Page 142 of Untempered
My thoughts fractured. I knew I had to be patient. I had to do this right. I didn’t know what wrong was, though. It wasallso right. I moved, and she started panting. I tried to circle my hips, tried to grind into her. Her cheeks were pink. I remembered the day she’d been riding her pillow. Wild horses, I wanted her to ride me, to grind us together until we collapsed, exhausted. I wanted her on top of me the way she’d been in the orchard, calling the pace, taking what she wanted. I wanted her hand on my cock, and I wanted her to stare at me with those whiskey eyes while I lost myself.
Her back was arched, her hands fisted, her lips open. She flexed around me, and I breathed through the rush of desperation, letting the pleasure burn through every part of me, holding the rhythm without wavering.
The first ripples of her orgasm clutched at my cock, and I held on as she arched up, her eyes unseeing, her expression one of rapture. Before me, she blurred as I struggled to focus or even breathe, feeling the peak coming and struggling to maintain the pattern she needed until the rippling of her muscles turned to a flutter, and I could throw caution to the wind, thrusting hard into her, climbing, and then letting myself fall.
CHAPTERFIFTY-SIX
AUDREY
“Hope can cause you to over-commit. Never hesitate to turn back.
Everything is replaceable, except you.” ~ Matri’sion lesson
My body ached. My hips hurt the worst where they had dug into the hard ground through the thin mattress. My shoulder hurt, too. Buteverythinghurt.
The warmth felt good, though, and I knew the pain was only a fraction of what it could be. What ithadbeen. I huddled into the pile of makeshift blankets and wished myself back to sleep in the cozy nest he’d re-made around us while I was still trying to recall what world I was in.
Mayhap I drifted in and out of dreams. The pain stayed, though, as I listened to the horses snuffling outside and the rise and fall of Chay’s voice as he cared for them. I should’ve joined him. The sun had been up for some time, and he’d already banked the fire and replaced the water.
But if I moved, then the day was a reality I’d need to face. And I didn’t want to. There was nothing good that would come from leaving this bed.
As I was swimming up through a sleepy haze of guilt and hopelessness, the door creaked open, and cold air gusted over me.
I ignored the pain as best I could, wiggling my toes and focusing on my breath. I could’ve pretended to be asleep, but I didn’t. When I saw the worried way Chay was looking at me, the guilt moved to the fore.
“If we wait a little longer, the sun’ll burn some of the cold off the air,” he offered quietly. “We should head straight back.”
There was no point in returning to the stone. Which meant there was no point in returning to La’Angi.
Had Isolde been well enough to bank her own fire? The thought had made my sleep sporadic and kept my belly knotted. And I wouldn’t know until I went back.
“We could stay,” he said softly, sitting on the ground. “There’s wood and some food. Plenty of honey.” His eyes went to my lips, just for a moment. “The horses have shelter.”
Tears burned my throat, and I swallowed them away. I didn’t want to go. I didn’t want to stay. I wanted tofixthis.
“We can’t spend another day at the stone,” he said slowly. “You know that, right?”
“Yes.” That didn’t mean I’d accepted it.
He was quiet for a moment, then offered, “I could make the ride to and from. You could wait here.Ifyou wait here.”
I remembered the time I’d fallen out of a tree Isolde had been teaching me to climb. I hadn’t broken anything, but half my body had been bruised. I’dhurt.She hadn’t been especially gentle or gracious. There had been no additional encouragement or teachings. It was what it was. I healed. I recovered. We tried again.
I didn’t know why the memory of such an everyday occurrence made me want to cry. Of all the memories I had of the woman, was that the one that would stay with me at the end? Not the time I’d seen her appear behind a man, cut the artery in his groin, and whisk away the children he’d threatened? Or…or the other things jumbled in my head? Like violently tossed bedsheets, the thoughts layered over one another, jarring. My heart skittered in my chest, and I couldn’t slow my breath.
What if shewasdead?
It was going to happen. I’d known it was. One day, I was going to walk in and find her alone in that big bed, the floor awash, dangling halfway to the floor, bruising around her throat and…
“Storm’s happy,” Chay said, and the words hit me like as smithy’s hammer on hot steel. “She’d prefer her warm stall, of course, but I found some apples that weren’t half bad and gave them both some treats.” He shifted to sit beside me. “Sun hasn’t been up long. I probably woke you cutting the wood a little while ago. The beekeeper must’ve had chickens, but they’ve been nabbed by someone hungrier than him. His garden’s passable, though.” He settled back into his place at my back, and I leaned into him. “I’m sorry about the stone, Audrey. I really am.”
Of course he was. He had it, too. I’d effectively ended his life in every single way. “It works,” I told him, and my voice creaked from disuse. “I know it does. I just don’t know how.”
“It might have nothing to do with fire,” he said tiredly. “For all we know, it’s powered by giant waves.”
It wasn’t impossible. It had to be fueled by something. “We don’t know enough about old magic,” I said, wishing I could be angry about that, about everything that had been stolen from us. “Did you know La’Angi used to have potatoes, not apples?”
“No,” he said. “Can I hold you?”
