“Anyway,” he whispered warmly against her ear, “here I come, cocky as hell because I had made the cut to see a live class at last, not to mention overrun with hormones and horny young urges. I was ready to see the big hurrah.”
“And?” she asked, already giving a little giggle.
“I spent an hour furious as hell with disappointment as I watched a nude couple engage in hair-brushing and hair-stroking techniques.”
“Really?”
“A lesson I had to re-take later on,” he added, his fingertips burrowing slowly and sensuously against her scalp until she shivered and sighed.
“I can see you paid attention that time,” she said with a soft, kittenish movement into his hands. He let her direct his touch, watching her neck as a run of gooseflesh skipped along her skin down to her breasts. He saw her nipples become taut under the colored silk and smiled with satisfaction.
“But never think anything is ‘practiced’ or a ‘routine.’ We do practice, but only to familiarize. And anyone who tries the same pattern and routine on everyone they encounter is doomed to failure. We do build a repertoire, what we can do and like to do best.”
Trace demonstrated by moving her hair off her shoulder and closing his mouth on the lowest curve of her neck. She gasped, then groaned as she slid silkily back against him while he used his lips, tongue, and teeth to stimulate the vulnerable nerve cluster there. He ended with a long lick that made her tremble.
“There, now, would you prefer I never do that because it is practiced and I have used it before?”
“If people used rules like that, we’d only be able to have sex with one person in our whole lives!”
“This is my exact point. We both know that you and I have had sex with others. When I was young, I confess it was a lot of others. Again, hormones.” He chuckled. “But I have been highly selective of late.” Trace slid his hands around the slender planes of her waist and onto her belly, the dress rubbing smooth and soft between his palms and her skin.
“You have?”
“Yes. And it is okay for you to ask me that because I brought it up first. I did so because I want you to understand something. Before I was with you in Shadowscape, I had not touched a woman in twelve years.”
This time he let her spin around to face him. She stared up at him in surprise for a moment, but then he saw in the pale blue depths of her eyes as she came to an understanding.
“Because of what happened when you were a prisoner,” she said with soft compassion.
“Mostly. Yes.” He swallowed. “Did anyone explain euphoria to you?”
“Magnus did.”
“I was playing with fire that day and I knew it. I couldn’t resist kissing you, and then when you told me you had never felt an orgasm, I couldn’t bear to leave until I made it right for you. But sometime just before you crested, I completely crossed into euphoria, and when I felt and heard you come…Darkness and Light have never heard anything as exquisite as you sounded to me. I forgot all about the woman who had tortured me with her evil touch. I forgot I couldn’t bear to touch or to be touched by a woman. I forgot I despised the idea of ever again being naked and vulnerable in front of a female. All I wanted was to feel you around me, and once I did it was so glorious a feeling that I needed it again and again. Twelve years’ worth and more.
“And you put up with every selfish second of it. To this day I don’t know why. Any woman from my race would have cracked me but good for being so greedy and thoughtless. And then again in that post office. So damn impatient, I was. It was the opposite of everything I had learned.”
“Maybe because you didn’t take your lessons in spontaneity. I loved the post office,” she whispered with a sexy little groan against his neck that sent a hot rush of blood pulsing down the half-erect shaft of his penis and finishing the fullness that had started at her first touch. “Mmm, I remember thinking how warm you were. You still are.” He felt her reach out to caress his sides and belly. “And I was trying to plan all the things I wanted to do to you. I wanted to be brave enough to do it that time.”
“And I just wanted to keep my head and get you home. But”—he breathed into her hair—“I catch your scent and everything unravels. Just like now.”
Chapter 15
Trace didn’t want to, but he glanced up at the rotunda ceiling, scanning the glass quickly.
“Jei li,” he said quietly, swallowing back a pleasured sigh when her small hands ran up over his chest. “Don’t forget we are in the temple proper. There are rules here.”
“Rules?” she repeated. “And this is the temple?” She looked around at the room that in her world might very well have been illegal, depending on the age of the students.
“Yes. In our religion, we believe that all teaching and all learning is a blessing. We believe it should…” His voice skipped when her traveling hands began to slowly slide down the muscles of his belly, making them clench. “It should be done by our ministers.”
That made her stop still, and he sighed with relief and regret. He couldn’t think straight when she touched him. It was the most outstanding reaction, and it baffled him because he had never felt so profound an impact at anyone else’s hands.
“You mean priests and nuns teach this class?” she asked in shock.
“Handmaidens. And yes. But that isn’t my point. When in the temple, we follow temple rules. No exception. And in this room, the rule is if you choose to make love, you are fair game for modeling to a class.”
That made her jump away from him so fast that he had to chuckle.
“Oh my God!”
“Only if we’re caught. But we will be.” He pointed to the glass rotunda. “That’s the second story. It’s an observatory window that sits in the middle of a very busy hallway. This section of the school is very sex intensive, so it makes sense for students to be able to study whenever they want. The lectern’s voice will carry and they can hear the lesson if they like.”
“We have to leave! Why did you bring me in here?”
She grabbed his hand and tried to pull him toward the door.
“Because the rooms on either side of us are holding class,” he informed her, making her stop still. “And the ones across the halls are the private lesson chambers. You came in this direction, I followed. It was my only choice when you pitched your fit at me. Every other room that might be remotely private was pretty far away, and I didn’t want you screaming and cursing all through the Sanctuary.”
“Oh,” she said meekly. “I forgot…I wasn’t thinking. I didn’t mean to be rude.”
“It’s okay. No one expects you to learn all the rules instantly.”
“But what about being in here?” She looked up nervously. “Are we going to have to do s-something? We should leave.”
“A few more inches below my belt with those sweet little hands of yours and we would have,” he told her as he drew her palm up for his kiss. “Any overtly sexual behavior makes us fair game. That means being caught crossing into any of the major erogenous zones.” His eyes tracked down over the round swell of her breasts. “I want you to tell me where your rooms are.”
“My…? I’m in the women’s dormitories.”
“There are three floors to the women’s dormitories,” he reminded her with amusement, never once looking up from the memory replay he was having of how fair and pretty her breasts looked when she was naked.
“Oh.” She backed away from him and waved a hand across his eyes. “Stop crossing my zones!” she whispered fiercely.
“I have no intention of sharing you with the entire winter semester,” he rejoined in a low rumble as he closed the space between them, “but I very much intend on crossing every damn zone on your body, so you better tell me where your rooms are.” He took hold of her by the back of her head, making her face the hard heat of need he knew was in his eyes. It had been banked there for two very long weeks as he had given her space and time to recover. “Unless you no longer want me for you, jei li.
The choice will always be yours.”
Ashla looked up at him with unreadable eyes for a moment, her expression closed in that way she could sometimes have when she wasn’t afraid or nervous. He had watched her closely these past days and noticed she was not as afraid of everything as she had been in Shadowscape, despite the fact that the world she was in now was just as strange. Her wild show of temper had been a bracing example of that, but it made him nervous suddenly to not know what she was thinking. Despite his generosity of power of choice, he didn’t want her to choose against the idea. Against him.
He cursed in his head as he looked back up at the rotunda ceiling. Anything he might do to best convince her would put them in danger of public display, and he knew Ashla would never be able to bear it. At least, not now. Perhaps in the future that might change, and just the thought of that made him painfully aware of the crying need in his body right then, but again he was losing sight of whose was the more critical need between them.
He drew her up close as he dared, bending to touch his forehead to hers. “What makes you hesitate?” he asked. “Why do you still doubt me?”
“It’s not you I doubt,” she admitted in a rush. “You are used to women who are trained and skilled in things that—that I am painfully ignorant of. I look different, act different; I am that alien you once found so strange as a boy.”
“I am no longer a boy,” he reminded her, roughly pulling her body into his to give her a physical reminder of that. “And you are no alien. We have been to this place before, Ashla. Don’t you remember how you satisfied me? How my hunger for you raged then?”
“You weren’t yourself then,” she argued stubbornly. “You said it several times now. What if—”
“What if,” he growled harshly as he swung her full around and began to back her quickly toward the door, “what if we find out for ourselves and then pass judgment, hmm? And let’s do so quickly before I am forced to show a classroom of infants as well. Trust me when I tell you that for me to play model to a class would draw nearly every student in the Sanctuary.”
He hadn’t thought someone so pale could get any paler, but she managed it.
“I’m on the ground floor, just across the courtyard. My room faces it near the onyx fountain.”
Trace didn’t even bother to move. He knew every corner and every best shadowed spot in the building. He had skipped them time and time again in years of practice. He closed his eyes and skipped her quickly into the courtyard, then once again into the hall closest to where she had mentioned. When they materialized outside of the three doors suiting her description of her room, she drew in a loud breath.
“I thought men weren’t allowed in the women’s quarters,” she breathed.
“They aren’t,” he said meaningfully, giving her a little shake to urge her on.
“This one,” she said, pointing.
He moved them into the room so fast that Ashla barely had time to take a breath. Then the door was closed and everything was like pitch nothingness to her before she blinked and details of her room began to define themselves more clearly. Slowly colors arose out of the darkness, showing her how much her sight was improving over time. She realized now that this was what Trace saw when he looked into darkness, although perhaps even more clearly than she could.
That thought just as easily flew out the window, though, when her back was pushed against the door and his large hands curved around her waist and swiftly rode up the length of her torso. She gasped as he crossed one of those promised zones, taking the fullness of her breasts into his palms.
“I want to do this right,” he said, his words like breath as they rushed from him. “But every time I touch you, everything hurries at me with a need I can’t even explain. You fear disappointing me when it’s impossible! Touch me, Ashla. Feel how my body shakes with anticipation.”
Ashla didn’t need to touch him; she could already feel the vibration of excitement resonating through him. But the invitation was irresistible. She curled a hand around his neck and drew him down to her, her lips parting as he came to kiss her. She melted against him the moment their mouths melded, sighing as his tongue sought deep for hers. His hands slid back and around her shape, gliding down the curve of her back and over her hips. She tried not to be self-conscious about how thin she knew she felt. It might be a coveted figure in American society, but here it was just thin and undernourished. All the women she saw here had curves and plenty of them. They couldn’t even find clothes for her at first without needing to tailor them.
Trace felt her stiffen and was well aware of her reservations. It was completely ridiculous, of course, but he had to treat her doubts very seriously and very carefully.
“What will it take to convince you?” he asked her against her lips. “Will you be satisfied of the authenticity of my feelings only when I am coming wildly inside you? Tell me, what will it take?”
The imagery his words evoked took her breath away, just as the heated depth of his kisses did. Soon she was dizzy with the need to breathe, and when he finally released her mouth she did so in a drawing rush. Her heart raced hard against her ribs as she began to truly realize how much vital male she was daring to take hold of here. He dwarfed her like a mountain dwarfs a tiny goat, but all the same she wanted to be nimble enough to conquer her mountain. She wanted to grab hold of him and show him how to take and touch her, as if he was in need of the lessons. She wanted to leave fear and doubt behind and just do everything she wanted.
She suddenly realized that this was the one man alive she could ever safely do that with. Knowing what torture he had suffered secured her mind that he would never be cruel to her. He knew too well what it felt like. Just as she knew what it had been like for him.
I forgot I couldn’t bear to touch or to be touched by a woman.
Yet he touched her. He’d had twelve years to touch any of those dark, curvaceous beauties, and he had wanted none of them. But he had wanted her…
“Yes,” he whispered into her neck as he ran a provocative tongue over her carotid pulse. “No other will do for me what you do. They never have.”
Ashla squirmed in delight at both his words and his playful tongue. The keen insight into her thoughts went completely unnoticed as her mind floated to a place of pleasure.
“Turn around.”
Total stillness followed the command, and he raised his head with a lifted brow and amusement in his eyes. “Turn around?” he echoed.
“Yes,” she breathed, flushing now that she had to assert her wishes while looking into his eyes.
But to her infinite surprise, her very dominant ’Dweller straightened up, took a step back, and did as she asked. Ashla licked her lips as she ran her eyes down the beautiful, high-powered length of him. From the broad scope of his shoulders to the tight narrowing of his waist, she could see the beauty of a truly fit male. Even the braced strength in his legs ran up tautly into an outrageously fine ass, which was accented, she felt, by the tailored cut of his slacks.
She had asked him to turn because she had barely gotten the chance to see him from behind last time. He had crowded and dominated her every movement. Now, this time, she wanted everything. Like him, she wanted it to be better.
Ashla stepped up behind him and slowly shaped her hands to the long muscles that crossed from his lower back around and down to his pelvis. Her fingertips bumped over his belts and their buckles. His katana was missing, but the second sword, the one he had told her was called a wakizashi sword, was in its scabbard on the other side. It was much shorter than the katana, but not as small as the one he kept strapped by his calf.
“Where is your katana?” she asked softly against the fabric of his thick woven shirt. She had to take the time to breathe in the scent of him, the richness and raw male message of power it imbued was heady and delicious.
“Ruined,” he admitted, displaying his regret in his tone. “Saw-stars are notorious for their weight and force. Deflecting them damaged the blade badly, an
d then using it afterward fractured the steel.”
“I’m sorry,” she said sincerely. She had come to realize there was value to his blade that went beyond its ability to help guard his life. Now that she knew he was Magnus’s foster son, it explained the similarity of their weapons and filled in the understanding that it had probably been a deeply treasured gift. “Can it be fixed?” she queried as her fingers closed around the buckle of the weapons belt.
“The master who made it has it. He will no doubt replace the tang.” Trace exhaled a long, slow breath as she took away his belt and laid it aside. She smiled when she returned her fingers around him to find the belt to his pants and removed it as well. At first she was enjoying the way he would stiffen up, as if in reaction to her teasing slow touch, but then she realized it only happened when she brushed or touched against his spine.
“Take your shirt off,” she demanded suddenly, pulling back so she could see his back once he did so. His hesitation gave him away and he knew it, so he turned to look at her.
“This is different than before,” he reminded her with a pulse visibly racing in his throat. “I feel everything; I am aware of everything.”
“Take your shirt off,” she repeated slowly, reaching out to turn him away from her again. She watched the tension in his body increase, and even heard him fortifying himself under his breath. He skimmed off the first shirt, and she watched carefully as he scooped the second one over his head.
She gasped, unable to help herself as she looked in wide-eyed horror at the scars raked thickly up the length of his spine. Now that she knew where they had come from, her imagination raced in wild and terrible directions until she couldn’t bear it anymore. Trace’s hands curled into fists and he twitched to move, but she reached out and stayed him, giving herself time to look at him and to reconcile all she was coming to understand.