Heart of Stone (15 page)

Her throat caught when his hand stroked over her slowly cooling skin, cupping her breast and giving a fond squeeze before sliding down over her belly to ruffle her curls. The man was trying to get milk from a boar hog at this point, but his touch felt so good, she made no move to warn him. Not even to apologize. After all, if she was too tired to fuck him now, whose fault was that?

His fingers delved further, sliding over her clit firmly enough to make her twitch. There must have been one last synapse holding out on her, but now she was definitely down for the count. Still, her hips arched just a bit into his touch as he parted her folds and traced the seam of her sex down to her tender opening. A long, lean finger circled, teased, then pressed inside and her muscles clamped instinctively around him.

Something else she hadn’t thought she had the energy for.

Opening her eyes, she gazed blearily up into a face drawn taut and fierce with passion. Still, even now his mouth curved slightly at the corners and his eyes glowed bright and dark as he gazed down at her. He kept his gaze trained on her face even as he began to stroke in and out of her body, his callused finger gliding easily through her abundant wetness.

Ella opened her mouth to apologize, to confess that he’d wrung her out, but a small quiver deep in her womb stopped her. Her heart stuttered, and she looked down at his palm pressed tightly against her mound as if she couldn’t figure out what it was doing there.

Well, sure, she knew what it was doing; she just couldn’t figure out how it was doing it. Was part of Kees’s Guardian magic the ability to wring blood from a stone? Or, in this case, orgasms from an exhausted pussy?

His teeth flashed in a feral grin, and Ella almost missed the glint of fang that usually accompanied his smiles. The finger inside her curled and pressed against her inner walls, rubbing firmly on a spot that made her eyes cross and her legs tremble. And just like that, desire flooded through her, bringing every last nerve ending back to life and filling her with renewed energy.

Dear sweet heaven, how did he
do
that?

He laughed dark and low and leaned closer, letting his exhalation stir the damp, silky strands of hair at her ear.

“I feel an instinctive need to make you come again, little human,” he purred, shifting his hand and pressing a second finger inside her. “Let’s see if I can manage that, hmmm?”

His fingers hooked and rubbed, and Ella gasped and arched and begged for more. He gave her more pleasure than she had ever imagined and simultaneously stripped away every last impulse she might have to resist him. She had propositioned Kees thinking to prove to him that he did feel emotion, that what was between them was more than just instinct, more than just the animal urge to mate, and here he had reduced her to little more than a female in heat. She would have done almost anything in that moment just for the pleasure of feeling his body joined to hers.

“Please,” she half sobbed, unsure if she wanted him to stop or give her more, unsure if she could take it either way.

He made the decision for her, adding a third finger, stretching her, preparing her, even as he pressed the heel of his hand hard against her swollen clit. The sensations quickly overwhelmed her, and she came again with a scream, hoarser this time, her throat already roughened by the first time.

Her body clamped down around his fingers, but he stroked through her grip for several long seconds, prolonging the orgasm, keeping the sharp sensations rolling over her in wave after wave. But this time, he moved before the pleasure could drag her under.

His hand slid away, leaving her empty and still reeling, but not for long. In the space between heartbeats, he moved over her, overwhelming her, bracing his hands beside her shoulders and using his knees to spread her legs even wider until she felt the burning stretch high in her inner thighs.

Her hands came up, damp and shaking, and she gripped his shoulders desperately, her gaze locking with his as he settled himself in the cradle of her hips.

She felt the head of his cock, wide and damp with his own desire, pressing urgently against her. She couldn’t speak, couldn’t move, couldn’t moan, but she could shift her hips just a little, just enough to tilt them to a more welcoming angle. Just enough to lure him inside her, into the place that ached and burned to feel him.

His lips parted, and she thought he meant to speak, but he only groaned and eased forward, breaching the tight ring of muscle at her entrance and feeding her the head of his cock.

She felt the burn, the stretching, but it wasn’t enough. He had made her so hungry, she didn’t know if there was such a thing anymore. All she knew was that she ached, deep inside, and he was the only thing that could ease her.

Her lips parted as his gaze slid down, watching as she licked the dry, cracked skin before returning to lock with hers. She could see no blackness now, only fire. Flames leapt and danced in his eyes, a million shades of red and gold, orange and amber, blue and white at the center, where he burned the hottest.

The heat threatened to sear her, to leave scars like a permanent brand on her flesh. Instead of fearing it, Ella longed for it. She wanted to throw herself into those flames and emerge new, like a phoenix taking flight.

She lifted her head from the mattress, straining toward him. She didn’t know what she thought, if she honestly believed she could walk into the fire of his eyes. She just knew she needed to be closer, to be one, to feel him with every inch of her body and every fiber of her soul.

And oh, he gave her inches.

With a muffled roar, his restraint shattered. Gone was the slow, measured torment. Kees thrust inside her with the impact of a battering ram, forcing her tight channel to part around his invading shaft. She felt him so deep inside her, she pictured him bumping up against her heart. She felt him nudge her cervix, but the slight instant of discomfort only seemed to make her hotter.

After pulling back, he thrust again, this time causing nothing but wild, unspeakable pleasure. He settled into a fast, pounding rhythm, and all Ella could do was hold on and hope she made it through in one piece.

Her hands gripped him hard, her nails digging in when sweat made his skin slick and slippery. She felt her toes curl and drew her legs up to wrap around his pistoning hips.

Kees rode her like a madman. He seemed utterly lost in the moment, his breath billowing in and out like steam from a mighty engine, but his eyes never left her face.

He stared at her like she held the secrets of the universe, but the only truth she had to offer was the one he had already discovered: that they fit together like pieces of a puzzle, two halves of a whole. One being, separated by time, by space, by species and experience, yet united by magic and passion.

Despite the pleasure he poured on her like hot summer rain, Ella had thought she was finished. She hadn’t expected the second climax, but when a third threatened to gather deep in her womb, she wanted to scream for mercy. Another explosion like that might just rip her apart.

Kees didn’t seem to care. He continued to ride her, hard and desperate. His hands dropped to close about her hips. Shifting his weight backwards, he slid his palms beneath her and curled his fingers around her ass cheeks to yank her firmly into his increasingly wild thrusts.

In and out he thrust, but his rhythm started to break down. Now he just moved according to the force of his lust. Ella felt her body tighten, felt her clit draw up, felt her heart leap into her throat as sensation blew over her, rushing in like a tidal wave and sweeping everything but her and Kees away in its path.

Even as her pussy clenched tight, she heard his sharp curse and felt his hips jerk convulsively. His cock twitched inside her, and he came with a roar, bellowing her name as he released a torrent of heat deep inside her.

Still shuddering, he collapsed atop her on a long, strangled groan. It sounded as if someone had just wrung out his soul.

Ella knew precisely how he felt.

Chapter Eight

Kees felt nothing.

He reminded himself of that, over and over, but doubt continued to claw at his gut, unsettling him. He had intended to demonstrate to Ella that a Guardian was ruled by logic and instinct. He wanted her to realize that no emotion polluted his thoughts or actions. Sex, after all, was the most fundamentally instinctive of acts, an action ruled by hormones and the most primal and reptilian areas of the brain.

Instead, he had ended up making love to her, showering her with pleasure as if she were the most precious thing in his universe. And he’d done it all for the simple joy of hearing her sigh.

What in the name of the Light was the matter with him?

Kees lay in the dark of the bedroom and stared at the ceiling. Sometime ago, he had rolled off his human lover for fear of crushing her and settled onto his back. She had followed, soft and sleepy, and curled against his side like a contented kitten. She’d nestled her cheek into the hollow of his shoulder, draped an arm across his chest, and promptly drifted into sleep. So, at least one of them was getting some rest.

Not that he really needed any. He’d been resting for centuries, after all, and could go for days at a time before adjusting to the pace of the waking world. Even then, he’d need no more than three or four hours of rest a night to remain at full energy. His problem, then, wasn’t lack of sleep; it was the thoughts keeping him awake.

Thoughts, he told himself firmly. Not emotions.

Just the idea that he might be experiencing human emotion for the first time in his long existence filled Kees with unease. He’d battled and slept through ages of men without ever suffering such an affliction. He hadn’t thought it was possible.

It shouldn’t be. The Guardians had been formed from stone, carved by the powers of the Light, and summoned from the ether into bodies as hard and enduring as their mission. They needed to be tough, strong, impervious to all but the fiercest attacks; otherwise, they could never succeed in keeping the demons of the Darkness at bay. Like mountains of rock, he and his brothers withstood the forces of evil that buffeted them, wearing down the opposition until it could be banished into the prisons of the barren planes.

Never had he heard of a Guardian who felt as the humans felt. Guardians experienced rage and frustration at the continued existence of the Seven. Those glimpses of feeling fueled their warfare, made them stronger and deadlier, but beyond that, they existed in an eternal state of cool detachment.

Even for the Wardens who served them, no Guardian ever developed feelings of caring or love. Kees still raged over Gregory’s death, but not because he cared about the mage; he raged because the
nocturnis
had dared to strike against him while he slept. Part of his task was to protect the Wardens of the Guild so that their mission continued for as long as the Seven continued to exist. Failing at that task angered Kees, and he had to remind himself not to clench his hand around the soft human female beside him. He had no desire to injure her, and less to wake her.

He still needed to think.

How could an emotionless Guardian define what he experienced around his small human? The lust was easy. Lust was simple, as he’d told Ella, animal and instinctive. Kees had known lust before, mostly after battle, when the hot tide of fury still coursed through him. In those times, he and his brothers had taken women, some human, some mages. Occasionally a minor guard who had joined in the fight. Sex acted as a release and a pressure valve, allowing the Guardians to let go of the intensity of the fight so that they could settle once more to sleep. That made it even harder for him to understand why sex with the human beside him didn’t make him feel relaxed and ready to slumber, but awake and electric and hungry to taste her again.

Was this some sort of magic she possessed that he had never encountered before?

Kees had a feeling such an explanation was much too easy.

In actuality it didn’t matter how or why he experienced these unfamiliar sensations around Ella. What mattered was that such a thing could not be allowed. Lust he could tolerate, but from now on, Kees would ensure that no more than lust would color his view of the small human. He would not allow it.

When dawn broke, he would make certain that the woman knew exactly where she stood. There would be no more tenderness, no more of her attempting to probe his soul and convince him of impossible ideas.

Kees was a Guardian, and while the loss of so many members of the Guild of Wardens made finding someone with Ella’s magical talent critical to their future, he must make her understand what the future would hold.

Stone and magic, not sweetness and love.

Resolved on his next moves, Kees closed his eyes. He would need his rest if he intended to follow through with his plan, and Kees always followed through.

*   *   *

“Today we must begin your training.”

Ella stepped out of the bathroom wearing a stretchy tank top and baggy pajama pants, holding a towel to her still dripping hair. She froze at the bark in Kees’s voice. Why did he sound angry?

“What?”

Kees stood in the doorway to the bedroom, his natural form filling the doorway, his wings actually rising above the lintel on either side of the opening. He appeared even more enormous that usual. And more intimidating. His harsh features were drawn tight into a fearsome scowl, and he glared at her as if he found her a particularly bothersome irritation.

What the hell was going on?

“You need to learn to control your magic, then you need to learn to use it,” he snapped, his expression never changing. “I had hoped Gregory would take on the responsibility, or at least contact the Guild and ask them to assign you a proper mentor, but neither of those options is available to us any longer. Until we locate another Warden and discover the current state of the Guild, I will have to do it myself.”

Ella had been a little surprised to wake in her bed alone an hour earlier, but she hadn’t worried. Maybe she should have. The Guardian currently staring at her like something nasty on the sole of his shoe—you know, if he had worn shoes—bore absolutely no resemblance to her lover from the night before. All she could remember were stunning mutual orgasms and the sense of peace that filled her as she had fallen asleep in his arms. Had she slapped his face in her sleep or something?