Demon Lover Page 4

  Autumn’s heart jumped back up, and she couldn’t stop the manic smile from spreading over her face. She turned away from him, hiding her pleasure as she fiddled with the TV remote.

  “You watch a lot of television? What do you watch?”

  “News programs and documentary films. I try to keep up with the happenings in the world. I like to see how real people are living, how they interact with each other.” He paused. “And… I like shows with a lot of people. People being together.”

  There was something heartbreaking about that, but Autumn kept her expression neutral. “Well, this one has a lot of people together.” She crawled back to the headboard, arranging pillows and blankets into a comfortable backrest. Irdu watched her, remaining at the foot of the bed. She settled herself on one side of the bed and gestured for Irdu to take the open space beside her.

  He crawled over, and Autumn was struck anew by the oddness of everything about him. How many times had she seen Dylan do the same—crawl across the bed to join her? Now she was seeing an entirely new man do it, but this man had claws and horns and blue skin and a tail and strange paw-like feet. She realized, in the low light, that the sigils on his skin gave off a faint, wavering glow. His tail flicked to the side as he settled to sit next to Autumn. She stared at it for a second before remembering herself and flipped the blanket over their legs.

  “Okay, so all you need to know is that this is set in an imaginary future in New York City where aliens have landed and are secretly infiltrating human society,” she told him.

  “I’ve been in New York,” Irdu said. He was sitting rigidly, as if her bed were made of nails. “Several generations ago, I think. There were no automobiles then. Women were still wearing corsets.”

  Autumn was silent for a moment, considering the image of a pre-Edwardian woman welcoming the attentions of an incubus, and felt an unwarranted stab of jealousy. Except that wasn’t precisely what had happened, she reminded herself. That woman in New York, all those years ago, would’ve simply believed she was having some amazing dreams. Autumn was the only one to have ever known what Irdu really was.

  Placated, she asked, “Where else have you been?”

  “Many, many places. Too many to list. A lot of them had different names than they do now. Some of them no longer exist.” He answered readily, but his posture remained stiff, his gaze pinned on the TV screen.

  “How old are you?”

  He hesitated. “I don’t entirely know. I...” he thought back for a moment. “I witnessed the construction of the Tower of Babel.”

  “The Tower of Babel is real?”

  “It was called Eurmeiminanki by the people who built it. It was a ziggurat in Borsippa.”

  “Did it really have anything to do with languages changing?” Autumn asked, knowing it was a silly question.

  He smiled at her sheepishness. “No. The workers already spoke many different languages. They were slaves, captured from other regions in war.”

  “So the tower’s construction wasn’t stopped by an angry god?” It wasn’t an entirely facetious question, considering that she was speaking to an actual, legitimate demon.

  “I can’t answer that with any certainty,” he answered sincerely. “But construction halted when the slaves rebelled.”

  “What happened?”

  “They turned against their masters—attempted to escape. They took the tower as their own, barricaded the entrance, and defended it with the very materials they’d been using to construct it. The king’s forces diverted irrigation canals to flood the base of the tower, destroying the foundation. The tower collapsed with the slaves inside. The king had each and every survivor killed for the insurrection. Before construction could resume, war broke out. Then famine. The old king died, a new one took his place, and Eurmeiminanki was forgotten.”

  Autumn considered his grim expression, the hollowness of his tone. “It must have been horrible,” she said gently.

  “Yes.”

  Despite her burning curiosity, she recognized his unwillingness to say any more about it. She tried to think of something else to say. Her gaze drifted over his body. “You know what? I think these—” she tapped one of the complicated sigils embedded in his skin “—look like writing.”

  He looked down at her finger, pressed to his bicep. He stared for a long time, until Autumn nervously withdrew her touch.

  “Sorry,” she said, realizing suddenly how pathetic every aspect of this situation was. She had somehow bullied a creature who existed solely for sex into suffering through some kind of platonic cuddle session because the few friends she did have were too busy for her and she hadn’t enjoyed the peaceful company of a man in nearly two years. “I didn’t think—”

  He caught her hand and brought it back to his arm, pressing it there. “Nobody ever touches me—except to fuck me.” He squeezed her hand. “It surprised me, to feel your touch without the urgency of arousal with it. But I enjoyed it. I am never touched in kindness, in gentleness, in curiosity. Don’t stop, please.” His cheeks were flushed purple, and he couldn’t look her in the eyes.

  Autumn melted against him, leaning her shoulder against his. She reached down until she found his hand and laced her fingers into his. It took him a second, but he finally reciprocated, curling his long fingers around her hand. He rumbled in his chest, a deeply contented sound.

  Emboldened by his obvious enjoyment, Autumn pulled her hand from his and, urging Irdu forward, slid her body behind his, sitting with her legs spread around him. She dragged her fingernails lightly down his back.

  Irdu shivered, pushing back into her touch. His tail was curled to one side, but the end flicked back and forth. Autumn continued to trace her fingernails over the broad, muscled expanse of his back, idly following tattooed lines and sigils. She pressed her thumbs into the line of muscle running up each side of his spine. She squeezed the tense muscles of his shoulders and the back of his neck. She slid her fingers up the back of his neck, threading through his thick, cobalt hair, to scratch at his scalp.

  Irdu let out that rumbling groan again, head and shoulders slumping as if in defeat. He submitted to the gentle explorations of her fingers, groaning like an old dog whenever she found a sensitive spot. At any moment, she expected his leg to start kicking.

  “Autumn,” he moaned her name as she massaged around the base of his ears. The plaintive neediness in his voice sent a bolt of lust straight through her core. “Autumn,” he gasped again, body going rigid beneath her touch.

  He can feel when I’m aroused, she remembered, mortified. “I’m sorry,” she said quickly. “Ignore me. I’m not touching you just so I can get laid. I want you to feel good. Just—”

  Irdu twisted around, pinning her to the headboard, caging her with his powerful body. One clawed hand gripped her chin, forcing her to look into the inky black depths of his eyes.

  “Never apologize for wanting me,” he commanded, his voice a gravelly bass. “That, too, is a gift I never thought to receive.”

  “Oh,” she breathed. The intensity of his gaze, the power of his body, the casual dominance of his touch—it all melded together into an explosion of pure want.

  Irdu felt it as soon as she did, growling low in his throat. He dropped her chin and the two of them surged together. Autumn had one hand fisted in Irdu’s hair, the other digging into the flexing muscles of his back as she wrapped her legs around his waist and sealed her mouth to his in a desperate kiss. She bit and sucked at his lips, flicked her tongue over the tips of his fangs, licked boldly into his mouth.

  Irdu let the full weight of his body sink onto hers. Pelvis to pelvis, she felt the thick length of his cock, hard and heavy, pressed to the slick, hot seam between her thighs. He rolled his hips, grinding the length of his erection against her. Autumn gasped, arching her hips up, taking every bit of sensation she could. She panted as she clung to him, rocking against each languorous thrust of his hips. She was still wearing her night shirt and panties, and they suddenly felt li
ke weighted nets, tangling her body, encumbering her freedom.

  Irdu reared back, helping her peel the t-shirt over her head. He reached for her panties, and she lifted her hips as he slid them down the length of her legs. Then she was as naked as he was. They stared at each other, drinking in the sight of their shared arousal. Irdu’s broad chest rose and fell with each rough breath. His skin was flushed purple along the crests of his cheekbones. His lips were swollen from her kisses. The dark scar across his throat looked livid against his flushed skin.

  Autumn’s gaze dropped to the furred expanse of his chest, golden piercings winking from each dark-blue nipple. She continued her perusal south, over the ridged muscles of his abdomen, following the tight V of his Adonis belt to the sculpted beauty of his erection—long and thick, flushed dusky purple, with a gleaming smooth crown, and a thickly veined shaft. To Autumn’s surprise, he had more piercings than those she’d already noticed. Three thick golden barbells studded the underside of his cock. The first was positioned just below the head of his cock, the second an inch below that, and the third an inch below that.

  “Oh.” She pushed herself up so that she could touch them. Irdu held stock still under her perusal. She trailed her fingers gently along the curving underside of his cock, stopping at each large barbell. She gripped the one just below the head of his cock and tugged ever so gently. A spike of lust stabbed through her, and Irdu nearly doubled over on a groan.

  “Does that hurt?” she asked, breath coming raggedly.

  “Do it again,” Irdu answered hoarsely.

  She tugged a little harder this time, whimpering at the powerful surge of arousal.

  Irdu fell forward onto his hands, head hanging as he shuddered through the overwhelming wave of her arousal. “Again!”

  Autumn was wet and hot and throbbing with the need to have him inside of her, but the control she had over Irdu’s pleasure was too good to rush. She caught one of his horns and used it to tilt his head back, making him look her in the eye as she gave the piercing a slow, sadistic pull. His brows drew together, his fathomless black eyes glazed with need as he panted through the exquisite torture. She knew he only enjoyed it because she enjoyed it—but that only made it hotter. The sight of such a powerful, masculine creature brought low by her sexual desire made her shiver and moan as another debilitating wave of pleasure rolled through her.

  “Autumn!” Irdu rasped her name, somehow making it sound like both a plea and a command.

  She felt an impending orgasm building inside like a thunder cloud. Just as with a storm, the air around them was thickly charged, redolent with the scent of the rising tension. Autumn was nearly mindless with the need to climb onto his cock and ride him to orgasm. But she wanted to draw it out more, torture them both, make the eventual release all the better.

  “Poor Irdu,” she purred in husky voice dripping with sex. “Are you hungry?”

  “Yes,” he panted, glazed, heavy-lidded eyes still held captive by hers. “Please,” he begged.

  She leaned back, pulling Irdu along by his horn. She drew her knees up, then parted them slowly, like the unfurling of a rose, revealing her glistening pink center.

  “Eat,” she told him.

  He surged forward, hands sliding beneath her ass to hoist her up for his greedy mouth. He licked into her slit with one, long swipe of his tongue. Autumn arched her hips up with a choked whimper, quickly losing control of the situation. Irdu growled as he licked and sucked at her clit, his fangs pressing into her soft flesh. Pleasure coiled inside her, winding tighter and tighter, coming closer and closer to snapping free—

  “Stop!” Autumn cried.

  Irdu pulled his mouth away from her on a sloppy, sucking kiss. Hovering just above her swollen, glistening folds, he met her gaze and licked his lips. “Why?” he asked, his voice an inhuman growl.

  “I want you inside me.” She threw her arms open in invitation. Irdu wasted no time in accepting, climbing up her body until his hips were settled in the cradle of her thighs. She wrapped her legs around his waist, her arms around his neck, and took his mouth in a long, hot, needy kiss. She tasted herself on him, and as the pleasure of that lanced through her, Irdu’s hips gave a wild buck, sliding his pierced cock over her exquisitely sensitive clit. She nearly came apart just on that one stroke.

  “Inside me!” she ordered, pulling at him with her legs. “Now!”

  “Yes,” Irdu panted as he shifted to align their bodies. The broad head of his cock nudged against her slick folds, and then he was pressing into her.

  “Oh!” He was big—painfully so—but somehow the pain only made her pleasure rocket higher as he steadily, mercilessly, fed every thick inch into her tight, wet channel. She bit at his shoulder and neck as he stretched her wide, until she felt she would split in half. “Irdu!” she whimpered. “Ah! Irdu!”

  “Autumn, Autumn, Autumn,” he rumbled back, nipping at her ear. He buried himself to the hilt and held there for a moment. They clung to each other, trembling and gasping for breath. Irdu filled her so completely, Autumn worried she wouldn’t ever feel whole again, except when he was inside her.

  “Perfect,” she gasped, clinging to him until her fingernails dug into his skin and her heels drove into the thick muscles of his ass. His tail wove sinuously around one of her legs.

  Shaking with the effort, Irdu began a slow withdrawal. Autumn mewled at the loss. His cock slid from her until only the head of him remained inside. And then, with a smooth, hard stroke, he plunged all the way back inside, seating himself with a slap of a skin against skin. Autumn let out a little scream, toes curling, fingernails digging harder into his back. She felt his claws curl against her hips in answer.

  “Go,” she begged on a sob. “Again! Please!”

  He drew back and thrust forward, steady and strong. Then again—a little faster, a little harder. Then again, and again, and again, until he was pounding into her with a frenzied need, driving both of them higher and higher to the thunder and lightning. Autumn was sweating, gasping, rolling her hips to meet each slamming thrust. She was so close—so close—

  Irdu grabbed her face with one hand and brought his mouth down on hers in a kiss that was just as wild and brutal as the thrust of his cock. Instantly, Autumn came—flying apart into every individual atom that made up her being. She felt the atoms of Irdu coming apart with her, the essence of them both mingling together as they danced through the empty space between creation and destruction. Their heartbeats matched the endless spin of every galaxy, their breath the expansion of the universe.

  At last, they reached the farthest edge of their pleasure, and slowly, inexorably, returned to corporeal reality. Hyper-aware of every point on her body, Autumn lay bonelessly beneath Irdu. She felt the press of the bed against her back, the wild disarray of her hair—a strand stuck to her sweaty cheek. She felt the sheen of sweat coating her entire body. She felt the pump of her blood, the gust of her breath, the flexion and contraction of every muscle. She felt the slide of her eyelids as she blinked, the rasp of her breath over her tongue and lips. But most of all—she felt Irdu. Big, hard, hot, and heavy. He was still inside her, all of his weight bearing down on her. His head was pressed to the mattress just above her left shoulder, one horn hooked in her afghan blanket.

  She twisted to look at him, cupping his cheek. His lips were parted slackly as he panted for breath. His eyes were vacant and dazed, dancing with a whorl of vivid blue over endless black. Autumn watched the galaxy-like spin of color while she caught her breath, waiting for him to come back to her.

  After a minute, the blue dispersed from his eyes. Slowly, the black began to recede until bright blue irises and elliptical pupils stared back at her. He blinked. Then blinked again.

  “Are you okay?”

  “Yes.” She stroked her thumb along his cheekbone. His eyes slid closed as he leaned into her touch. “Are you?” she asked.

  “Yes.” Suddenly, he seemed to realize he was still on top of her, his claws still sun
k into her hips. He released his grip and lifted himself off of her. “You should have told me I was hurting you!” he said, slowly easing his cock from inside of her.

  She gave a little hum in her throat as the thick head of his cock passed through the tightest part of her entrance. “I’m fine,” she told him with a bemused smile. “I liked how it felt.” She looked down at her hips to find new marks, some dotted with blood, added to yesterday’s. She grinned at him and sat up. “Besides—I left my own marks on you.” She traced her fingers along the gouged skin on his back. “Now you’re mine.”

  Irdu stared at her, an unreadable mixture of emotions passing behind his eyes.

  “Are you sure you’re okay?” Autumn asked gently.

  “Yes,” he said, his voice a bit unsteady. He shifted and looped an arm around her stomach, pulling her back against his chest. He laid them both down and pulled the blankets over Autumn’s cooling skin.

  “Will you stay with me again?” she asked.

  “As long as you will let me,” he said, resting his chin on top of her head.

  “Then stay as long as you can.” Autumn turned off the long-forgotten TV and snuggled into him, feeling safe and content for the first time in years. Sleep was not far away, and she succumbed to it with a soft smile.

  4

  The days passed slowly, the nights too quickly. As she’d requested, Irdu came to her at sundown. With time, they fell into easier and easier conversations with each other. She asked him about his human past, and his life as a demon. There were some things he was tight-lipped about. But as the nights passed, he opened up more and more to her.

  Autumn made a point of giving Irdu platonic touches—leaning against him while they watched TV, dragging her fingernails gently over his scalp, giving him idle massages. Inevitably, those innocent touches turned sexual. After Irdu brought her to orgasm, he’d hold her until she fell asleep. She found herself staying awake later and later, talking with him.