Dark Paradise (18 page)

She wrapped her hands around it, squeezing gently, wallowing in the groans her touch elicited from him.

Cupping his balls with one hand, she held him at his base with the other, then lowered her mouth to his erection.

She swirled her tongue over the head, swallowing the beads of moisture that gathered there. He jerked and dug his hands into her hair. He growled lightly, a sound that always turned her on, no matter if it was in battle or during sex. She loved his savage side. As if he had any other side.

She took him deep, his cock filling up her mouth. She moved her hands with busy caresses over his dick and below, to the sinfully soft, yet full and firm sac.

His hands lay hard against her skull, guiding and urging. She closed her eyes and loved him with her mouth, her lips, her tongue. At that moment, nothing else existed but him.

He finally pulled her mouth from his cock. “Enough, Cin.” His voice was deep and strained and made her smile.

“I like how I can make you feel,” she told him, her pussy on fire with need.

He wrapped his big hands around her upper arms and pulled her up his body until her face was on his chest and she lay half on top of his hard abdomen. “I will make you feel good.”

“You always do.”

A deep rumble of appreciation came from low in his chest, and he pushed her off him. He was not gentle, but then, she didn’t want gentle. He seemed to always know what she needed.

He pushed his cock against her thigh, insistently, and she reached down to caress him. She rubbed her thumb over the moisture beading at the tip of his erection, loving the feel of his silkiness against her palm.

He cupped her face, then slid his big hand behind her head and lowered his mouth until his lips were close to hers. “I never cared so much for the kiss before you,” he said, then kissed her.

His kiss was hard and deep, and that was the way he would fuck her. She couldn’t stand the wait. She wanted him so much her pussy was wet, her clit swollen and throbbing so hard it hurt.

“Please,” she groaned, her voice lost inside his mouth.

He explored her mouth with his tongue, taking his time, torturing her. He moved on top of her, and she spread her legs. She squeezed his ass and bucked against him, urging him on, rubbing her clit against his rigid cock.

He pulled his mouth from hers. Cupping her breasts, he squeezed them and pushed them up, causing her to squeal as lust, pleasure, and pain raged inside her, much as the storm raged around them.

He swept his tongue over her stiff nipples, lapping away the droplets of rain the storm blew in on them. The abruptly cooling air caressed her bare skin. Touched at once by the cool of the air, the wet of the rain, and the heat of his body, she didn’t know if she was cold or hot. Maybe she was both. Maybe neither.

She shivered against him, moaning with fevered desire as he pushed a hand between their bodies and found her clit. He rubbed it hard, and she stiffened in fearful ecstasy as her climax loomed.

Beneath his ruthless massaging, she squirmed, not wanting to get away from it, really, but unsure if she could take it. Then her orgasm exploded, rolling over her in waves of violent pleasure.

She dug her nails into his skin, her breath leaving her in a rush. She was able to feel, for that moment, only the attack of her climax. “Mach!”

He pushed her legs open even farther and positioned himself at her opening, probing and teasing with the head of his huge cock. “Yes?”

“
Yes
!”

He plunged inside her, driving himself as far as he could go, and again she screamed. Her voice blended with the fury of the storm, and when she came again, it released everything wild inside her.

She clawed at him, urging him deeper, harder, faster.

His dick stretched her, opened her, forced her to come again and again. There was no recovery, no time to take a breath. He stole her ability to think, to breathe, to do anything but feel.

Every time he’d fucked her, she’d been taken places she’d never been, but now, this time, he took her even further. Gave her even more.

This time he loved her.

She knew it.

Chapter Twenty-one

Afterward, they didn’t speak; the time for talking was over, at least for a little while. All her concerns and worries and anxieties floated away beneath his kiss and his touch, and she let them go with little more than a sigh.

They were insulated from the outside world by the storm, and she thought, for a brief second, that there could be no better place than right here, cocooned with her man.

But of course there was, and Elder waited for them there. They would find him, someday, when it was time. When she could buy her way in right alongside Mach.

She let her exhaustion and the storm lull her to sleep, her head resting on Mach’s chest, her arm around his waist. His long hair was tangled in her fist, as though she needed a tether to him, lest she somehow lose him. Or maybe it was just because it made her feel safe.

Over the next few weeks, they settled into a routine of sorts, with most of their days spent hunting shrube. They found none but were not deterred. Shrube didn’t just jump up and bite a miner on the ass, begging to be taken.

It was never that easy.

Still, Mach didn’t hesitate to inform her that he was the greatest miner on Ripindal, and they would find their shrube.

Before the bad weather came, they prepared for the time they would spend on the mountain by settling into an unoccupied cabin. The previous inhabitants had left it as someone before them had left it; with its battered pottery, thick but smelly blankets, big wooden bed, and a fireplace that took up nearly one entire wall. When Mach and Cin descended the mountain come spring, they would make sure it was left the way they’d found it. A crude but cozy shelter that would ensure they did not die before winter had wheezed out its last cold breath.

Cin spotted Elif once, only briefly. The girl didn’t seem inclined to get too near Mach if she didn’t have to, but Cin knew she’d gained a friend in the little Weechin.

Constantly, they kept a wary eye out for avenging housekeepers or other authority who decided to hunt them down and exterminate them for ridding Ripindal of the nasty Mehnarthi men.

The air turned cool, the nights becoming downright cold, and she knew it wouldn’t be long before the first snows came.

She paused in her shrube hunting and shaded her eyes against the glaring evening sun. It made its way reluctantly from the multicolored sky, giving way beneath the power of the coming moon.

She closed her eyes for a moment, inhaling the teasing scent of wood smoke that floated to her through the chill in the air. From far away, the sound of an ax striking wood sounded, and she wondered how many others would winter the coming months in the mountains.

“Lonely?”

She opened her eyes as Mach spoke. He’d slipped up behind her without her even noticing, and she silently rebuked herself for being so unaware. That could get her killed in a hurry.

He pulled her back against his chest and wrapped his arms around her, warming her immediately.

“Maybe a little,” she admitted. “Sometimes having people around is…” She shook her head, unable to find the word that would say exactly what she meant.

“You miss him.”

She twisted around to look at him. “Don’t you?” she asked, knowing the answer but wanting to talk about him. She’d spied Mach staring into the distance a few times, his eyes sad, his strong, carved face covered with tired lines.

“Every minute.”

She nodded. “I know.” She put her arms around him. “But every day without him means we’re one day closer to seeing him again.”

He cleared his throat, then after a quick squeeze, set her away from him. She pursed her lips and stared at the ground, giving him a minute. She fiddled with Saint and Satan’s hilts, and as always, a spike of relief stabbed her heart that she was once more in possession of her beloved knives.

“Shrube?” His voice was gruff.

“No. I couldn’t find even a good item. Today was not prolific.”

“I found one. For you, tomorrow will be better.”

“Yeah.” She smiled up at him, happy that he’d added another shrube to their pile. Shivering at the descending cold darkness, she added, “And soon the poe will come.”

They walked back to the cabin. She looked forward to the cheery fire and the roasting game, the scent of which, long before they reached their temporary home, hung heavy in the air and beckoned her ever onward.

She had never eaten so well. Mach kept her fed, made glorious love to her at night and would protect her with his life. This was as good as it got on Ripindal. It was good, period.

“Cin.”

She stopped walking, the strange note in his voice scaring her. “What is it?”

“I have love for you,” he admitted, sounding almost shy.

Her entire body stiffened, and then she turned on her heel to face him. His smile flashed in the dark, and she melted against him, whispering, “I have love for you too.”

Why not? She cared about what happened to him, she wanted to be with him, she wanted him to be happy. What else was love? What else, in this world? In any world?

He lifted her in his arms so they were face to face, his lips almost touching hers. “We will protect the helpless until we leave Ripindal.”

“We will.”

“I will not leave without you.”

“Nor I you.”

It was something of a marriage. She smiled, then moved her face a breath closer to his so she could purse her lips and touch them to his in a soft, almost shy kiss.

“We will never stop seeking paradise.”

She shook her head. “Never.”

“We will never forget Elder.”

A tear wound its way down her cheek, and he kissed it away. “No.”

“We will always carry the knowledge that we will join him again.”

“In paradise.”

“In paradise.”

And they would.

She knew it.

Epilogue

Elder floated.

At times, he came to himself enough to realize his was the haze of drugs, only to be pulled back down into the snug, warm comfort of something even in his daze he equated with a mother’s womb.

Time passed; he had no inkling of how long he floated, but part of him recognized the passage of time. He didn’t care.

He could stay here forever in this magnificence, where pain and fear were but dim memories, and his body and mind quietly moaned their pleasure.

Sometimes he floated to the surface of awareness and realized he was smiling, a wide, loopy smile that was followed by a sigh of content.

Was this, then, the paradise he hadn’t quite believed in?

Slowly, in extremely small increments, he became Elder again. He fought it. He shut out the murmuring voices that coaxed him from his cottony, cloudy dreams. Why should one wake up in paradise?

But fingers stroked his cheek, and the voices became insistent. Surely the drugs were carefully discontinued, for wake up he did.

He didn’t open his eyes, not at first.

His body wasn’t even weak. When he came to full consciousness and took inventory of himself, he felt his health and his strength.

Resentful, he finally opened his eyes and got his first glimpse of paradise.

Loose Id Titles by Cassidy Hunter

Asylum

Beyond the Shadows

Dark Paradise

Sanctuary

Cassidy Hunter

Cassidy is a writer of urban fantasy romance and paranormal romance. She lives in Ohio.