Page 32 of His Human Believer

“It is.”

“And I’m in love with him.”

“I know, sweetheart,” she says. “Drink your wine.”

Chapter Ten

Vidar

Two months, eleven diurnals, and approximately nine hours.

I know these numbers the way I know my own name. I’ve calculated this many times per day since the vow began. A giant countdown clock in my head. Originally, when I first made this vow of celibacy, I had no idea of a potential bound and no prospects for even a pleasure mate. It seemed like the right thing to do in order to rid my planet of a faulty legend that had been plaguing Hyrrokin for hundreds of years.

And now I am tormented by that decision.

I lie on top of the bedding in the dark, in the lower suite of another male’s domicile with my cock hard against my stomach.

I have accomplished nothing this entire evening.

Many diurnals of unattended recordings need to be reviewed before the alignment. Finalizing the equipment placement for tomorrow night, which is the single most important night of my professional life, needs to occur. I have not opened the file.

Plus, I was trying to get plenty of sleep.

Heh.

The entire difficulty is that Margaret Reyes is sleeping two floors above me. There is a floor, a staircase and layers of stone between us and yet I can find her in my awareness at any moment I choose, which is a thing I have never been able to do with another being in my life.

She has been in that room upstairs, with Hannibal’s bound for hours.

I want her here, with me.

I have spent this evening, instead of working, doing my best to ignore how much I want to take my erection in my hands and shoot my come as I shout out her name. I want to know what her mouth tastes like. Her thighs around my waist, my claws in the follicles at the back of her head. Does she cry out when she orgasms?

And I cannot do the one thing that would help. Not once. Not here, in a shut room, in the dark, in a domicile where every other being is asleep and no being would ever know.

I put both claws flat on the bedding on either side of me, which is undignified, but it seems to work.

Thinking about Margaret’s lush body is not a violation.

And then underneath all of it is the other worry. After this is over, her vacation ends and then she will leave on a transporter disk. Will my female want to return to Salo and never return to Tarvos?

She would send messages, for a while, but I assume this would end. After all, why would a female of such value wait ten more months for my vow of celibacy to end? Yes, I can constantly scent her arousal for me but that does not mean that she wants anything more than pleasure mating. And I now understand that I want more than that.

I am falling in love with this female.

I want her as my bound and my mate for life. I want her as the mother of future Coalstones. But would she be willing to give up her life on Salo to live with me on the grounds of the Academy, here on Tarvos? And does she even want to have offspring?

I do not know.

At the third hour I get up and leave my room, telling myself I want something to eat. Mainly, I’m having trouble staying asleep and I think a snack might help.

I exit through the inside door that leads to the rest of the house.

The domicile is quiet. Skylo sleeps on the top floor with both of the smallest children. I have been in this domicile six diurnals and have never once gone upstairs in the night. The dispenser in the lower suite functions perfectly well and I have used it at all hours without difficulty.

I go up anyway.

The Hellstone residence is large and comfortable. Staying in the downstairs guest quarters with its own exit to the backyard has been no hardship. The only problem is the proximity to Margaret at night, which leaves my body and mind vulnerable to the desire that plagues me constantly.