“Really, squid-boy?”
The male lifts two hands with tentacles for fingers, then two more, and blinks. “I juuust wanted to knooow her textuuure. It’s uuunique.”
I wrap my legs around Aura’s waist. “Sorry, I’m taken.”
Aura rasps a deep breath, lets the squid-man go, braces the back of my neck, and kisses me with force.
I bask in the electric tingle and heat of his tongue against mine, the way he caresses me like I’m made of glass, and how he manages to make me feel like the only woman in the universe.
When we’re finally left alone in the hot water, Aura breaks the kiss. “Not yet, you’re not. Not officially. I have been trying to cover you with my scent, but I see that is not enough.”
I have to agree. And I’ve had time to think. If I want my life to change for certain, I’m going to have to go all in. “Maybe we should do something about that.”
Aura’s muscles bulge. “Really?”
I kiss his firm lips. “Yeah.”
He collects me, hikes out of the water, and carries me to our table. “You don’t have to ask me twice. This whole place smells like sex. I can barely think.”
He sets me down, wraps me in my towel, and then flash-dries himself with a blink of light.
At the other end of the pool, Cora leans against the railing, chatting it up with a tall Jorbiun. Aura glances over his shoulder, sees her, then leans back into the railing and bumps it with his shoulder.
“Ow! Fucker!” Cora shakes a hand and then curls around it.
Aura collects me in his arms again and starts for the complex.
“Prince Aurelius.” A staff member says in warning.
He shrugs as we pass the gate and, with a cutesy voice, replies coyly, “Oopsies!”
I cover my mouth with a hand as I hold back hysterical laughter. “You’re almost as bad as her.”
“Except, I don’t start it.” Aura nips at my neck. “But I am going to start something with you.”
He kisses me all the way to the main doors barely stopping for a breath to ask me, “Your room or mine?”
“Yours is probably nicer. But mine is closer.”
Aura growls with lust and practically runs to my room. I swipe my wrist, and the door opens. In two seconds, he’s launched us across the room and at the bed. I cringe in anticipation of it breaking, but it bounces with surprising resiliency.
“It’s fine. They can handle us,” he says.
“How do you know?”
Aura grins as my door shuts. “I heard you jump onto yours last night. So, of course, I had to try it.”
“You’ve seriously never jumped on a bed before?” I’m shocked.
“Didn’t have a mattress when I was little.” Aura nibbles my ear. “Royals didn’t allow such behavior. So, no.”
His kisses travel lower, igniting my skin with every glowing lovezap. The electricity is gentle and tracks along my bodyweb until it fades from perception.
Aura eases his massive body over mine, lowers his nose to my neck, and bites free the strings of my damp bikini top with his teeth. His hands roam my back even as I lie beneath him, and he trails nibbles down my chest.
“You are…” Aura grunts in lust. “Cai’aklictia, amamora.”
I want to ask him what it means, but his tongue wraps around a breast, then glides it’s wet, electric softness over mynipple, stealing my breath. My ribs tense. Skin prickles. And my delicate flesh drips with growing need.
