Page 39 of Something Handsome This Way Comes

“Grievance… I…” He was beyond sensation. He was just a ball of nerves. A spirit filled with so much love he felt like he could snap from existence at any moment. Because no living thing on this planet had the right to feel as good as Milo did right then. “Grievance… I love you.”

The Naga tilted its head, the corners of its eyes lifting in that reptilian, almost-smile.

And even though he knew those jaws could literally open and take his head off, Milo didn’t hold back when the rush of love forced him to move. To flatten his body against his mate and kiss him.

Grievance hissed, even as his lips began to taste and explore Milo’s. They weren’t so much lips as they were swollen, plump scales. Milo didn’t care. He kissed them anyway. Then that forked tongue slid past his lips and began its own intertwining mating dance with his, and Milo was lost.

Grievance picked up the pace, and Milo was just a sack of flesh and bone, his soul taking a detour to new heights as his mate made love to him in a way Milo never imagined, even in his horniest dreams.

When the thrusts grew shorter—sharper—Milo knew he was close. Then the Naga’s bulbous tips swelled, and it was over. The finale to their epic dance, punctuated with incoherent moans as slick cum flooded Milo’s insides.

Milo moaned in surprise when the liquid pouring into his body came a little colder than he expected, eliciting a contrast that surprised him so much that before he knew it he was cumming. His tortured cock spurted weakly between their pressed bodies, lubricating the glide of their dance until they were both slick. Skin sliding against scales in a hot, wet mess.

Milo gasped, head resting on a scale-plated chest. Grievance’s taloned hands stroked carefully down the slope of his back.

Milo didn’t know how long he lay like that. He certainly didn’t remember Grievance pulling out of him or tucking him under the covers, or turning back into a man and holding him impossibly close.

All he knew was he was enveloped so fully in the scent of his mate that it was comically easy to fall into a peaceful sleep.

At least…until something woke him two hours later, trying to line up its suckers with his nipples.

Milo opened his eyes blearily.

Fuck. He hurt everywhere. But not in a way that was completely… unwanted. Maybe wrung out was a better way to say it. Like a wet towel twisted to the point where there was nothing left to squeeze out.

A distant banging brought him back to the room faster, consciousness snapping to attention. He looked around at the popping coals in the dying fire, the thin blanket pooled at the waist of his naked body.

And perhaps the most prominent thing in the room: a massive, muscle-lined, bare back slowly rising and falling.

He’s back to normal. Thank the Lantern.

Grievance’s body had resumed its shape as a man, his tattoos resting in a feathered pattern down his back. What was the last creature he’d been? Milo tried to remember, but it wasn’t coming to him.

He’d been stroked with feathers, rubbed raw with coarse fur, and slicked up with tentacles for so many hours he had no reference for what creatures had ravaged him in the night. Only that every single one of them had made Milo feel…

Well.

Milo very much doubted a sane person would be smiling and pleased by the amount of bruising, bite marks, and scratches that were scattered across his body.

I’ve never cum so much in my life.

He hissed as he reached for another gulp of his revitalizing potion, looking down to see a very obvious circle of teeth marks right over his nipple. The canines left a deeper impression than the others.

“Fucking hells Grievance…” Milo said, shaking his head and swallowing yet another dose of the buttery potion.

The banging came again, so distant Milo almost mistook it for the pop of wood in the grate. But it came again, more insistent this time. A distant shout.

Groaning, Milo slid free from the bed, grabbing the nightstand for a moment as vertigo momentarily made him wobble.

“I’m going to kill Rowen,” Milo said once again.

This wouldn’t have happened if not for that stupid drugged muffin…

Milo found his favorite knitted pink sweater. It was torn to shreds. Groaning, Milo managed to shuffle it on, his shoulder spilling out and a slide on the hem going all the way to his hip, but this was the best he had right now.

The banging continued.

Hissing Milo slipped from the bedroom, closing the door silently behind him and wrapping his arms around himself. The rest of the cottage was freezing this far from the fire.