Posey
The fever returns in the morning when the sun rises. It’s thick and syrupy with no end in sight. I sit up, surrounded by sheets and pillows I don’t remember carrying up here from the couch. I’m wearing nothing but one of Aris’s cut-off T-shirts, which I don’t remember putting on. I rub my face on the worn fabric, inhaling deeply, trying to clasp onto whatever shred of reality I can find. All that takes up my mind is… here. Being here, in this cabin, with this man I’ve known my entire life. A man so far out of my league it’s laughable.
The same man who made love to me last night like it was something fated. An act we’ve done a million times. Slow, tender, aching, the kind of touch I imagine comes from decades of knowing a lover's body.
I’m delusional when I walk downstairs, my brain split into sections. Sex. Lust. Greed. Possibly, hopefully, a single shred of who I am outside of this heat, but that section is the weakest of all. Sunlight pours through the open front door, casting the bare-bones furniture in hazy light I haven’t seen in several days. It burns, honestly, after so long spent in the rain and fog. I shield my eyes but halt in front of the couch, gingerly stepping back, but the place where I dropped the tonic has been cleaned and swept thoroughly.
Aris… I don’t think he came to bed last night at all.
Of course he wouldn’t have. How stupid can I possibly be? Thinking Aris–the man, the myth, the fucking legend of Veiled Valley–would ever stoop to my level and snuggle with me until we both fell asleep. He can have anyone he wants. He has anyone he wants.
Last night, it was me. I’ll guard that for the rest of my life. One single, deliciously deranged memory.
It has to be enough for me.
But this fever is just… relentless. My bones ache with every step I take into the strip of sunlight painting the rustic cabin bright gold. Only when my eyes adjust do I see Aris sitting on the front porch, shirtless, his back to me as he stares out over the lake, which is finally visible.
It strikes me then how far north we came. Instead of dense, humid forest, the horizon is dappled by shallow, evergreen mountains. Tucked deep in those mountains too far to see, and past a rolling river, Veiled Valley rests high above the river, and beyond that… home. I’m sure, if I stayed here long enough, I’d be able to pinpoint which of the towering ridges belongs to my father’s territory.
A floorboard creaks below my foot as I step into the light. Aris turns slightly, notices me standing there, and rises methodically. He’s sweaty, wearing nothing but a pair of briefs, and smells like the forest. He just got back from shifting. I can sense the wolf on him when he turns to face me. His pupils are still wide and dark, like he’s not totally back in his human form yet.
A sharp ache clicks between us, and my fever spikes like it never has before. I swallow a whimper, my lower lip trembling. What’s happening to me? To us?
He mouths my name, nostrils flaring, and suddenly, I’m in his arms, and he’s carrying me across the house. He deposits me on the kitchen table and spreads my legs wide. I’m not wearing underwear. All he has to do is pull his briefs down just enough to free himself, and within seconds, and a sharp gasp, he’s buried inside of me again.
There’s nothing gentle about this. It’s so fierce. So passionate. So… overwhelmingly good. I grip his shoulders, and he rolls his hips into mine, each thrust hitting deep points that set my blood on fire. I tangle my fingers in his hair at the base of his skull and encourage him, moaning and mewling without restraint. It's animalistic. The cabin fills with the sounds of our passion. He nips my neck as he picks up the pace, groaning against my skin when my inner muscles tighten abruptly and spasm in rhythmic, satisfied waves, the fever rolling away with each passing second.
He is the antidote. I wonder if he knows. He has to know.
“Look at what you’ve done to me,” he rasps, groaning into my ear. “You’re fucking perfect. You’re so perfect, Posey. I’m a mess.” He inhales sharply, thrusting as deep as he can go, his body shuddering. “I want to come inside you.”
“I want you to,” I whimper, my nails leaving claw marks on his back and shoulders.
He groans again, but he’s frustrated, taking out that frustration with little bites to my neck and collarbone. His movements slow, but he’s rigid.
“I want you to,” I repeat, brushing the words over his chest. “I want you to come in my pussy.”
“Fuck,” he grunts, growling, and pulls out, his cock pressed between us. He holds me close, one hand splayed flat across my lower back to keep my upright and the other braced on the table.
“Why?” I ask as heartbreaking clarity fills the void left by the fever. “You did this last night, too. You didn’t come.”
“I can’t.”
“I can help you.”
He chuckles darkly against my forehead. “Just looking at you does the trick. Trust me.”
“Then why?”
He grabs my hand and brings it between us, folding my fingers around his thick shaft. He’s amazing. A work of art. But he’s the only man I’ve ever been with, and it’s still all foreign. But then, when my hand reaches the base, he grows… hot and swollen. Much, much bigger than before.
I look up at him. He has his eyes closed, his mouth parted in what I can only describe as ecstasy when I tighten my grip. I start to move my hand, traveling up and down his length again, but he stops me at the base of his cock.
“What is it?”
“A knot,” he replies hoarsely, licking his lips. He looks down at me through slits, his eyes hooded and heavy with heat that ripples through me, igniting another fire. “It happened last night, too.”
“What does it mean?”
“It means my wolf wants to fuck you as much as I do. It would have fused us together. It would have hurt you.”
“I want it–”
“No,” he breathes, shaking his head. But his mouth quirks in a sly smile. “It’s not possible.”
I want to ask why not, but he presses me back down against the table and kneels, my legs draped over his shoulders, and silences me by licking me from base to clit, sucking and nibbling until I’m beyond words or sounds, and the cabin fades to nothing but bright, white light, and the fever dies for good.
***
Passing time with Aris is the equivalent to watching butter melt on freshly baked bread. It’s perfect. Like nothing will ever be the same again between us but in the best way. I don’t think many people get to see this side of him. The serious side. The side sitting on the ground with an old book, explaining his conspiracies and opinions about the past wars with animated detail. The side that laughs into the sun as we look for freshwater clam shells on the shore. The side that listens intently when I talk about my garden back home and the little trinkets I’ve made using alchemy. The quiet, contemplative side. His warm body. The rhythmic beat of his heart as we look up at the stars, sprawled out on a blanket in nothing but our skin.
He checks everything off my list and then some, until the morning of our third day at the cabin dawns, and my heat slips through my fingers.
Reality doesn’t seep in until the sailboat meets the dock at his manor in Ruby. We’re still laughing, smiling and telling silly jokes when he helps me off the boat, and we turn toward the house.
My body instinctually begs to turn back, to climb aboard the little craft and sail back to that cabin where we can be just Aris and Posey again. Not the prince of Veiled Valley and the monster whose secrets are a death sentence.
I wanted to tell him the real reason I have to leave, but I can’t. I can’t bring myself to admit it. Even when he jokingly talked about marriage again, the children we’d have–with hair like mine and eyes like his–I couldn’t tell him the truth. That there would never be a child because I cannot bring something else like me into the world. That it would break me to see the look on his face when he realized what I was, and who I am, and the secrets I guard like a dragon atop its hoard.
I might survive watching him slip through my fingers. I’ll never survive his hatred and disgust.
“Are you okay?” he asks, but his voice is tight, and his gaze lingers on the house for several seconds before he meets my eyes. He looks as torn as I feel.
“It’s been a…” I turn to him, aching to reach out and touch him. “Thank you, Aris. For everything. I know this isn’t supposed to mean anything, but I’m really glad it was you.”
He stares at me, those silver eyes gleaming in the sunlight. He hasn’t shaved since we left. I yearn to reach up and run my fingers over the stubble–several shades darker than his golden hair. He looks looser and more relaxed this way, like he doesn’t have a care in the world.
I wait for his boyish reply, that smirk. That roll of his eyes followed by a shrug that would scream, “It wasn’t a big deal. It meant nothing at all. If you want to fuck again with no strings attached, you have my number.”
But he bites his lip, his gaze locked on mine to the point I feel like he can see right through me and into the deepest, most closed off places in my soul. I’m in his spotlight, and I’ve never been warmer or more at ease.
In another world, in another life, I feel like this could have been the beginning of something.
“I asked you to consider something. Do you remember what it was?”
Now, I’m biting my lip. “Aris, we talked about this.”
“You don’t have to go into a convent.”
“I don’t have another choice.”
“What if… the things we talked about. What if you knew I wasn’t just joking around?”
Marriage. An entire semi-platonic life together. Two birds, one stone.
He steps closer, closing the distance between us.
“I could give you everything if you let me,” he says. “I trust you, and I think you trust me. That’s enough for me.”
“You shouldn’t,” I whisper, and he presses two fingers to the underside of my chin and forces me to look up at him.
He searches my gaze. “What’s going on with you, Posey? Did we not just establish that this is beyond friendship?”
My stomach hollows out.
I did not expect this from him. Not from Aris, the man whose sexual proclivity is well known throughout Eastonia and possibly Crescent Falls, as well. He could have anyone. I’ve been telling myself that for days, telling myself I should feel blessed. Fucking lucky. But the way he’s looking at me now?
It’s tearing me apart at the seams.
I watch the column of his throat bob as he swallows, leaning closer like he’s about to kiss me. “What’s stopping us, Posey?”
The sound of the glass door on the back patio sliding open steals both of our attention. Aris doesn’t step away as a shadow moves into view.
My blood runs cold, and Aris’s touch on the underside of my chin burns as Roman raises a hand to shield his eyes from the sun to look down at us across the yard.
I step away before his vision clears, and it feels wrong. Like I’m making a mistake. Like I’ll regret this for the rest of my life.
And that's the worst part of it, that… I don’t think I’m okay with that anymore. Pretending everything is okay. Being so completely, utterly alone.
I turn to Aris to just say it. To tell him everything before it’s too late.
But Roman calls out our names, and Aris growls low under his breath, “What is he doing back so soon?”