Page 100 of The Girl Who Fell Through Time
She hardly knows what she is asking him for. She’s a stark, frantic column of desire. Need digs into her bones. She needs him. Needs him inside her.
“Are you sure?” he asks her again.
She’s sure she’ll die without him. Her fingers go to his breeches, trying to help him out of them. She wishes she could tear them off his body like he tore off her underthings.
The length of him springs free, and she touches him like he touched her. He moans into her neck, gasping, whispering her name, clasping at her waist. His cries ripple inside her. There’s so much pleasure from giving it.
She asks him to go inside her. Begs him for it, maneuvers herself into the right position. His hand splay against her stomach—
Dorian pulls back, leaping to the end of the bed like she’s scalded him.
“I’m sorry,” she’s says, “did I hurt you—”
“No, no, it’s fine.”
His breath comes in hard, ragged pants. Selene places a hand against his back, feeling the heat of his skin, the frantic hammering of his heart next to his spine. He’s trembling.
“I don’t want to…I can’t…”
She strokes small circles between his shoulder blades. “Dorian?”
His fingers tighten where they rest against the sheets. “I don’t want to get you pregnant.”
Selene freezes.
The words shouldn’t cut, but they do—sharp and immediate. Almost all men desire children. Dorian would make an excellent father. Is it her he doesn’t want as a mother?
She swallows the thought down before it can take root. No. This is Dorian. There will be some other reason, some careful, considered logic that only he would think of.
Then it comes to her.
“Is this because of your mother?” she asks softly. “Because of what happened to her?”
Does he fear losing her the way his father lost his mother? It would be a kindness, in its way—a terrible, twisted kindness—but she is willing to take that risk.
Dorian stiffens.
Then, after a moment of unbearable silence, he says, “I need to tell you something.”
A cold fist closes around Selene’s stomach. “Go on.”
He turns, and his face is pale, drawn. His throat bobs as he swallows. “I loved a woman before.”
She had expected this. “Luna?”
His eyes widen. “How… how do you know that name?”
“You murmur it sometimes in your sleep.”
His breath hitches. “I… I see.”
Selene keeps her voice gentle. “Who was she?”
Dorian exhales shakily. “She… she died.” His jaw clenches. Then, with a sickening finality that makes her stomach plummet, he adds, “While she was pregnant with my child.”
Selene’s heart twists. “Oh, Dorian.”
“It was my fault.” His voice is barely above a whisper, but it cuts through the room like a blade. “What happened to her… it was my fault. I caused her death, and I can’t, I can’t lose…”
