51. Stella

51

STELLA

“We won.” My voice wavers, and I pull the blanket tighter around my shoulders. The night went later than I expected, and I assumed I’d be able to sleep without seeing my husband.

But I was wrong. I’m drawn here like standing too close to a stinging bonfire. It hurts, but the burn is better than the cold alternative.

“You wouldn’t be surprised at all,” I continue with a shrug. I’m not all that surprised either. I feel the difference in the territory since my attempted abduction and the downfall of our enemies. The fae lord who backed Frank and Leo still needs to be dealt with, but that’s a distant problem in a whole other realm, and the harpies’ ally might already have it in hand.

“I don’t think they even needed an heir,” I muse, but smile when my disturbance gives a pulse to remind me that it’s still here. Still ready to take on the world when the time comes. “I think they just needed to face their demons rather than live in fear. They had to feel a part of something.”

The charms probably helped…and me.

They see me as a leader. There may be the passing poetic whisper about me turning into some mourning ghost over my healing husband, but when it came down to it, they want to be led by me. Every meeting with a business owner or concerned citizen over the past week, every moment of care I gave to them, paid off.

It’s everything we wanted, and it feels hollow.

“I just wish you were here to see it.” I clear my throat and shiver. The blanket isn’t that thick, and I’m only in a sleeping slip under it. My bare feet have long since become numb. I should go in soon, but the same drive to see him stops me from leaving.

I take in the changes made around us.

Mom dropped by and prettied up the space. A couple of winter flowerpots and the string of fairy lights add a cozy element that nearly touches the shadow in my heart. There’s even a space heater that I was too stubborn to turn on, but now I sigh in defeat and click the button.

The makeover is a silent acknowledgment of what everyone knows.

I’ll be visiting this statue for the foreseeable future.

We may not be giving up, but I’m realistic enough to know that this may take longer than anyone wants to admit.

Perhaps I will become a ghostly visage up here alone.

“Stella.”

I suck in a breath and spin at the sound of his voice, so familiar even though I haven’t heard it in weeks. The tears welling in my eyes fall without permission.

Ben.

“You should have called me.” The stricken expression on his face stabs at my own wounded heart.

The flash of anger is instant, and I wipe the tears away. “Why would I do that? You left.”

He steps closer, and I take a step back. He looks…not as put together as he’s existed in my memory. His hair is sticking up in places, and there’s a smudge of dirt on his cheek. He wears a T-shirt and sweats in the place of his usual suit.

“You should’ve still told me.” he says, and the vehemence of it surprises me. “I could have been here.”

“Why?” I ask like I didn’t ache for that every night.

“Because I love you!”

“You have a shitty way of showing it,” I snap.

He winces but steps closer again, and when I retreat more, I bump into the immovable object that is Stoneheart.

“He’s been like this for a week, and I had no idea!” Ben’s voice breaks, and pain spills over his features.

It’s clear in this moment that I’m not the only one he loves. I stole his opportunity to react to the state of the gargoyle we both care for.

My shoulders drop in momentary defeat. I lose the grip I have of the blanket, and it falls, pooling around my feet, but Ben reacts before my first shiver.

He hisses in dismay and grabs me around the waist, pulling me in. I make a sound at the warmth of him, my fingers digging into his fabric-covered shoulders.

“Gods, Stella! What are you wearing? It’s freezing up here.”

“Fuck you,” I snarl, not ready to abandon my righteous anger for the sucking sensation of guilt.

Ben’s eyes darken. “Let me take care of you.”

“No,” I say, but I don’t push him away. The contact of our bodies is already sparking a heat low in my belly. “I don’t need you to take care of me.”

“I know, but I need you,” he whispers.

Those words. They don’t make up for the moments of loneliness and doubt, but they heal something.

My nipples press against his chest, hard and sensitive. There is no cold or stars above us. Only our mate at my back and a helpless anger in my chest even as my body comes to life under his touch.

“You abandoned us.” The tears I wiped away return with a vengeance.

“I’m sorry. I’m so sorry,” he breathes against my lips.

I rear back, but the solid form of Stoneheart leaves no room for me to escape what my heart is clamoring for. Almost as if he’s really here with us, guiding back together again. Our bodies and souls are like magnets. The impending crash of slow heavenly bodies. I’m caught in his soulful gaze.

Ben’s grip on my waist tightens, and mutual momentum draws us in. This time when his face presses near mine, I tremble, panting against his mouth, needy for this connection even as I still suffer from the wound he dealt.

“I was wrong. Let me make things right,” he says, as enraptured with me as I am with him.

His kiss is warm against my cold lips. All at once, the frustration rises and breaks. He abandoned me, but I forgave Stoneheart of the same crime.

I refuse to hold my hurts close to my chest until they poison everything. I reacted all my life to being cast aside upon birth. I won’t let the fear of rejection steal this demon from me.

I won’t be left alone with my memories and forget-me-nots again.

I wrap my legs around him, and he grinds his arousal into the cradle of my thighs. I make a helpless sound. The fabric of his sweats pressing against where I’m bare. I’m not wearing anything under the sleeping dress.

“Ben,” I beg.

“Let me warm you up,” he growls.

I make an impatient sound. I need him as reckless for this as I am. I claw my fingers into his hair, kissing him like I can keep him from disappearing on me again just by force. I almost sob at the acute need. My hunger is so sharp I taste blood and gasp.

He pulls back. A smear of red mars his lip, and shock reverberates through me.

I bit him. I marked him for all to see.

I open my mouth to apologize, but his gaze stops me. It’s fire, and when he kisses me next, there’s nothing contained about it. He devours me, groaning.

His erection pulses against me, and I make an impatient sound, pushing down his pants as he pushes up my dress. I’m almost surprised that I’m wet with how tumultuous this moment is, but his cock presses against my folds, smearing my arousal against my thighs before lining himself up.

He doesn’t wait for an invitation before thrusting inside.

The stretch makes me moan, and Ben’s kiss steals the sound. It’s been an age, and I’ve been so empty. The sudden fullness eases something unwieldy in my heart.

“I’m staying,” he growls against my mouth. Apparently wanting to have a conversation as he moves inside me.

I scowl, but it’s impossible to hold on to anything other than the heat between us. “For how long?”

“Forever.” His next thrust is hard and grinds my back mercilessly against Stoneheart’s icy cold chest.

The tears stream down my cheeks unchecked. “Do you promise?”

Our eyes lock, and he slows his thrusts until the slow drag threatens to have me clawing him to go with the bite, but the look on his face hypnotizes me, absolute certainty.

He brings his hand up and wipes the blood from where it sluggishly wells on his lower lip, before placing it past me and against the statue. A fresh red mark to layer on the one I left with my blood during the ceremony.

“Cross my heart and hope to die,” he vows.

The oath buzzes with significance.

I buck my hips against him, urging him deeper, to take more. Pleasure and something darker making me want to claim this demon’s soul as surely as he has ours.

The stone heats and softens against my back, and suddenly we are wrapped in wings, cutting out the cold.

The rhythm of our thrusts stutter as a large hand holds my ass up, giving me leverage even as a tail snakes around and pulls Ben deeper inside me.

Another hand grips the back of Ben’s neck.

“I told you you’d only make it worse for yourself,” Stoneheart purrs.

Hearing him, being surrounded by his scent, the strength of his body around mine after days of heavy fear that I’d never see him again are too much to process. I come with a cry, my head thrown back against my husband’s shoulder.

“That’s it, firefly. Take our demon.” Stoneheart’s voice is low, and he pulls Ben harder against us, surging the demon deeper into me.

My body clutches hard around Ben’s as my hips move, wanting to be filled with him, wanting to consummate his promise.

Wanting to claim him for the two of us.

I pull down Ben’s shirt, ripping the collar until the bare skin of the crook of his neck is exposed.

Stoneheart doesn’t ask any questions before he strikes, sinking his teeth in to leave a claiming mark.

Ben is ours. Forever.

Ben cries out, ragged and complete as his seed pulses hotly inside me.

The stars burn above us, and there’s nowhere I’d rather be than between these two.