Goddesss gift get your r.., p.9
Goddess's Gift (Get Your Rocks Off Book 4), page 9
“Come, Kira…” he growled.
“I love you, Aen.”
“Kira! So close. Come!”
I didn’t close my eyes when I did, not letting him look away when it took me under. My eyelids merely fluttered, a series of rasping, hacking gasps fighting free of me as I squeezed the hell out of them. My cunt and my arse were in a riot, clenching, clenching, clenching.
Something so frightening rose in his eyes when he jetted inside me. One need was absolved, but another rose up, twice as big and needy. I saw the rapid flicker of his forms as he fought to hold his male form, at least until this was done, until he’d emptied into me.
“I love you,” I said, giving him everything I had in those three words.
I kept repeating it as they pulled out of me, my body instantly missing their presence when they were gone, saying it over and over as Marlow pulled me against him and then pushed me into Aen’s arms.
“How did this happen?” I asked, looking into his green eyes, seeing the rapid shift in his bone structure as he still fought for control.
“It’s what always happens, love,” he said, as if that was all there was, but there was more than that. No matter what he’d said about previous avatars, no matter his confidence of me returning his affection, he struggled with this too. I heard it in the rapid pace of his heart as I lay my head on his chest, in the sigh that came as I snuggled down against him.
“I love you too,” she said finally, a hint of irritation in her voice that had my head craning up. She looked flushed, bright eyed and bright cheeked, her eyes narrowed slightly as if warding off a blow. That didn’t soften until she brushed my hair away from my face. “So much, Kira. You have no idea. I’ve been aching with it. My chest hurts every time I look at you and…”
I reached up and touched the corner of her eyelashes, watching the tear I’d caught there slide down my finger. I moved up and pressed my lips to hers, melting into her and her softness until I felt the shift, stubble grazing my cheeks.
“Can she say what you can’t?” I asked him, pulling away.
“This form is used to keeping a lot more in,” Aen replied, “but we’re not separate people. In that form, I’m just better at saying things than I am in this, but…” He stared into my eyes, seeming able to look at them forever. “I’ll never love anyone or anything as much as I do you, Kira. I’ve been alive for thousands of years, but here am I, lying here with you, my heart beating like a callow boy’s at the feel of it.”
His eyes burned as his brows drew down, like that would dampen the flames within them.
“I thought I knew what I was getting in you. I thought you were going to be just another avatar, that it’d be sweet and hot and you would love half of me.” His eyes dropped for a moment. “It’s not that you love both sides of me that’s the deciding factor, it’s you. You can be this tough nut to crack, leaving me pick, pick, picking on the outside, dying to come in, and then you just surrender. There’s something so terribly brave about your heart once it opens to someone. You let them in, let everything in.” He reached over and pressed his lips to my forehead. “Hold on to that, love, please. Always be that brave. Don’t let the shit grind you down and have you locking everything away.”
“You’re talking about The Changelings,” I said.
“I’m talking about everything. You’re going to face trials that will challenge you in ways you’ve never been before. Just hold on to this, this moment when you do.”
I nodded sleepily, feeling completely and utterly drained in a way that was beautiful. I dug my nose into his chest and closed my eyes.
Chapter 8
I sat down at the breakfast table with the tentativeness of someone who was well fucked. There was something harsher about my loves since they’d been made my consorts. The gloves were off, and I was here for that. I felt delightfully bruised in all the right ways, my body letting me know what we’d just been through, aftershocks making me twitch beneath their hands as they slid up my thigh.
“I hear there have been some promising developments, Kira?” Ashanti said with a regal nod. “The performance of both you and your consorts yesterday sounds very impressive. Your progression is gratifyingly swift. Duke and I have spoken and—”
“With all due respect…” I was being rude by interrupting, but there was something I needed to say. My words failed me as everyone in the room turned to look at me, but I forced myself to forge on. “Training isn’t going to be especially useful right now.” I watched people stiffen around the table. “It’s all about connection, isn’t it?”
“Yes, but—”
“Well, I need to develop that with almost everyone. Don’t I need to focus on that first?”
“She’s right,” Duke said. “Picking her consorts? That wasn’t standard. She’s still feeling them out.”
“While Rutherglen musters his forces.” Ashanti sighed, then nodded. “I understand. This isn’t something that can be forced, as much as I might wish otherwise.” She looked up at me. “So what do you suggest? You wish for some time to spend with your consorts?”
I nodded, struggling to find the words. People stared at me, Duke, Bea, the rest of Ashanti’s enclave. They looked at and expected things from me.
“Most of them know how to wield their power already. They can teach me once things have been…consolidated, but Marlow and Jake came into their powers through their connection with me. Perhaps instead of training with me, someone can train them and I can watch, be around, connect.”
I finished the sentence lamely, feeling horribly embarrassed somehow by the whole thing. Marlow squeezed my thigh, so I shot him a grateful look. Spending the morning with him, watching him create those beautiful sparks on the end of his fingertips—
“Your affinity is with water, yes, Jake?”
“Yep,” he replied, scanning the room, his jaw tightening.
“Well, then I’ll show you the basics after breakfast. Now, where did we get with the housing assessment?”
“We’ve counted the rooms. They—they keep changing,” Rey said.
“What?” Ashanti said.
“We were talking about whether we had enough space to fit everyone, how to divide up the families in the rooms available, and then there were more.”
“What do you mean more?”
“What I said. There were four hundred and fifty rooms, and then there were five hundred, six hundred. We’ve been running up and down these halls and counting them, and each time, we come up with something different. You know something about that?” Rey asked me.
“No, this place is as much a mystery to me as to you. We’ve noticed it changing. Wanting something seems to influence the way the building presents.”
“Which is why my team should have been left to assess the building before introducing all these people into it,” Bea said.
“Why?” I asked. “If it responds to what you want, you could go into a room and ask to see what it was like at any point in its lifespan and it should show you.”
The woman blinked, then went to get to her feet, but Ashanti shook her head, indicating that she should sit.
“So we have unlimited resources at our disposal?” Ashanti asked.
“We’ll need them. Not enough food, medicine, or bedding.” Quinn walked in and took a seat before turning to look at me.
“Quinn…” Ashanti warned.
“We’re stretching things as far as they can go, but this is coordinated. He’s set up ‘riots’ in at least twenty different cities in the States alone. Known hotspots around the world are erupting, new ones cropping up every day. I don’t give a fuck if this place is the goddamn Ark itself, people are hurting, Mother.”
“I know, Quinn. That’s why you were called here today. Duke and the rest of the council will discuss our plans for evacuation and protecting our people. Now, let’s eat. Kira and Jake can meet me in the water training room in an hour.”
When I walked into the room, I noticed the moat of water around the edge, set up almost like a Japanese garden, with sand on the floor, strategic rocks, and beautifully designed waterfalls creating a peaceful atmosphere. It didn’t wash off on me though. I turned when I heard crunching steps to see Jake enter the room.
There was something closed off about Jake. His eyes kept meeting mine, only to be yanked away, those big broad hands picking at each other as he came to a stop. He wore jeans and an old white band T-shirt, the sleeves ripped out, the thick muscles of his arms on display.
“Hey,” I said, the word feeling odd and weird, but so was the silence.
“We’re gonna do that, are we?” he asked, nodding to himself. “Yeah, OK. Did you sleep all right last night?”
Flashes of memory hit me hard, despite trying to keep some decorum. Gasps escaped me as I felt those teeth digging into my neck, those lips tugging at all my most sensitive points, the thrust of two cocks—
“Mm…” he said, having appeared at my elbow. “Don’t you smell luscious? Who was it this time? Aen? Marlow?” His smile widened when I didn’t reply. “Both?” His eyes flared hotter when I just stared back at him. “Ohh, Kira, did you get double teamed last night?” He said the words like others would describe something delicious. “Did you take both of them at the same time? I bet you did. Opened yourself right up to those thick dicks.” He darted forward, drawing his nose across my neck but jerking back before I could swipe at him. “Fuck, you smell sweet, but the sugar cookie thing? It’s kinda caramelised. Getting more complex. You got it good.”
His grin faded, something fragile rising instead.
“That makes me ache. Makes all of us ache for wanting the same damn thing. If you’d just come to us, we could show you…” He shook his head, dismissing the thought. “Doesn’t matter.” He shifted back a step, moving restlessly. “I like the ache. Just makes me harder.”
I needed to say something. Everything I said the other day was true, but with Jake, there was something there, something that tugged at me, wanted to kiss the small frown away, hold him close, and make sure he never ached again. He was like six foot two. The need to smooch his boo boos away was ridiculous, and yet…
“I’m sorry I’m late,” Ashanti said as she walked in the door. “The discussions got quite convoluted. Now, Jake, your new affinity. What have you been able to do with it so far?”
“I can make it appear.” He leant his head back, holding his hand over his mouth, and a thin stream of water trickled into it. Some splashed wide, trailing down his cheeks, his neck. He brought his head back down, rubbing his hand through his hair, making it spike up messily. “But if you’re expecting me to save Kira with tsunamis and shit, I got nothing.”
“Well, that is promising for someone who’s come so late to their powers. You’ve never shown an affinity to elemental powers before now?”
He shook his head. “Never really given a chance though. My mother was one of Rutherglen’s sex slaves. No one spent time educating us. We were to be everyone’s meat when we got old enough, so why bother? Some showed hands of power. One kid smashed in the skull of some of Rutherglen’s most valued henchmen when they tried it on with him.” He shrugged. “They executed the kid, but he impressed Rutherglen.”
Ashanti just looked upon Jake, a heavy warmth in her eyes that made her designation as Mother make sense. There was something endless about it. A mother’s undying love.
“Look, you seem like a nice lady and everything, but don’t look like that. Everyone does…that.” He gestured to her face. “I’m not there. I don’t have to put up with that shit anymore, and Kira’s going to make it so no one does.”
I was? I met their collective gaze and fought to keep still, not back away from the responsibility being thrust my way, but he was right. I tried not to think about young Jake, in that room with all the brutality and squalor. He deserved more than to be seen as other people’s abuse, but really, if I was supposed to ascend and gain untold powers, what else would I do but end this? My brows jerked down as I thought about Dave’s stupid fucking face when I’d taken Marlow, Jen, and Vervain from him.
“Yeah,” I replied, “we will.”
“Admirable goals,” Ashanti said. “So, let us begin. You’re able to manifest water, which is good, but I want to see if you can manipulate the water that is around you.”
There was something beautiful about all of this, a quiet falling over me, over the room, that I felt like I could just sink into. Ashanti and Jake moved like dancers, with long sweeping movements that drew the eye, making you feel like you were performing the forms as well. Ashanti curled large fluid whips of water around her, almost like the ribbons used in rhythmic gymnastics, and Jake did something similar. His streams were much harder to control. They swelled to great torrents that roared around him, starting to splash the ground around him before Ashanti would stop and get him to recentre himself.
“You are doing very well,” she said, stepping closer when the last stream collapsed around him. He nodded, jerking his now saturated shirt off and dropping it to the floor with a splat. I hadn’t seen it when I was with the guys, the crisscross of white scars across his back, partially obscured by something that hadn’t been there before—a tattoo of a phoenix. I stiffened when she moved closer, putting a hand on his arm. It was gentle and non-sexual, but I was up and off the stone I’d been sitting on before thinking about it.
“Water is often seen to be the element most associated with emotions. When we struggle to be at peace with what we feel, we will always struggle with control of our element. Today has been very promising. Very promising, Jake. It usually takes months of training to move water like that, so you must allow yourself to be pleased by that.” He nodded, eyes trained on the ground. “I’m going to suggest that you spend some time with one of our counsellors—”
“No.”
“You’ve obviously experienced considerable trauma. Your water affinity reflects your emotional state. Lack of control can be dangerous. I won’t insist, but please, consider it.”
He didn’t get a chance to reply, one of Ashanti’s people appearing at the door of the training room.
“Mother, apologies for interrupting, but a delegation from the sentinels has arrived. They are demanding an immediate audience.”
“Demanding?” Her eyebrow cocked upwards. She shook her head with a hiss. “Jake, think about it. My door is always open. Keep practising your swirls, but not for too long. If you’re struggling more and more for control, it’s time to stop.”
She nodded to me, then strode out the room.
I’d seen Jake getting ploughed relentlessly by another man, shining bright in the gloom, so why did this room suddenly feel a lot more intimate? The door was open, so in theory, anyone could walk past, yet it felt so small. As if responding to my thoughts, he turned around to face me.
Jake got put into a lot of boxes—wild boy, submissive, child abuse survivor. But when he turned around, water trickling down his bare chest, tracing the lines of the muscles there, his eyes burning into mine, what I saw didn’t fit into any of them. His mobile mouth curled slightly into a one-sided smirk, those eyes glittering as he waved his hand in the air, a spray of water obeying his command and resolving itself into a plume of fluid that shifted in response to his gestures. It was hypnotic—the slow, sinuous passage of the water, the muscles in Jake’s arm and chest shifting and changing. I should’ve looked away, I was just distracting him, but while he held my gaze, I couldn’t bring myself to.
His hands stilled, the water forming into a ball. He didn’t follow the gentle, sweeping motions Ashanti had prescribed. Instead, each he moved in a different way, jerking, fluttering, slicing, thrusting. The water was sliced into two balls, each one rocketing through the air in chaotic sweeps.
“You wince when you sit down.”
I looked at him blankly, not sure what he meant.
“I saw it for just a second, at breakfast. You’re hurting.” He didn’t look disturbed by that at all, if anything, his eyes burned brighter. “Someone, someones put an ache into you.” His eyes ran down my body. “One you’re still feeling now.”
I was. At his words, my cunt clutched down, tugging at muscles and skin that had been well used. I felt it—the shadow of the pleasure they’d pulled out of my body and kept on pulling until I was crying for them to stop. If you thought big declarations of love were enough to stop things, you’d be wrong. Aen couldn’t keep his hands off me, pulling me to him over and over, and when I was against him, he was touching me. When he was touching me, he was winding me tighter until I was on hands and knees, begging them to use me once more. I couldn’t stop coming, and neither could they, rallying like they had the devil in them.
Jake’s smile widened, his teeth shining white in the artificial light.
“Show me,” he said, crooking a finger.
I felt a little sting, watching a droplet of water appear from my chest and sail over towards him, the balls splashing down on the ground when he held out his hands to catch it. I watched it, heart racing as it landed on his palm, breaking on contact.
“Oh!” His cry was soft, his eyes falling closed, his head tipping back as whatever he’d pulled from me rushed through him. “Mm mm…” he purred, then burst out laughing, that same crazy chuckle of his that’d come rushing out whenever he went on stage. His legs spread wide, as if that was all it took to keep him upright, the wet denim making clear how he was enjoying this. “Oh fuck! Fuck! Oh….” His voice trailed away, silence falling over the room again, broken only by his rasping breath.
He was slow to right himself, and it became apparent why. His eyes shone with unshed tears when he opened them again, looking like I’d cheerfully trampled all over him and left him with the resulting destruction. His gaze quested, seeking mine, seeking something in my eyes as one tear fell free, then another. He twisted his fingers, the droplets of water pulling away from his face as his lips thinned down, then he flicked them at me.
