Raven of Water

Chapter 19: Breaking Point

I was tugging off his black t-shirt before my brain could catch up with what my body was doing. Kai's mouth formed a grin against mine as he moved to help me undress him. When our kiss broke so that I could finally pull his shirt over his head and toss it to the side, his words were a breathless whisper.

"So you remember everything?"

Nodding, I placed my hands gently on either side of his head and began tasting his tongue while leading him to the bed. It wasn't that long ago that I'd hated him. At least, I had thought it had been hate, though I'd been wrong.

It was love.

It had only ever been love with Kai.

Now that I knew the full truth, I didn't know how he'd been able to keep his distance from me for so long.

The man's fingers were on the front of my dress distracting me, his touch frenzied but pausing just long enough to gently remove the metal pins holding the cloth top of the gown together. He chuckled, pulling the garment off me and exposing the corset-like stays I wore over top my white shift. "I forgot how many fucking layers you used to wear."

His words had me returning the laughter as the back of my legs hit the edge of the mattress and I fell backward. Kai grinned, his eyes flashing in the dark before he pounced on top of me and began kissing my neck while his hand crept beneath my underclothes to caress the back of my knee.

"We could just magic my clothes away." I laughed, cradling his neck as his lips traveled to my cleavage.

"More fun this way. I missed you so fucking much. I've waited centuries for this. I intend to savor every moment of you." As he spoke, his warm breath on my chest had me melting into the soft mattress underneath us.

"I remember almost everything, Kai."

The caress of his lips made me shiver until he paused kissing long enough to mutter a reply against my skin. "What don't you remember, Lex?"

His expert hands were now working on untying the stays, pulling them back and revealing the thin cotton shift underneath. It was now the only thing separating my skin from his.

"My name."

I gasped as his lips were on mine again. He had at some point completely removed the stays, leaving me in just my shift and the skirts over top of my bottom half. He tasted like I remembered, like home, and his kiss made my mouth burn as I hungered for more. It reminded me of ginger, his taste did.

He broke the kiss long enough to remove the rest of his clothing before once more pressing the weight of his body into me, pinning me against the mattress.

"Oh, darling, that's the best part. You're Alexandra. You've always been Alexandra."

"Oh..." I trailed off, distracted by running my fingers over the man's abs, feeling him flex under my touch before my hand searched lower and felt other parts of him. "That makes things easier, I guess."

His laugh had me grinning as we set about making up for all that lost time the best way that we knew how. It was late in the afternoon when both of us were finally spent, and in Kai's arms, I drifted into a sweet dream. In it, I would slip between our past life together and the world now. The best part was that no matter when I was, Kai was always there, grinning down at me. That was all that mattered.

***

I slowly awoke to a half snore in my ear, which then jolted me the rest of the way to consciousness. I laughed quietly.

"What?" Beside me, Kai yawned and rubbed his eyes, leaving me to notice the room in almost complete darkness. There was no moon tonight.

Sighing, I nestled deeper under the covers, relishing when Kai wrapped his arms around my waist and squeezed to the point that it was almost painful.

"I'm cold. And you still snore."

"Well, I can fix one of those things..." His eyes flashed in the dark as he trailed off moments before I sensed his power seep out. This magic wasn't his natural one. It smelled acrid and sulphuric. It was... demonic, an intricate part of the new side of him that I didn't yet know. The way it contrasted with his natural humid, rain-drenched scent made me shudder. The smell had me feeling like I was outside and huddling around a fire in the middle of a thunderstorm.

Then the fireplace roared to life with enough force that I jumped. "Well, that's new..."

I looked back in time to watch him grin, teeth flashing in the flickering firelight and dark horns shimmering ephemerally on his head as he sighed and scooted into the middle of the bed, pulling me onto his chest in the process. "There's a lot new about me, darling."

I snorted, rolling my eyes and resting my cheek against his skin so I could watch the fire dance. "Is all we ever did fuck?"

"How crass this twenty-first century has made you, Miss Alexandra." His words had me chuckling before playfully nipping at his skin, leading him to smack my ass lightly in return. "Brat. You know that's not all we did."

"I know." I sighed contentedly, marveling in the feeling of peace even as I felt slight unease settle in the pit of my stomach. "What... what was it like becoming... demony?"

He went rigid beneath me, leaving me wondering if I'd said the wrong words until he finally answered. "Painful. Physically and emotionally. My kind were never to be in service of evil or good. Nature brought us into being. It's why we exist. I just... the pain from being ripped from nature, from the land and place where I belonged, I didn't know if I would make it at times."

Tears came to my eyes as I realized just what the man had been through, and I bit my lip to keep from bawling. He'd gone through all of that pain for me.

"Are you crying, love?"

"No," I said, lying through my teeth as some teardrops oozed out and onto Kai's skin. They reflected the firelight beautifully.

He didn't argue and instead kissed my head. "It's okay. It brought me back to you. Don't cry for me, Lex."

"Of course I'm going to cry for you. I... what else can I do? I wasn't there when you needed me, and there was so much pain for you."

"It's alright, love. Really." His words were soft as he guided me off him and to lay next to him, wrapped in his arms and facing the fire, the warmth of which dried my tears. We laid in silence until a log popped on the fire, causing Kai to grow rigid before kissing the side of my head and whispering in my ear. "Lex, I'm going to need you to trust me, okay?"

"I always trust you Kai. Always have. Always will."

I felt my eyes closing, felt the warmth of the flames on my face as I identified some surprising soreness in my muscles. It had been a while since I'd been with a man. And centuries since I'd been with Kai who was the man I'd always needed.

"I'm just saying," he spoke, his hand lazily tracing patterns on my thigh, "if there should ever come a time where you doubt if you can trust me, don't doubt me, okay? Even if it's hard."

"Hmm..." I asked, getting off track as his fingers worked their way higher with maddening slowness.

"Lex—"

"Well, you can't expect me to take anything you say seriously while you're distracting me! And if this is some dumb foreshadowing, I'm not here for it. We're a team. Always have been. Always will be. Got it, Raven?"

"A team."

He nodded against me, though I couldn't see his face to help me understand what he was thinking, and all curiosity about where man's mind was fled my brain as his fingers finally found the part of me with the sorest muscles, though the soreness was immediately replaced by something else, a need that overrode all other thought and sensation. I still wasn't entirely convinced that in our past we'd done much else other than have sex, and I couldn't say that I minded the idea. I was sure we had done other things, too, but right now, the importance of being with each other was all that mattered to me.

In fact, it was like my magic needed him, that we were basking in each other, our powers rushing out and greeting each other and swirling together. All parts of us were one... except for that demon side of his, which I felt keeping its distance. I wished I could tell Kai that I loved all parts of him, the old and the new, but I was far beyond the point of talking anymore. We'd discuss the sexy demon side later. Now was for the Raven of Water.