“Then we will do all of these things.”
“What about packing the paintings?” I ask, striving for casual. Pretending I don’t notice the slight tightening of his muscles when I ask the question.
Duncan kisses my temple. “I stayed up last night working. We can afford a few hours.”
Ask him.
Ask him why it felt as if you’d met him—felt him—before that first afternoon.
He winds my loose hair in a fist, distracting me. Moaning over the rise of his erection between my thighs, I allow him to pull my head back, exposing my throat. His tongue travels from my clavicle to my jaw, his breath starting to release in bursts. “Before we go, may I take my relief?” His voice is a deep rasp of hunger. “May I give you your own?”
I’m dying to say yes, but I’m giving up too much ground.
There are explanations needed. Questions I should be asking.
So instead of saying yes, yes, my frustration with myself leads us down a different path.
“No, giant.” He drops his face into the crook of my neck and groans miserably, his arousal like a sword against my belly. “But if you can stand my teasing all day…”
He holds his breath, that mountainous body vibrating.
“If you can stand it,” I say, sinking my teeth into his ear, pulling until he starts to pant, before letting it go. “When we get home, you don’t have to ask for permission. Not for anything. Just this once.”
Several seconds pass before he lets his breath out slowly, shakily. “You mean…I can take ye without asking?”
Sinuously, I rub my sex on the long ridge of his. “Any way you want.”
His swallow is like cannon fire in my ear. “Rough, like?”
I blink innocently at him and nod. “I won’t stop you.”
Those dark-chocolate eyes of his lose focus, growing slightly dazed. “Ah, Thea. You’ll be so wet from teasin’ me.” A shudder passes through him, his voice taking on an eager quality. “I’m already in pain. Can’t imagine what it’ll be like after a whole day.”
“You love it,” I whisper, rocking on him.
“Aye.”
We’re very close to the point of no return. Where he’ll have to unzip his pants and enter me. But the promise of the control he’s offering me, the promise of seeing the world beyond the walls for the first time in years, forces me to loosen my legs from around his waist and slide down. I take his hand in mine and guide him out of the gallery, my skin hot under his intense gaze. And I tell myself tomorrow will be soon enough to start asking questions.
We are in Duncan’s car.
A large black one with dark windows.
My legs tremble on the leather passenger seat, my fingernails digging into the edge.
I can feel my giant looking over at me with increasing concern, but I can’t seem to get my breathing under control. So far, we’ve only turned out of the long gallery driveway, onto a quiet lane canopied with trees, but we might as well be flying upside down in a fighter jet.
“Thea,” Duncan says, low and measured. “There is not a thing in this world that can get through me to you. You are safe.”
“My heart knows that. My body doesn’t seem to care.”
“Tell me what you’re scared of.”
“I…I don’t know…” I shake my head, trying to calm the chaos. “People smiling at me, but they’re secretly monsters. They’ll transform as soon as I turn my back.”
For some reason, this seems to bother Duncan a great deal.
His Adam’s apple rises and plummets roughly.
“The scariest monster you can think of will run the opposite direction of me, Thea,” he says quietly, slowing the vehicle to a stop at a red light. And it’s on the tip of my tongue to ask him what he means. Why would monsters fear him? Who is he and what has he done? But then a family passes through the crosswalk in front of the car. Parents and a child. They’re each holding one of the small boy’s hands and swinging him upward on the count of three, sending him into fits of laughter.
There is no mistaking that their joy is real.
My claws loosen their grip on the seat slightly and we keep driving, passing more and more scenes like the one on the crosswalk. Lovers in the park cozied up together on a bench. A man handing ice cream to children through a truck window. Women pushing babies in strollers. An elderly woman kissing her dog while he wags his tail excitedly.
It’s not just the people that capture my attention, either. It’s the sky, giant and blue and uninterrupted by walls. It’s the different scents in the air. The sense of ease I didn’t expect. No one is secretly hiding horns and pitchforks. There is no fighting or explosions or pits of fire.