Veiled (25 page)

“Touch me,” I whisper, pushing his hand away from my breast where his tongue is teasing in slow circles. I lead it down the front of my stomach, my abs tightening as his skin brushes against me.

He hesitates before the band of my underwear, maybe having second thoughts. He pulls his head up and stares at me, this wild, barely caged beast in his eyes. I stare right back, wanting him, willing him. I’ve never been so god damn needy before in my life, never thought it was even possible to feel this kind of hunger, to chase my release like an animal after prey.

He shuts his eyes, his mouth finds mine again, our lips and tongues fused together, a rock against flint until we’re sparking into flames. His taste, oh his taste. I could drink him in all day.

Then his fingers slowly slide down into my underwear, long and intimidating in their own right. Hands that seem to know my skin already, that possess an ease with the intimacy.

He sucks in a sharp breath when he finds how wet I am. I don’t even have breath to begin with. My body has become a surprise to me, like it’s finally showing me what it can do, what it wants, needs, craves.

His fingertips are rough and I am silk and he slides one finger slowly, deliberately, over my most sensitive flesh. Now I’m groaning, whimpering, feeling too much, needing too much. I feel myself opening wider as the pressure gets tighter. I grab onto his neck, his shoulder, my legs starting to give way as the blood inside becomes weightless.

He responds by dipping his fingers lower until I feel him inside me, then slowly drags it back out, pressing hard.

I can’t stop it. Can’t hold back.

I explode into his hands and Ada doesn’t exist anymore. I’m boneless, jelly, reduced to a single-celled organism floating in the stars. I know I’m crying out loudly, that Jay is grunting into my neck, finding pleasure in my pleasure, my nails digging into him so hard that I’m sure I’m drawing blood.

I’m still not myself, still not of sound mind, still shooting across galaxies when he grunts “Fuck” and then picks me up, throwing me onto the bed.

I lie there, dazed, sated and yet forever insatiable, as he puts his hands at my collar and rips the t-shirt right in half. Totally unnecessary but Jay is no longer here, just like Ada is no longer here. His eyes tell a different story, one of an untamed beast who gets to hunt and eat for the first time in his life.

My underwear is deftly shucked off and I’m lying here on my back, naked and exposed to him for the first time. His eyes rake over my body, taking me in, his nostrils flaring like a bull about to charge.

Yet, somehow he holds back. It’s an effort. His face is flushed, jaw set, his muscles straining as he stands there at the foot of the bed, letting his eyes taste me.

Then he strips.

Shirt gone.

Jeans gone.

Boxer briefs gone.

And then Jay is naked.

I knew he was a chiseled, masculine work of art but I had no idea just how magnificent he was until right now. Every inch of his body is flawless, lightly golden, and cut like a diamond.

And he’s hung.

As in
well
-
well-well
-hung.

I’d only felt him minutes ago, but it still takes me by surprise. I don’t think I’ve ever properly leered at a man like this before, let alone a naked one. Dillon had a good body but it was one of a boy and he didn’t wear it with confidence. The glimpses I got of him were quick and hurried, usually blurred by alcohol or clothing.

But not Jay. I see him clearly with hawk eyes that take in every hard inch. Jay is all man and he stands before me not giving two shits that he’s naked. If anything, he wants me to stare, wants a reaction. He’s been so skilled thus far that I keep forgetting that the man is a virgin in the loosest terms and adoration over his body might be exactly what he needs.

I don’t fake it. My mouth has been gaping this entire time and the release I found moments ago is back to building inside me, just as greedy and eager for him now as I was before.

“Come here,” I say, my voice choked with yearning. My boldness still surprises me, the fact that I lack any shame or insecurity. Being with him has made me want to own every beat of this moment.

He clears his throat, his eyes blazing at the invitation. “Are you sure?”

He’s afraid to let go still, afraid he’ll hurt me.

I don’t care.

“Whatever you do to me,” I tell him, “is exactly what I need and want.” I slide my hand down between my legs, parting them slightly, giving him a look. “I can handle it. I can handle you.”

He lets out what can only be described as a growl. “We’ll see about that,” he hisses and then he’s on me in a flash, the mass of his body looming over mine. Impatience fuels his hands as they slip between my legs, as they slide up my sides, as they settle back into my hair and make a fist.

Lips find mine, open and messy and wild, and then his mouth is everywhere, my collarbone, my breast, my stomach. For a moment his head goes between my legs, his tongue, flat and hot, licking the inside of my thighs before it laps up my clit, causing me to teeter to the edge again.

I grab his hair and haul his face up and for a moment worry lines his brow until I say, “I don’t want to come so soon.”

He wipes his glistening mouth with his forearm and now he looks confused, probably wondering why I don’t want to come all day every day. But the truth is, I want him inside me as quickly as possible. The cravings are getting too powerful to ignore.

He moves up my body, placing a hand beside my head to prevent his muscled frame from crushing me as his knee jerks my legs further apart. With his other hand he grips his dick, positions himself between my legs. His entire body is shaking with an urgency that I can feel in the heart of me.

This, now.

I need this, this, this.

Please.

Now.

Please.

But somehow there is still reason inside my brain. It speaks up. “Do we need a condom?” I ask breathlessly. Because that’s been a hard fast rule for me, having used one with Dillon every time.

He almost looks amused, his mouth inches from mine. “Trust me when I say we don’t.” And in the real world with some other guy, I wouldn’t believe that line. But this isn’t a line. And this bedroom feels miles away from the real world and Jay isn’t some guy. He’s barely human, mostly supernatural, and I’m guessing he’d be shooting blanks.

Satisfied with that, I reach around and slide my hands down the hard planes of his back, all the way to his ass, impossibly round and firm. I grip him there and shrug him forward, urging him inside me.

His gaze is on fire as he stares into my eyes, the connection between us burning like an electrical fire.

“Oh you gorgeous creature,” he murmurs.

Then he pushes in, just enough, a raspy hiss coming from the back of his throat. He teases, coming out again, testing me, taunting me.

“Please,” I whimper, unable to keep it together, this insatiable want.

He growls again, an animal noise, and pushes in fast and hard and I can’t breathe. He’s heavy, hard, and so thick that when his hips push against mine, I’m close to being in pain.

But then the pain melts away to something else, my body giving way to his as his hips perfectly curl toward me with each and every thrust, the sensation of ourselves fusing together in perfect harmony, and now it’s like I can’t get enough of him. He’s air and I’m gulping him down, needing him to survive every second.

He’s grunting loudly now, sweat dripping from his brow, and I can see the restraint in him, that despite all he’s warned me about, he’s still holding back. I dig my nails into him ass and moan, “Jay. Harder. Rougher.” Just to spur him on. “All of you, give me all of you.”

It works.

Something in him unhinges, the cage door swings open and the wild beast is unleashed.

He comes at me with fury, his hands gripping my hips like a vice to keep me in place, the headboard starting to slam against the wall. Somewhere in the room a painting falls off and shatters. The sheets on the bed pop off and bunch behind me.

There is sex and there is fucking. I’ve never known the latter until right now, until this moment when something snaps within me, a wild creature of my own. Because this is pure and unadulterated and as immortal as he is.

And I’m enslaved to it.

I am equally as savage, desperate and crazed.

I rake my nails down his back drawing blood, and he’s biting my neck until the skin breaks and we’re two sweaty, frenzied animals who buck and pull and slam against each other at a breakneck pace.

He’s grabbing the headboard now, pulling us both up so we’re not falling off the bed and I watch with wide eyes as he hovers over me, each straining muscle, glistening with sweat. His face is the picture of pure determination as he works me hard.

He might pull that headboard right off
, is my last thought before my brain gets gummy and the world swells with warmth. My body is close to the edge and I hover in the split-second before the fall as all the switches in me flick to on.

Keep going.

Keep going.

Keep going.

I pull him even closer, rutting up into him, hunting my release.

Keep –

I go off, the spark at the end of the fuse, and just before I pinch my eyes shut, unable to control any part of my body, I glance at Jay. He’s staring down at me in amazement, maybe even pride, like he’s seeing something most people never see, like a meteor shower at sunset, or dawn from the top of Everest. He’s looking at me like I’m the most beautiful sight he’ll ever witness and that I’m his and always will be.

Then the orgasm becomes too much and I close my eyes and I’m molten, lava flowing through me, igniting my soul as my legs quiver and my body jerks and I’m just completely obliterated. I’m sure there are bits of me all over the place, like I’ve exploded into fiery confetti.

Jay lets out a hoarse cry and starts slamming into me harder. The air crackles between us and time seems to slow down. Maybe it really is slowing down. I can see and feel everything he’s doing to me in perfect clarity while the room starts to buzz, a glow entering all corners of my vision.

My eyes are glued again to Jay as he comes, his rhythm frantic and punishing and making up for so much lost time. His gazes at me in surprise, like he’s caught off guard, and then his head is arched back, his neck exposed. A thick, inhumane roar comes from his lips as they fall open, then softens into a groan.

The strangest thing is that I think I can feel him as he comes, like he’s filling me with heat and starlight and it’s seeping through every inch of me. The sensation is as supernatural as he is.

His pumping slows and finally stills, arms braced on the headboard, his head hanging, the sweat dripping onto my chest. Then he comes down, his breath still ragged, and props himself on his elbows on either side of my head.

We don’t speak.

Not with our mouths.

We speak with our eyes, the way he looks over me with so much tenderness and awe it nearly brings me to tears.

We speak with our hands, as my fingers skirt down his damp spine, as his thumbs brush the hair off my face.

We speak with our lips as he places his against mine, soft and sweet and still needy underneath.

We speak with our bodies as he rests inside me, still pulsing, and I wrap my legs around his waist. He’s almost getting hard all over again.

And that’s all we need to say to each other.

Our breaths are caught, our sweat is cooled.

And we start all over again.

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

I’ve always been the first one to roll my eyes at Cosmopolitan when the cover promises “Mind-blowing Orgasms Tonight!” or when girls wax about how awesome some guy was in bed. I figured the whole world was lying to me, because when I had sex with Dillon, my mind wasn’t blown. If anything was blown, it was him, a thankless job.

Sex was never horrible—except for the first time, in the back of his car, where it not only hurt because the asshole didn’t believe in foreplay and I was too unschooled to know what I wanted, but it was awkward too. We didn’t know each other’s bodies at all and Dillon didn’t really care. So sex during our relationship had just been okay. I never came and I only figured out the magic of masturbation after we broke up, but I put up with it because this was it, the thing that’s supposed to change your life.

But now I get it. Now I understand and I understand in such a way that I’m thinking back to those Cosmo covers and I know they have no idea. No idea what mind-blowing really is.

Because what Jay and I have, what we share, goes beyond sex. The sex goes beyond sex. I’m sure if the rest of the world just experienced what I experienced, humanity would end up dead in their bedrooms. This is the kind of sex that makes you crave more of it, that has you forgoing food and water and sunlight and proper speech, just to have one small taste of ecstasy.

Needless to say, Jay has ruined me. In his warnings, I know he said I would ruin him, change him. And this might be true. The more insatiable sex we have, the more wild, more human, he becomes. But I never thought I would be reduced to such a primitive beast myself, a craving, lustful, starving creature that can’t get her fill.

We spend four days in that Seaside hotel room.

We don’t venture outside once.

We order room service, but we barely touch our food.

All we touch is each other.

Four days of him being inside me, making me come over and over, taking me every way he can, everywhere he can. The floor, the desk, the shower, the sink, even the balcony late at night when I have to bite down on his shoulder to keep quiet.

And somewhere in the back of my lust-addled mind, I know this isn’t normal. I know that sex isn’t supposed to be
this
good. I know that the man fucking me is a man in all the right ways, but not quite a man all the same. An immortal beast that’s finally unleashing his deepest, most primal desires.

But I don’t care. The sex has rendered me stupid and ignorant but incomparably happy all the same.

Until the outside world has a way of reaching in.

Jay’s phone rings just as we’re coming, our bodies entwined on top of the covers. My orgasm is ripping me apart and I’m floating so high that reason doesn’t enter my head until I start to come down.

Jay had put his ringer to off.

Then my phone rings.

My ringer is also set to off.

Then the hotel phone rings.

And finally Jay is pulling out of me. It translates to instant hollowness, like I’m being denied a vital part of me. He brushes the hair from my sweaty brow, his sated eyes turning to annoyance. “I have a feeling if we don’t answer, we’re going to get a very unwanted visit,” he says, getting off the bed and striding over to the desk, the morning light from the balcony making him light up like an angel. My eyes are fixed to his large thighs, the taught, round swells of his ass that are blemished with a few bruises of my own doing. I can’t help it. With an ass like that, you have to bite it.

Jay snatches up the phone, clearing his throat. “Hello?” he answers but it still sounds husky, like he’s spent the last few hours moaning and groaning. Which he has.

I can’t hear the conversation but I already know it’s Jacob. There’s not many people who can make a muted phone ring.

Jay doesn’t say anything except “everything is fine” and “yes.” Then he hangs up, keeps his back to me. I momentarily admire his shoulders, made for an Olympic swimmer, before I ask, “What did he say?”

“Said the coast is clear,” he says as he turns around, folding his chiseled arms over his chest, the very chest I like to run my nails down. “We can go back to your home.”

Home. It sounds like a foreign word. This is my home now more than anything.

He’s my home.

My eyes drift down to his cock, still half-hard.

“Ada,” he says imploringly. “We have to go.”

I sigh and flop back dramatically on the bed, my fingers curling around the sheets like it’s second nature. “I don’t want to go home. I want to stay here with you. Our cocoon.”

“I’m not taking you home,” he says, coming over and slipping on a pair of boxer briefs.

This has my attention. “What are you talking about?”

“Your mother,” he says to me and images of her crash into my mind. Her in Hell, tortured, begging for help. It’s all it takes to bring me out of the sex-haze and into the very real and very painful reality.

Oh god, I’ve been so heartless. This whole time I’ve been having sex with Jay and not bothering to remember what Pippa said.

“It’s okay,” he says, reading me. “You were handed a painful pill to swallow. They say sex is always used to keep the truth at bay. I get that now. You were trying to protect yourself.”

Protect myself by sleeping with him? “Jay, that’s not why we’ve—”

“I know that too,” he says, pulling on a grey t-shirt. “But it certainly makes things easier. But your mother is still in Hell, she still needs your help.”

I frown at him, the guilt lingering. “What are you saying? You’ve been trying to keep me from this.”

“I know,” he says, reaching down and tossing me the black dress I arrived here with. I honestly haven’t worn any clothes since. “But you’re right. I should have never kept you from it. It wasn’t fair. And now I want to help you get her back.”

I can scarcely believe my ears. “What?”

He sits on the edge of the bed. “You can put up walls, Ada.”

“But I don’t know how to do it. It just happens.”

“Exactly. Which is why you can’t do this on your own. I mean, how exactly would you wander down to Hell anyway?”

My brain is still fuzzy from the last few days and struggling to be used again. “Get Perry to make a portal?”

“It would be a portal to the Thin Veil and a dangerous one at that. She would have no idea how to get there and it would only harm her while endangering others. You have to go through a portal with me. And I know where one is.”

“And you’ve been in this portal to Hell before?”

He shakes his head, gives me a twisted smile. “I’ve never been to Hell before, as far as I know.”

“Then how do you know what to expect?”

He stares at me in that way of his, the one that says
I just do
.

I blink, feeling a rush of something new in my veins, clearing out the dreamy lust.

It’s hope.

“So you’re saying you’ll take me to this portal and come with me to Hell to get my mother back? Sorry, I just want to make sure we’re on the same page here.”

Jay nods gravely. “It’s the only option we have.” He pauses, gives me a steady look. “But it’s up to you. This is your choice. Your call.”

“Well then. I guess we’re going to Hell together.”

He doesn’t smile at that. Instead he gnaws on his lower lip, thinking. “This isn’t going to be easy, Ada. People say things are going to be Hell without even the slightest notion of what Hell is.”

“You said you’ve never been there.”

“Just because I’ve never been there doesn’t mean I haven’t seen it. It’s worse than your imagination can possibly allow you to comprehend. It’s like trying to think of infinite space. You can’t. Your brain won’t be able to wrap around what you’ll see. Or hear. Or smell. Or feel. It’s your worst nightmare, when you’re running from something but you’re slowing down and they’re catching up and it’s that moment before it’s on you, the anticipation of being ripped to shreds, and then actually being ripped to shreds. Then it’s fifty times that horror. Over and over and over again, burrowing inside every cell until you don’t even know who you are anymore and you’re certain you never had a soul. You’ll forget your name, where you came from, and who you were meant to find. You’ll forget everything until all that’s left is a pinprick of who you used to be and eternal damnation instead.”

My eyes have been held wide open this entire time. If he meant to scare me, he’s terrified me. But even so, I raise my chin and look him dead in the eye. “I’m going to get my mother back.”

A ghost of a smile graces his lips, something like admiration. “Okay. But first, I have a request.”

“Don’t speak to the Devil unless spoken to?”

“Yes,
that
,” he says. “Just like the Veil, there are specific rules we need to follow or it’s all over. But, we have to head up to Seattle. To see your sister.”

“Perry? Why?”

“Because of everything I’ve just said. Because you need to remember where you came from and who you’re there to find. Perry’s special, just like you, and your bond is just as strong as the one between you and your mother. You need to see her before you go. Even normal people feel comfort in having a loved one nearby. But you two aren’t normal. She’ll imprint on you for a few days, it’s part of your abilities and your bond, how close you are. Your mother will be able to feel her too through you. It will make things a lot easier, trust me.”

As weird as that all sounds, I know he’s right. After I spend some time with Perry, I often feel her with me for a few days after.

“Okay,” I say, picking up my phone from the bedside table and glancing at it.

A million missed calls and texts. One from Jacob, I’m assuming. Some from Dad. Most from Perry, even Dex.

I know I’m going to get an earful but I dial anyway. No way is she going to understand I haven’t been in touch because I’ve been having a load of hot sex.

She answers right away.

“Oh my god, are you okay!? Ada!?” Perry yells so loud I have to hold the phone at arm’s length for a moment.

“I’m fine,” I manage to say before she erupts again.

“You asshole! Where the hell have you been? I’ve been calling and texting and calling and texting and you never answered! I was so worried! Fuck, Ada! I called Dad and he said that you were off with Amy somewhere and so I called
Amy
,” Oh no, “and she said you guys weren’t really friends anymore. So that was a fucking surprise! How come you didn’t tell me that? And then I started really freaking the fuck out because oh my god, what if you’ve been kidnapped. Or worse? So then I called Dad.” Oh no! “And guess who answered? Jacob. He explained what’s really going on, that you had to leave and Jay has you. Is that true?”

“Uh, yes.” I’m looking at Jay with wide eyes. “That’s true. I’m with him now.”

“Is he being okay to you?”

I laugh.

“It’s not funny, Ada. You don’t even know the guy.”

I roll my eyes with a sigh. “Yes, he’s being
okay
to me.”

Jay frowns and gestures to the bed in disbelief as if to say
I think I’ve been more than okay
.

I dismiss him with my hand. “Anyway,” I say quickly into the phone. “We were wondering if we could come over tonight.”

“Tonight?” she asks. “Where are you? He said you were in Seaside. If I didn’t hear from you soon I was going to start calling every single hotel.”

“We’re here but we’re leaving. I don’t want to go home quite yet,” I tell her this white lie.

“You know you have school next week.”

“I know. Don’t worry. So can we come say hi or not?”

“We?” she repeats.

“Well obviously Jay is with me.”

She exhales noisily. A pause. “Yes. Fine.”

Sheesh. What’s up her butt? “Okay, great. So we’ll see you in like four hours or something.”

“Text me when you’re near so I can run down and let you in the parking garage.”

“Will do.”

Pause.

“Perry?” I ask.

“Yeah?”

“Be nice,” I tell her. “Dex is rubbing off on you a bit too much.”

Then I hang up.

Jay raises his brows at me. “I get the distinct feeling they don’t like me.”

I shrug with one shoulder. “Eh. She’s had bad experiences with Jacobs and I’m pretty sure she’s against any guy I spend too much time with.”

“But she has no idea about . . .” he trails off and motions to the room.

              “Oh hell no,” I tell him. “And she’s not going to know. She’s protective over me as it is.”

“So am I,” he reasons.

“She wouldn’t understand. I’ll always be fifteen years old to her, just a kid.”

“You’re still just a kid,” he says lightly, eyes dancing.

I glare at him. “Compared to someone who is ageless and immortal, yeah I guess I am.” I exhale and get up on my knees, about to slip the dress on. “So, when we get there, this can’t happen anymore.”