The gentleness of Varen's hand cupping the side of my face startled me. As he brushed his thumb along my cheekbone, my gaze returned to his and I met soft eyes. "Then take your fill, Tabitha. Anything you want."

My fingers kneaded into fists by my side, partly to give me strength, but mostly to hide the fact that my hands were shaking. I'd never done this before, touched someone intimately. I hadn't even seen one in real life either.

Rugged stone dug into my kneecaps and foaming water washed around my shins and feet as I slowly knelt in front of him. Hot skin met my palms when I spread my hands over his hips. His cock pulsed beneath the fabric and he exhaled on a deep groan. I was so nervous I jerked my hands away.

Oh my gods...

Was I really going to do this?

Yes, yes, yes...

My trembling fingers dipped inside the stretchy fabric of his boxer briefs and I stilled, nervously glancing upward, wondering if he was going to stop me, wondering if I was going to stop myself.

Varen did nothing but stare back at me, his eyes so heavily lidded there was nothing but a strip of violet beneath the fringe of thick short lashes.

I peeled the boxer briefs down and his erection didn't spring out, it unleashed.

Enormous and wholly intimidating with masculine strength.

Wetness glistened at the smooth crown. Angry veins ran along the thick girth and its length to meet dark curls at the base of his shaft. The scent of him, faintly earthy with a hint of salt and man flowed over me. I had a wicked urge to lean forward and slide my tongue over the tip to sip on his distinctive flavor and let the essence of him slide down my throat.

His cock suddenly bobbed and he gritted out a hiss, while a jolt like a clap of thunder cracked through me to see it move like that.

Hellsgate...freaking hells-gate...

It was a long moment before I was able to steel my resolve and stop my hands from shaking so I could go through with what I wanted. The boxer briefs slid down his muscular legs as I gently tugged them off. He stepped out and with a foot, he deftly kicked them away.

And there he was standing before me unashamedly naked, with brutal scars and jagged welts crossing the curve of his ribcage, the curl of inked flames, and the scarified wyrm.

Varen loomed above, blocking out the moonlight, as threatening and powerful as a thunderstorm. The air vibrated with his otherness, a low tremble almost indiscernible but for the fact, I could detect its subtlety. I briefly wondered if his strange unearthly powers seeped out when he was enthralled with emotion. The intriguing thought was scattered from my mind when his blunt-tipped fingers angled my head up to meet his gaze. Desire coated the handsome curves of his features, and his voice, thick and syrupy, poured over my skin like honey. "I could come from you simply looking up at me with those big innocent eyes. You wouldn't even need to fucking touch me."

I blinked in surprise.

To think I could do that had a rush of feminine might surging through my blood.

Varen's heated gaze lowered to my slack mouth and his black eyebrows slanted upward as he hoarsely gritted out my name as if in pain.

The gentle pressure beneath my chin urged me to stand. I rose slowly, gliding my hands up his thighs. His entire body was taut like overworked metal. A gentle touch alone could shatter him. And my touch was gentle as I explored the smooth shape of muscle, my fingertips rounding behind to graze tight hamstrings, marveling at the beauty in the sharp cut of his hips as I straightened my pose.

His movement was so fast I didn't realize what he'd done until my breasts tumbled free of my bra when the cups fell forward and the straps slipped down my arms. A fluttering of material fell between us and my bra floated on the water lapping around our feet.

I stood before him in just my beige panties.

The eruption of shock had me instantly crossing my arms to hide myself as embarrassment stole up my chest.

I'd never bared myself before, to anyone.

No one had seen me topless.

No one.

Varen stopped my hurried flight. His fingers handcuffed my wrists and he gently untangled my arms. He made a soothing sound as if calming a wild animal. "You're beautiful, every single inch of you. Every single summer freckle."

My blush only intensified with scorching heat and my insides twisted at the word, beautiful. One word I thought no one would ever say to me. But it was there reflected in Varen's fervent gaze, his truth. He really did consider me beautiful. He'd said it before in the pool and now he illustrated it by peppering tiny kisses on the cluster of freckles on my cheek.

Freedom was gifted to my wrists.

The rope of my wet hair was nudged aside and my neck tingled as his fingers carefully glided around its nape. He massaged a spot behind my ear with his thumb. Slowly with the comfort of small, gentle circles, I relaxed. He stepped closer erasing the gap between us. "Let me show you what it would be like."

I gasped when my breasts, heavy with arousal, met his chest. His cock swelled even bigger and harder and dug into my stomach. A smear of stickiness against my skin. My soft curves melded against his hardness, and it felt like an incendiary device had exploded beneath my skin. Every single nerve ending smoldered with dark craving. "This is how it would be, Tabitha," he murmured quietly, angling my head to the side. "My skin against yours. Both of us sharing our bodies."

His warm mouth lowered to the flittering pulse point on my neck and he laved it with wet licks until I locked my hands around his biceps, panting and squirming under his relentless attention. "I'd have to get you ready to take me. Make you slick and wet so I could ease in." Satiny strands of wet hair tickled the side of my face as he moved upward to feather his lips lightly against the sensitive curl of my ear. "I'd kiss your pretty nipples and tease them with my tongue."

The decadent promise vibrating against my ear had me moaning loud and low. My nipples pinched as if he'd sucked the areola into his mouth and flicked the sharp tip with his tongue. The air felt thinner, harder to inhale, and my mind splintered apart and descended into an erotic daze.

"I'd kiss you everywhere," he husked, grazing the edge of his teeth along my jawline. "All over your gorgeous body and between your legs until you were swollen and mindless and begging." The words were brushed lightly against my lips and arrowed straight to my heart. "I'd be your first and you'd never forget this moment. Not ever." His tongue swiped slowly along the seam of my mouth to nudge my lips apart. Heat and longing burned in his gaze as he ran a hand down my side. "Gods, you'd look beautiful when I do take you." His tongue licked in and plunged against my own. My spine bowed in surrender, shifting my hips forward to move restlessly against him, seeking pressure and release. Pure desire sparked along my bones, from the ends of my toes to the tips of my fingers, as the low static hum of a climax began to hunt me down.

I had to touch him now.

Our mouths chased and captured each other in a feverish kiss. The thrust of our tongues kept tempo with the urgent need thrumming inside my sex. I tripped my fingers blindly down the taut lines of his side, his muscles twitching with my gentle exploration until I met his hip. Slipping my hand between our rolling pelvises I encountered male power. Vulnerable yet iron-hard.

Varen stilled like stone, the only part of him moving was his erection pulsating wildly against my touch. He briefly squeezed his eyes shut and groaned. "Fuck."

His cock strained as my thumb tentatively swept over his slit, throbbing when I smeared silky precome down its shaft. He was so large my fingers and thumb didn't meet when I gripped his girth. For a moment I panicked at his size, until I reassured myself, right now, all I had to do was stroke my hand back and forth. Maybe later, I'd be brave enough to bend at the waist and take him inside my mouth. Maybe later, I'd hook my ankles around his back as he thrust fast and deep inside.

Except Varen had other ideas.

Just as I was about to move my hand he stopped me by resting his over mine. He reached for my other hand and placed it around his cock right beside the other, and squeezed my fingers until I was a vice around him.

Anticipation and exhilaration thickened the air as I wondered what he intended to do.

Water rained gently down from above to pelt our skin and slide over our bodies in hazy rivulets, drummed against the backs of his fingers, and slid through the gaps. Glowing willwips spun above us and washed the gloomy light in pale lilac and heather.

I peered at Varen beneath the fringe of my eyelashes, my heart stumbling.

Varen's dark gaze locked with mine

A heartbeat later he thrust his hips and speared himself straight through my fisted fingers. The sharp gasp leaving my throat made me sound as innocent as I was. My eyes flared wide at the veined ridges, the velvet tip with its curved crown as he pushed against my tight grip. "That's what it would feel like," he rasped hoarsely. "I'd push in gently, take it slow, and break through your pretty hymen to claim what is mine."

My intimate walls clenched helplessly around nothing. I could practically feel what it would be like, him nudging at my entrance, parting my slick folds, and thrusting inside my sex. How full he'd make me feel. A stretch. A pinch. Until he consumed me entirely. His massive body pinning me to the stone wall as he took my virginity.

His lips feathered against mine in a kiss that stole another piece of my heart with its tenderness. "And I'd kiss you and keep kissing you until the sting receded," he breathed.

The weight of his hands on mine disappeared. His calloused fingers scraped my skin as he braced his hand around the nape of my neck, his thumb lightly resting in the hollow of my throat.

Varen peeled his torso from mine, arching his spine back so we could both look down where we were connected, my slender fingers curled around the hot angry length.

His outstretched arm was braced taut, his large palm cinched around the nape of my neck. While the other arm, tattooed right to his wrist, hung by his side with fingers curled into a loose fist. Droplets of water coursed lazily down his golden chest and the ripple of muscle. Wide-eyed and breathless I watched his abs and pelvis roll in a seductive wave as he pumped his hips to stroke languidly back and forth through my clenched hands.

My arousal tightened like a corkscrew.

His deep voice grew more uneven, breathing gusty. "I'd take you slow and deep and careful. Even though I'd want to fuck you rough and hard and fast. Pull your hair. Bite your neck."

An echo of a phantom sting heated my scalp and burned at my throat with the ghostly feel of sharp teeth biting. I wanted it badly. Everything he could give me. Everything I could take. My carnal desire must have shown on my expression because his eyes shone bright with hunger and he whispered, "Gods, you're perfect, perfect, perfect..."

He watched me the entire time as he snapped his hips back and forth. His cock stroked through my grip, sliding against my soft palms, pushing against my hold. He wasn't even inside me, but I was gasping and moaning as if he was.

His free hand brushed up and down my side, grazing the outer swell of my breast, skirting the sharp hip bone to fan wide and almost touch my sex. His voice was low and husky. "I'd have you moaning and squirming beneath me, clawing at my back, meeting the thrust of my hips, begging me to go faster. But I wouldn't. Fuck no. I'd take you slowly, so slowly it'd be torture."

My sex turned to liquid heat. My panties were too constricting. Gods, I wanted him.

This is what it would be like if I accepted him inside my body, the stretch and fullness. The naked intimacy of the act if our bodies were clasped together. Nowhere else to look but into one another's eyes as we both drowned in each other's pleasure.

"What am I doing to you, Tabitha?" He raised his hand to run his thumb along the inside of my lower lip. The roughened pad rasped against the soft flesh, tugging gently. "I know those dirty books you read. I've experienced that filthy mouth first hand."

There was no hesitation. I captured his thumb and sucked.

Hot sparks raced down my spine at his strangled sound of surprise and the way his thick eyelashes flashed wide, the flex of his cock in my hands.

Leisurely, with a flattened roll of my tongue I pushed his thumb from my mouth. Maybe he expected me to say something else, but I spoke the truth instead. "You're f-fucking my hands with your c-cock."

A joyous laugh barked from him and his large shoulders shuddered with the rich sound. He smiled broadly down at me, teeth shining in the muted light. I soaked that magnificent smile up like a flower opening up for sunshine.

A blink later I stole his breath and his amused expression faltered, then startled, when I pumped him at the same time he thrust. "Holy fuck, Tabitha...fuck."

I did it twice, once more, relishing the sting on my scalp as his fingers dug through my hair, the shudder that wrecked his entire body. His luscious mouth slackened as he moaned my name. Kept moaning it along with a string of muttered curses. His eyes rolled back as he let out a filthy groan, bucking his hips up to meet the glide of my fingers feathering softness at the base of his shaft. The climax washed over him, straining his sharp jawline, deepening the creases around his pinched eyes. His parted lips glistened with a heavy, gasping breath. He was beautiful and wild. Lost in the abandonment of dark pleasure. And it heightened my own.

It was the abrupt lack of motion, the sharp pain at the rough clasp of his hands on my body, before a thunderous rumble clawed from his throat.

Shock erupted, swift and fierce, as warm stickiness struck the backs of my fingers. A hot ropey line splattered up my chest. A wild ribbon across my breast. A pearlescent droplet on my nipple.

Varen canted forward and he crushed my body against the stone wall, a river of water splashing over my shoulders. His forehead tipped against my own and his grip on my neck loosened its hold. Trembling fingers stroked through the rope of my hair. His voice was low and hoarse. "That's it, Tabitha, you understand now how I'm at your mercy. How I'd do anything for you."

We breathed one another in. While his panting slowed and eased, mine increased.

I was breathless and shaking, every single inch of me.

There was a desperate ache between my legs.

I'd been wound overly tight. A twist too far. And I was going to shatter.

Slowly, I became aware of sticky brushstrokes sweeping across my breast, as he kissed the corner of my mouth, then the other, while he smeared his cum over my body as if to say mine, mine, mine.