Page 56 of Bewitched By the Djinn
I shift, spreading my legs. “Please.”
His eyes are dark and hot, spearing me in place with their intensity. His hand slips easily under the waistband of my leggings and below my panties. When his fingers encounter the slickness between my legs, gliding over heated flesh with ease, we both groan at the contact.
The world around us ceases to exist. My entire being focuses solely on the pressure of his hand at my core, the murmur of his voice in my ear, and the incessant need pounding in my blood.
His free hand fumbles at his pants, freeing his massive erection, and I reach out, grasping his hard length in my palm.
He moans, his fingers between my legs faltering for a second before resuming their ministrations, his palm pressing against the most sensitive part of me while his fingers slip into my wet heat.
Then he leans over me and draws one tight nipple into the heat of his mouth and I buck and cry out as the orgasm overtakes my body, making me arch and contract, the world tilting once again, except this time we aren’t falling through a portal.
Bennet shudders next to me as his own release finds him.
We lay there until the last tremor fades and we’re lying tangled and spent, hearts pounding in sync.
He shifts just enough to drape an arm across my waist and lets out a slow, contented sigh. “Well,” he mutters, “that’s one way to travel.”
I release a shaky laugh and meet his amused gaze. “Maybe the best way... minus the lightning and terror part.”
Slowly, I sit up, rubbing my now chilled arms. The ground is damp beneath me. The air is thick with the scents of moss and earth. Overhead, the moon hangs low and swollen, casting silver light over the inky water and glinting off surrounding trees.
Did we move forward in time as well? In the cemetery it was still dusk. Here, the sky is pitch-black, dotted with stars visible through the leaves and branches overhead.
Torches glowing with eerie blue flames float in the air, trailing into the distance, lighting a path through the thick trees around us. The sounds of croaking frogs and rustling leaves float on the breeze.
Bennet pushes himself up next to me. “I suppose we found where the witches live.”
So we’re not going to talk about the romp on the swamp floor. Got it. Straight back to business. It shouldn’t bother me. I’m the one who insisted it was just the magic. But didn’t he say it was more than that?
I swipe my hair out of my face, like I can swipe the memories of the past fifteen minutes away with it. “Maybe we’ll find Helen here too.”
He swings to his feet, buttoning up his pants and reaching for our clothes, handing me my shirt and bra. “Maybe.”
Thank the gods I brought wet wipes. I offer him one before cleaning myself up and tugging my clothes back on.
He shrugs his own shirt over his head, covering up the masculine perfection that I’m pretending not to look at.
He offers me a hand and I take it, clambering to my feet.
“I suppose that’s the way we go.” I point out the lighted path.
We pick up our bags and get moving. The blue lanterns bob in the thick night air, leading us forward like ghost lights over the bayou. Each one drifts just far enough ahead to keep us going in the right direction, vanishing the moment we draw close.
Bennet walks beside me, footsteps soundless.
The path narrows, trees pressing in around us, their gnarled roots rising from the dark water like skeletal hands. Spanish moss drapes from their limbs, shifting in the breeze.
He glances behind us. “The portal, when we crossed over, it felt familiar to me. It was like passing through Aetheria. It may be a fold.”
I purse my lips. “What is that?”
“A place where the space between worlds folds in on itself, where the veil is thin. When you step through a portal like that, you’re passing through Aetheria and then ending up in the same plane, just farther away.”
That makes a weird kind of sense, even if it makes my brain throb. “So, what, these places are all around us? Random portals in the universe?”
“Not random. Certain places are naturally thin. Old places. Powerful places. Places that have seen both great and tragic events.” His eyes flick to the glowing lanterns. “And I suspect the witches know exactly how to use them.”
A bird cries somewhere in the distance, long and haunting. The usual hum of the swamp—frogs croaking, cicadas buzzing—dulls as we walk, like the world itself is holding its breath.
