Page 38 of Bound

Then again, he was impossibly old to most. Not much was older than him, except for the creatures who invented these voids in the first place. And as far as he knew, they were all dead.

“That sounds… peaceful,” Ruby said slowly. “Lonely. But peaceful.”

“Lonely.” Slate snorted, his tail flicking. “I was picked for this void for a reason. I enjoy my solitude.”

“You werepicked?”

“Every elder Skullstalker was picked for their void. Not like the younglings, who stagger around any void they can find, wreaking destruction.” He pointed at the chocolate melting in her hand. “You are dripping.”

“What? Oh!” Ruby ran her tongue over her chocolate-streaked wrist. Her tongue was so small, and yet Slate could not tear his eyes away. His mind filled with memories: Ruby running her small tongue up his cock. Fitting it into his slit and licking away the salt. Rubbing it so tenderly over his knot?—

“For someone who likes being alone so much,” Ruby said quietly, fiddling with a feather jutting out next to her leg, “You don’t seem too annoyed having me around.”

Her heart was racing. He could smell the sweat on her skin. His mouth filled with saliva, which had been happening more since her arrival. At first, he assumed it was because of her soft, tantalizing meat. But the saliva usually occurred when he was thinking of devouring her in a very different way.

He loomed closer, watching her pupils swell. “Are you still sore?”

“I’m sensitive but not sore. I, um…” Ruby cringed. “I keep touching myself? Which isn’t helping.”

Slate didn’t respond. He was lost for words, which was such a rare occurrence he had no defense against it. The saliva pooling in his mouth was coming dangerously close to dripping down his chin. His eyelids drooped behind his mask as he imagined Ruby’s lithe fingers slipping inside herself, stuffing her hole as full as she could manage.

Ruby’s throat clicked. She shifted against his nest, getting her scent over it. She smelleddelectablywet. He wanted to eat her whole.

“Do…” She hesitated, looking up to meet his half-lidded eyes. “Do you ever do that? Touch yourself?”

Slate suddenly wanted to rub her scent around his entire nest. To go to sleep in it. To strip her naked and watch her arch against the furs as he stretched her.

Ruby bit her lip. “Slate?”

He hadn’t answered. He didn’t want to tell her the truth: he very rarely touched himself.

His desires had sloughed away with age. His lust had gone the same way as his appetite. He had assumed they were gone for good. But with this little human cautiously stroking his belly, it was all slamming back into him faster than he could resist.

“Why should I?” he asked. “I have you.”

With that, he surged forward and twisted her around until she was pressed chest-first into the nest.

Ruby moaned. She sounded shocked and, if he was reading her tone correctly, slightly appalled. Then he ground his hardening cock against her dress-clad ass, and everything melted out of the moan except for desperate hunger.

“I meant before…” she trailed off, gasping as he ran a hand down her back and made the dress vanish. He watched the shadows roll away from her skin hungrily until she was completely naked in his nest.

He kept the dagger in its holster band around her thigh. They would not be attacked in his nest, but he liked how it looked against her skin.

“Before I got here,” Ruby continued breathlessly as he pressed her naked breasts into the fur. “Did you go somewhere, find someone when you needed—ohhhh.”

He felt her groan as he ran his tongue over her naked back. He reached around her torso, rolling her small breasts in his hands. He made sure to retract his claws this time, but only after pressing them into her skin and feeling the soft give.

“As I said,” he rumbled in her ear. “I enjoy my solitude.”

Ruby twisted her head, her dark eyes far too coherent for his liking. “But before, when you—when you needed release?—”

Slate did not want to explain his previous lack of hunger when he was suddenly starving. He slid his tongue over her shoulder, fitting it into the grooves of her collarbone before wrapping it around her neck.

Moan, he thought desperately.

Ruby did. Slate felt it deliciously, her delicate neck vibrating against his tongue. He gave her a thankful squeeze, getting another moan in return, and slid his tongue down her spine, counting the notches.

“Spread your legs,” he said.

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