An Alien for Her Heart (A New Home #2)

20. Catherine

20

CATHERINE

I must drift off to sleep at some point because when Varek stirs beneath me, I open my eyes with a weariness that suggests I’d been resting. In a well. My body draped across his as I straddle him.

I’m supposed to be cold and worried. Instead, I feel warm and…safe.

My eyes flutter to meet his and he grimaces.

“Apologies, sura. I did not mean to wake you.”

Stifling a yawn, I run a hand through my hair, wincing as I disrupt the skin at my temple where I must have hit my head in the fall.

Varek notices immediately, his arm a blur as he reaches forward, his claw tightening around my wrist. “You’re in pain.”

I can’t help the soft smile that graces my lips. “Not really. I hit my head—”

“Where?” He tugs me closer, his scent enveloping me as he leans in, his face so close to mine that I can feel the warmth of his breath fanning across my cheek as he examines the wound hidden just behind my hairline. His brow furrows, a rumbling growl building in his chest.

“You’re hurt,” he growls, but somehow I know his anger isn’t directed at me. “I should have protected you better.” And I’m right. It’s directed at himself.

Before I can reassure him, he leans in closer, his tongue darting out to gently lap at the cut. I gasp at the sensation, my fingers instinctively curling into his shoulders. His saliva is warm and slightly tingling, soothing away the sting.

“Varek, what…?”

He pulls back just enough to meet my gaze, his eyes glowing faintly in the dim light. “To help you heal.” He says it as if it’s just another usual thing, but the way he’s looking at me sends a tingle to the base of my spine. There’s a rumble in his chest that makes his scales feel like they shift against me.

“What is it?” My whisper is barely there, as if I’m almost afraid of what he’ll respond with.

“I can taste your lifeblood.” Without hesitation, he leans forward, swiping his tongue over the wound again. Another rumble starts in his chest. One that should concern me. All it does is send that tingle from my spine to my center. “Sweet,” he growls.

A nervous little giggle rises from my throat. “Should I be concerned that you like it so much?”

For the first time since I’ve known him, I see the corners of his eyes crinkle.

“Maybe, sura. Maybe you should worry that after a taste of your lifeblood, I will want to consume you now.” Those yellow pits warm as they regard me and I finally realize that I can see much more of him than I could before. The sun is rising. We made it through the night.

I breathe a laugh through my nose. “Consume me, huh?” I tease, trying to lighten the suddenly charged atmosphere between us. “I thought you were supposed to be my protector, not my predator.”

Varek’s eyes flash with a heat that makes my breath catch. “Can’t I be both?” he rumbles, his voice a low, seductive purr. “I would consume you in the most pleasurable of ways. Devour every inch of your sweetness until you’re trembling and crying out for more.”

My core clenches, my thighs tightening on either side where I’m straddling him and his eyes darken at the same time. I’ve never seen this side of him before, this raw, sensual creature who looks at me like he wants to feast on my body for hours.

Varek’s claws slide down my back, the sharp tips lightly grazing my spine through the thin fabric of my shirt. I shiver at the sensation, heat pooling low in my gut.

“I want to take my time with you,” he murmurs, his lips brushing the shell of my ear. “Worship every inch of your body until you’re drunk on pleasure. Until the only word you remember is my name.”

It’s only then that I realize the hard thing between my thighs isn’t his leg. It’s him . That the entire time I’d been sleeping on him, he’d been nursing the most massive hard-on I’ve ever encountered. It feels even bigger now than the last time. As if he’s so engorged his shaft has swollen to the size of my arm.

A whimper escapes me as he rocks his hips up, pressing the hard length of him against my center. Even through our clothes, I can feel how much he wants me, how much he’s straining to keep control.

“Goodness, you’re big.”

The rumble of approval makes me release a laugh through my nose.

“Better than your human mates?”

I laugh again as he shifts his hips once more, forcing my core to grind against his hardness. The sensation almost makes my eyes roll over in my head.

“Bigger than any human male.” I pant.

He rumbles something in his chest again. “But not better.”

I huff out a laugh. “I didn’t mean that you’re not—”

Varek presses his lips against my ear. “Not to matter. I intend to be the best you’ve ever had. I won’t stop until I am.” His voice is a sinful growl that vibrates through my core. “I have a lifetime to prove it to you, my sura. A lifetime to learn every secret place that makes you moan, every touch that makes you tremble.”

He punctuates his declaration with a slow, deliberate roll of his hips, grinding the thick length of his arousal against my aching center. I gasp, my head falling back as pleasure sparks through my veins.

“Mm, I’ve got you,” he soothes, one claw coming up to cup the back of my head, angling me for a deep, drugging kiss that leaves me breathless and aching. “I’ll give you everything, my Catherine. Everything you need, everything you want.”

He seals that promise with another soul-searing kiss before trailing his lips down the column of my throat. I let my head fall back, surrendering to the bliss of his mouth on my skin. He finds my pulse point, lavishing it with attention, licking and suckling until I’m sure he’ll leave a mark.

A small, distant part of me knows we shouldn’t be doing this here, not when rescue could arrive at any moment. But the rest of me, the part that’s been craving Varek’s touch for longer than I care to admit, can’t bring myself to care.

Let them find us like this, I think hazily as Varek’s claws slice through the fabric of my tunic, baring my breasts to his hungry gaze. Let the whole world see that I’m his. That this powerful, magnificent male has claimed me, body and soul.

“Gods, I missed this,” Varek rasps, reverence in his eyes as he drinks in the sight of me. “So many sols the memory of you has haunted me.”

Then he’s cupping my breasts in his massive fists, his rough palms igniting sparks across my sensitive flesh as he sheathes his claws. I cry out as he takes one aching peak into the wet heat of his mouth, swirling his tongue around the tight bud.

He lavishes first one breast, then the other with devastating attention, until I’m mindless with need, my hips rolling shamelessly against the thick ridge of his hardness.

“Oh,” I gasp out, my nails digging into his shoulders. “Oh my. I don’t think…I don’t think I can wait. I need you inside me…”

I’ve never been one to beg, especially for something like this. But my shame has gone. I can only feel. And I need . I need him.

A deep, approving growl rumbles through his chest. In a move almost too fast to follow, he lifts me so I’m standing over him. For a split second, I’m confused as I look down at him. With a wicked glint in his eye, Varek slides his claws up my legs, the tips of his fingers hooking into the waistband of my panties a second before he rips them away. He shifts the tunic up, leaving me bare and open to his scorching gaze.

“I’m going to feast on you now,” he tells me, his voice a sinful caress against my overheated skin. “I’m going to taste your sweet honey until you scream for me. And then, when you’re wet and ready and begging, I’m going to bury myself so deep inside you, you’ll never want me to leave.”

My mouth falls open in both a gasp and shock. Before I can do more than whimper my enthusiasm for this plan, he’s shouldering my thighs apart and tilting his head back as he pulls me down on his face.

The first hot swipe of his tongue through my folds has me arching. I reach for the walls of the well as a strangled moan tears from my throat. I miss. The only other thing to hold on to is his green mane. As soon as my fingers slide through the strands to grip on to his skull, he groans in appreciation. The vibrations echo through my core as he licks me again, more firmly this time.

“Delicious,” he praises, his eyes flashing up to meet mine. “You taste divine, my sura.”

Then he seals his mouth over the throbbing pearl at the apex of my thighs and proceeds to make good on every filthy, electrifying promise.

Varek’s talented tongue works me mercilessly, licking and suckling at my most sensitive flesh until I’m writhing beneath him, my hands fisted in his hair. He traces obscene patterns through my slick folds, dipping inside to tease at my entrance before returning to the bundle of nerves that has me seeing stars.

“Varek,” I pant, my hips undulating shamelessly against his face. “Oh, don’t stop…”

He growls more approval. Spearing me with his tongue, he reaches up to grip one of my breasts, kneading it in his palm as another rumble of pleasure goes through him. The dual assault ratchets my pleasure impossibly higher.

I can feel the tension coiling tighter and tighter at the base of my spine, my inner muscles fluttering around his invading tongue. I’m close, so close, I just need a little more…

As if reading my mind, Varek moves his claw from my breast, trailing it down the quivering plane of my stomach to where I’m spread open for him. Still licking my center, he presses one long, thick digit inside me.

The added sensation is my undoing. With a hoarse cry of his name, I shatter, my body arching backward as ecstasy crashes through me in violent, cresting waves. Varek growls in male satisfaction, continuing to stroke me through the aftershocks until I collapse back against him. He catches me, pulling me back down into his arms as my entire body heaves with the aftereffects of my peak. I’m boneless and spent.

When I open my eyes and my gaze meets his, his eyes are like molten gold in the growing light. I can see the barely leashed hunger in his expression, the raw, primal need to claim me, to make me his in every way.

“I need you now,” he rasps, his voice guttural and strained. “I burn for you, my Catherine.”

“Then take me,” I breathe, reaching for him with trembling hands. “I’m yours, Varek. Now and always.”

I reach for him, but he catches my hand. His hips roll underneath me as he forces me upward, bracing me above him with one arm as he undoes the clasp of his trousers with the other. A deep, reverberating groan tears from his throat the moment his shaft is released. Even without touching him, I can feel the heat of it between us. With a sinuous roll of his hips, he notches himself at my entrance and thrusts forward, sheathing himself to the hilt in one powerful stroke.

I cry out at the sudden fullness, my body stretching to accommodate his girth. He stills beneath me, his massive frame trembling with restraint as he gives me a moment to adjust.

“You feel…” He shakes his head, seeming to struggle for words. “There are no words. You consume me, my sura. Body and soul.”

Overwhelmed by the depth of emotion shining in his eyes, I dip my head to capture his lips in a searing kiss, trying to pour everything I feel for him into that one point of connection.

He drinks me in like a man dying of thirst, his tongue plundering my mouth in a drugging slide. Slowly, carefully, he begins to move, withdrawing almost completely before surging forward again, starting a rhythm as old as time itself.

I meet him thrust for thrust, drawing him impossibly deeper. Our bodies move in perfect sync, our gasps and moans mingling in the charged air between us.

Varek buries his face in the crook of my neck, his sharp teeth grazing the sensitive skin almost as if he wishes to pierce my flesh with his fangs. He keeps them there as he drives into me again and again, stoking the embers of my desire back into an inferno.

“Let go, my sura,” he commands, his dark voice seductive silk against my ear. “Let me feel you come undone around me.”

His words ignite something primal inside me, an urge to obey, to surrender myself completely to the ecstasy he’s offering. Throwing my head back, I give myself over to the sensations, letting them build and build until I’m teetering on the knife’s edge of release.

“That’s it,” Varek encourages, his thrusts becoming erratic as he chases his own end. “Give yourself to me, Catherine. You’re mine. The gods know it. The fates know it. I know it. And you will, too.”

With a keening wail, I do just that, my inner muscles clamping down on him like a vice as rapture floods my veins. Varek roars his own completion, his shaft throbbing with each pump of his release as he fills me up.

I’m a boneless mess as I collapse against him once again.

In this moment, cradled in the strength of his arms with desire thrumming through my blood, I know he’ll be true to his word. He won’t rest until every cell within me belongs to him. Until the mere brush of his fingers is enough to set me aflame.

He will ruin me. And oh, what a sweet, exquisite ruin it will be.