Allie's War Season Three (36 page)

He kissed my jaw, caressing my face with his.

"Allie," he murmured, kissing me again. "Allie...I've wanted a child with you since the cabin..." He closed his eyes, his fingers tugging at my hair, his other palm and fingers caressing my breast. "You said you wanted children with me once. Do you still want that?"

Swallowing, I nodded. "Yes."

Pain swam through my light in another warm flood, stuttering my thoughts. It took me another breath to realize it was his.

His desire worsened, even as he arched into me again.

"Does that mean I can try?" he murmured softer, kissing me again.

His pain worsened again in the pause. I felt my face warm, but I couldn't think straight, not even well enough to pretend.

"Aren't we too young?" I said finally.

He shook his head. He arched into me again, hard enough to take my breath.

"I don't know," he said. "I don't know anything, given what we are." His eyes met mine. "I could be sterile, Allie. A lot of Sark males are sterile..."

I nodded to that, too, still watching his eyes.

"Can I try?" he said. "Can I try now, Allie...even with all of them watching us?"

Feeling a flush of pain, that time mine, I shook my head, but not in a no. "It doesn't matter about them," I told him. "You can try...if you want..."

His pain worsened again, even as his light grew more directed.

He didn't wait, but began pulling on me again, fighting to tug and tease more of my light open even as he coiled into me harder where he held me already. I tried to follow his coaxing, realizing only then I'd closed up a little tighter while we were talking, maybe because of the others watching us, maybe out of embarrassment, or the look in his eyes or the seriousness of his light, or my own wavering self-control...I don't know why.

In any case, he worked at it with a methodicalness that I found impossible to resist. I felt him force himself to slow down, to take his time. Like an inhaled breath, the violence in his light dimmed. Around me, his light moved slower...tugging sensually at mine, pulling on it with a heat that stole my breath, that forced my hands open, my body. He felt like the infiltrator again as he worked...maybe because I'd given him a goal he wanted more than an orgasm.

Within seconds I was lost in him.

Once I lost control, his began to slip. Gasping, he hung over me, his eyes bright with light as I found myself talking to him...unable to track anything I said. I gripped his lower back, wrapping my legs around him. He clasped me in his arms as his body arched deeper.

I cried out when he extended all the way into me.

He let out a groan that seemed to come from deep in his chest, pinning me until I couldn't move. He continued to cry out, his voice holding disbelief again. I watched his eyes glow brighter as he asked me to let more of him in.

It started to build in me...then I realized it might be him...that I couldn't tell the difference. He reached up with one hand to grip the headboard, then he was arching into me harder, using the leverage. I slid my hand over my head too, pushing back on the same board, and he let out another groan, watching my face.

It felt like we hung like that for a long time, both of us half gone, lost in some place only half-related to our bodies. When it started to tip over that edge I gave another cry, pulling on him with my light, pulling on him with every part of me...

He started coming somewhere in that.

I did, too, not long after...or maybe before him, I don't know. His breath came out in short pants, timed with each thrust as his head lowered, his muscles softening as our bodies slowed. He had so much of his light in me by then I couldn't think at all. My fingers dug into his back; I knew he held me just as tightly, but it still felt like it wasn't enough.

I have no idea how long that lasted.

He was still rocking against me, his body spasming in jerks, when I found myself aware of us again, of where we were. I looked up at him, lost in the sharp angles of his face, visible even under the beard. His hair was sweated to his neck, his face flushed, but I saw so much relief and emotion in his face that it brought another stab of pain.

Then we were lying together, tangled in the sheets, kissing.

It seemed like a long time passed before I had calmed down enough to be able to breathe, to just lie there against him. He rolled us partway to his back even as I thought it, and my arm curled over his chest, cushioning my head.

His light felt different already.

So did mine.

Still, the change wasn't quite the same as the first time, despite what Balidor had said. I didn't feel lost in the same way, but there was something else there, a kind of seriousness to both of us that I couldn't quite put my finger on. Also, I could feel more of him than I remembered feeling in that cabin. He felt larger somehow, and yet closer to me, too.

Something about the difference made me almost nervous.

Maybe I hadn't quite gotten over that feeling that he could leave any second, or change on me again. I was still getting to know him as this more complex person, so maybe that made me nervous, too.

As affection-starved as he was, this Revik didn't need me in the way the others had. He was more of his own person. I liked that...in fact, I liked it a lot when I let myself really feel it, but truthfully, a part of me was threatened by it, too.

I watched as he rubbed his face with his hand, seeming to notice his beard for the first time. Tugging on it with his fingers, he glanced at me, smiling.

"I guess I should have shaved first..."

I grinned at him, running a hand over the scruff of his chin. I didn't hold his gaze for long though, embarrassed at the way I was probably looking at him. I could feel just how goofily happy I was, even with my body and light still pulling painfully on his.

Lowering my cheek back to his chest, I explored the outline of muscles and bones with my hand, until I was lost in that too, realizing again how long it had been since I'd just gotten to touch him. He'd really felt different as Syrimne, when he'd been with Salinse. The sex had been great then, too, but it just felt...different. The last time I'd felt him even remotely like this had been at the cabin. I found myself unable to stop looking at him as that occurred to me, watching his body as it continued to calm down.

He was still half-hard, enough that I knew it probably wouldn't take much to get his interest again. I wondered if he would mind, if I...

He laughed, lowering his hand from his face to look at me.

"No," he said, gripping me more tightly. "No, I wouldn't 'mind,' wife, if you did that to me...but you probably shouldn't do it anyway, at least not here..." Briefly, his heart pounded harder against my skin. I felt his erection return abruptly. "Alyson," he murmured, kissing me. "Gods. You were dangerous before. You're positively terrifying now..."

Even as he said it, I felt his light reacting to his own words. A flush of jealousy slid through him, connected to something he'd been thinking...or realizing maybe. I couldn't really nail it down, since he stifled it almost at once, but the intensity of
that
made me nervous, too.

Raising my head cautiously, I studied his face, but he kept his expression still.

"Please," he said, smiling faintly at me. "Can we go somewhere more private before you seduce me again? I'm a little tired of having an audience, wife..."

I continued to look at him, then decided to let it go.

"Like where?" I bit my lip, shrugging before I laid my cheek back on his chest. "You mean like another hotel or something?" Thinking about this, I snorted. "Or more like another continent...?"

"Not exactly."

I could feel him hovering on a question.

He wouldn't let me see it, not directly anyway, but I got a whisper of what it was about. I saw enough that it managed to dissipate the worst of my paranoia. Relaxing into his chest, I let my body sink deeper against his.

"So," I said, feigning casualness. "I suppose we have to go downstairs. First, I mean."

He caressed my hair with his fingers, not answering.

"I should go back to my room," I added. "Get changed...you know? I probably shouldn't face 'Dori and the others in a bathrobe...especially given the privacy issues..."

He didn't answer that, either, but continued to stare off to the side, his eyes faintly clouded. If I didn't know better, I would have thought he was talking to someone in the Barrier. Hell, for all I knew, he was. I hoped it wasn't Balidor.

Finally, I sighed in exasperation, raising my head. "Do you want me to just ask you?"

"Ask me what?" he said, his voice distracted.

"Fine," I said. "I'll ask. Can I move in here with you?"

He turned his head, staring at me, his eyes showing a blank shock.

Then he laughed. "No," he said, smiling, tugging on my hair.

I flinched. "No?"

He shook his head, kissing my face. A smile still tugged at his lips.

"You don't want us to live together?" I said, trying for clarity before I reacted. "I thought we talked about, once we started...you know...doing
this
again...that we'd do the marriage thing for real this time. Try to, anyway..." When he still only smiled, I frowned, making a seer's gesture with one hand. "So what was this, then? A little casual sex action? Should I prepare for the walk of shame down to my room, try to sneak out before someone sees me...?"

He chuckled, watching me fume at him from where I sat up on his chest. His fingers clutched me tighter, pulling me flush against him.

"I didn't say that."

"Which part?" I said.

"I didn't say I didn't want us to live together," he smiled.

"Yes...you did," I said, pushing on his chest. When he refused to loosen his hold on me, I tried to wriggle free. When he just kissed my throat, pulling sensually on my light, I gave an outraged laugh, shoving at his chest. "Don't try to get all cuddly on me
now,
husband. You just totally set me up! You let me feel you thinking about it...then you let me make an ass out of myself, asking...all just so you could say no."

"I said you can't move in
here,"
he said, emphasizing the last word.

"Yeah, I heard you," I snorted, pushing at him again. "Don't tell me you were hinting you want to share
my
room...?"

"Is the sink in here really that much better?" he said, smiling.

"Revik. Seriously. I'm not in the mood to joke about this..."

Again, he refused to let me go. "So maybe you should ask me what I meant, wife...since you know for damned sure that I didn't mean I don't want to share a bed with you. I've been harassing you to live with me since I lured you to that cabin..."

I rolled my eyes, but his words slowed the heat that had been building in my chest.

They also made me realize that 'Dori and Vash
had
been a little right, at least in terms of me. I might not feel quite as crazy or as out of control as I had when I slept with him the first time, but there was a definite thread of irrational woven into my emotional reactions right then. The highs and lows were a bit higher and lower than usual...or maybe a lot higher and lower, it was difficult to tell. In any case, I needed to keep a tight rein on my reactions, at least until we'd worked out a few of the kinks between us.

Teasing each other probably wasn't the best idea. Not right then anyway.

But we'd always done that, especially to dispel tension. And there was the other elephant in the room we hadn't talked about yet, either. That thing about the imprints...meaning the fact that there hadn't been any. We'd obviously had some kind of lengthy light exchange when I held for him; I remembered our brief stint awake where he undressed me. Between how out of it we'd been and the length of Revik's beard, we must have been lying there for longer than a night...or even two. During that time, it was possible something happened to bind our light back together.

Maybe that something had erased the imprints, too.

But I didn't let myself think about that for long, either. Not lying that close to him. Even if he was feeling less emotional than me right then, my time with the Lao Hu was not a topic either of us was ready to tackle. Maybe ever.