but I don’t say them. Not because I don’t mean them—I do; very much—but because Beckett doesn’t trust herself that much. Not even close. And the last thing I want to do right now is get her thinking about all the reasons she isn’t sure we should be doing this.
“Yes,” I finally tell her, leaning back against her so she knows it’s true.
Her mouth is still pressed to my skin, and I can feel her smile as she slides her hands around my waist. She leaves them there for a second, stroking my stomach and the top of my hips until my body starts moving restlessly against her of its own volition.
I tell myself to stay still, to wait for whatever she wants to do next. But it’s so hard to do that when I’m on fire. When my every nerve ending is screaming for more. Screaming for her.
There’s an ache in my belly, a hollowness deep inside me that’s begging for something I never imagined I’d need. Not like this. And that’s before she slides her hands up my ribcage to cup my breasts in her palms.
“Oh!” I gasp, and the first press of her fingers against the underside of my breasts has me moving restlessly against her. “Beckett!”
She stills. “Do you want me to stop?”
“No!” The word bursts from me like an explosion. “Please don’t.”
There’s that laugh again. “I won’t.” And then her thumbs are sliding back and forth against my nipples, the edges of her nails flicking at them through the thin fabric of my jumpsuit.
“Oh my—” A shudder works its way through me. “Beckett!”
“Oh my Beckett.” She grins against my neck, presses soft kisses all the way up and down it. “I like that.”
“I like it, too,” I gasp out. I’m shuddering now, shaking, my whole body aching for hers in a way I’ve never felt before.
“Good.” Her hands slide up past my breasts, and I whimper a little at the loss. But she just hushes me and slowly, carefully begins removing my jumpsuit.
As her fingers brush against my naked skin, I’ve never been so happy in my life that I didn’t have a clean camisole to wear this morning. And when she finally—finally—peels the jumpsuit off my shoulders and rolls it down my back to my waist, I nearly cry out with joy.
“You have a tattoo,” she says after a moment, tracing the design on my left shoulder with a fingertip. “It’s pretty. Reminds me of the motif on theStarlight.”
“It’s a birthmark,” I tell her of the star surrounded by the rays of light. “All the high priestesses have them. It’s one of the ways they recognize us from birth.”
Beckett is quiet, her fingers trailing the mark. “Interesting,” she finally says. “I like it.” She leans forward and presses hot, open-mouthed kisses to my shoulder before her tongue sneaks out to trace the lines of my birthmark.
My knees nearly go out from under me then, and I swear the only thing that keeps me upright is the strong arm Beckett wraps around my waist. “Still okay?” she murmurs as she licks and kisses and bites her way down my spine.
“Not even remotely,” I manage to gasp out.
She pauses about halfway down my back. “In a good way?”
“In thebestway.”
“The best way,” she murmurs as she drops to her knees behind me. “You’re good for my ego.”
“Yeah, well, you’re good for my everything.” It’s not even an exaggeration.
She laughs, then moves to unclasp my boots. I kick them off as she tugs on my jumpsuit, drawing the material over my bottom and down my legs so that I can step out of it. And then I’m standing there in nothing but the pair of black panties Kali got me on Askkandia what feels like a lifetime ago.
Suddenly, I’m nervous. What if Beckett doesn’t like the way I look? My skin is so pale next to the rich olive of hers, my small curves so different than her long, lean angles. It’s hard to stand here like this without seeing her face, without being able to judge if she likes what she sees.
But then she lets out a low, shuddering exhalation that fans across my lower back as she slides reverent hands over my hips and down my thighs. “You’re so beautiful,” she breathes, her voice rough.
“So are you,” I tell her.
