Chapter 10

Ivy

Besides the fucking mind-blowing sex I've just had—the best I've ever had in my entire life—I notice the heat. It's all around me, everywhere, all at once as I come down from the high. I'm basking in it and moan, wanting to prolong the pleasure, still connected with Atlas. When I open my eyes, I'm imagining I'll see him over me with an infuriating see-I-told-you-so smirk, but that isn"t what greets me. Instead, Atlas is awash in a brilliant light. His tattoos are swirling with a golden glow, and as my eyes adjust to the brightness, I realize that stretched out behind Atlas are… giant white wings, feathers and all.

What the fuck?

I jerk, attempting to scramble out from beneath him, but he's got a tight grip on my hips and holds me steady, his cock still buried deep inside me, still twitching.

"Don't fucking move," he orders me, his eyes still squeezed shut.

I swallow and listen, because damn, his bossy tone does something that makes me want to submit, while at the same time making me want to rebel just for the punishment I might receive. Sensations are heightened, my body responding to him still inside me. That now- familiar warmth races under my skin and greedily consumes all my need so that it just grows into a giant inferno of desire. I tilt my hips and rock against Atlas inside me.

With fucking wings!

He growls, his fingertips biting into the flesh of my hips. "You're moving, Ivy." But he tests it, pulling out with a slick sound and pushing back in, still hard.

"Atlas?" I ask, sighing his name more than saying it.

He hums, acknowledging that he's heard me, but keeps his eyes closed as he withdraws once more and slides back in.

I moan, because dammit, it feels so good, then reach down and grab his ass. "Did you know you have wings?"

He hums again, and this time he opens his eyes, and looks at me. "Yes, and they hurt like a motherfucker, but so fucking good." He falls forward, releasing my hips as his hands, one on either side of my head, support his weight over me. He rolls his hips, grinding into me, and I hook my ankles around his legs.

"Did you know you're glowing?" he asks.

I shake my head back and forth as I gasp. I can't see it, but I can fucking feel the heat. Sliding my hands up over the round muscle of his ass to the small of his back, I settle into the rightness of him sliding in and out of me once more. I breathe, the strength of those breaths expanding and growing in volume.

"Play with your clit," he orders me. "I want to feel you come around my cock again."

I reach between us, tilting my hips to meet his thrusts, and slide my finger through our mess and circle my clit. Moaning, I relax into the sensations while Atlas drives into me, the rhythm more haphazard than before.

I'm awash in sensation, the heat wrapped around every inch of my skin. Atlas's huge cock filling me, sliding in and out, stretching me. His hips hitting home again and again. Him lifting my hips and hitting that perfect spot so I cry out. My own finger slipping around that nub of nerves and pulses zinging up through my body, so I gasp, arching my back.

"Ivy. Fuck. Ivy," Atlas growls, his fingers biting into my hips.

"Atlas," I pant. "Oh–I'm close."

"Fuck," he breathes. "Fuck. So good." He's lost the rhythm and is just pounding into me. He pulls one of my legs from around him and hooks it over his arm, followed by the other, until my body is tilted and open for this onslaught. He hammers into me, groaning and gliding with abandon.

I'm as much lost to the sensations as he is, and my climax rips through me hard, crashing into everything that makes me as if it were a freight train. I cry out with it, closing my eyes because it's too much. It's too much.

"It isn't," he says, and I realize I've been chanting it out loud. "It's perfect. You're perfect. Fuck, Ivy. I'm coming." And he rams into me, his body suddenly tense as he grunts, breathes through it, his head falling forward.

When our orgasms pass, I wrap my arms around Atlas's shoulders, careful of his wings— his wings!—and pull him down into my arms. He releases my legs, relaxes into my embrace, and his wings relax, draping around us, covering us in a winged shroud.

I'm not sure how long we lay there, just breathing. We both might even sleep, and only when Atlas shifts, attempting to slide to my side and alleviate his weight pressing me down, I whisper, "Stay," so he does, his body still connected to mine. It's welcome, that weight, a compression boxing up the rambunctious overthinking that usually accompanies me. In that golden light we're emitting somehow under the shroud of his wings, I'm aware of my breath, of his, of our bodies, and the sensations still feeding me, of the slip of his softened girth as it slides from my body.

But one thing is gloriously absent: the voices.

There's nothing.

Just him.

Us.

I've just had life-altering sex with a man I've known for less than twenty-four hours—a man with wings—and it's the first time since I can remember that the voices I've tried to silence since my mother died are just… quiet.

"Am I dreaming?" I whisper.

He moves then, coming up onto his elbows, his gaze filled with so much emotion that I can't interpret everything it's telling me. He shakes his head. "If you are, so am I."

"I feel different."

"Me too." He slides a finger over my forehead, moving a curl.

I reach up and slide my palm against the white feathers. They are soft, but sturdy. "You didn't have these? Before?"

He shakes his head. "You… our bond, gifted them to me. The sereph Incitare."

"So not all sentinels have them?"

He shakes his head. "Only those who've found and joined with their incitare calix."

I'm not sure what to say, in awe. "I'm surprised you didn't want to just get this over with. You know… to get these."

He frowns. "Over with?"

"I just mean…"

He tenses and pulls away, withdrawing the covering of the winged shroud, and swipes a palm over his face.

I sit up, chasing after him. "I didn't mean it like that. What changed your mind?" I ask. "These?" I touch them.

He somehow tucks them closer to his body, and I watch them collapse and compress until they are tightly fitted against his back. "No." He stands and looks for his discarded clothing.

I can see that he's angry, that I've somehow said something wrong. Though in my experience with men, there usually isn't a lot of emotion wrapped up in a one-and-done experience. "I would understand. And I said we should do this. You know. For my sister. I wanted it."

"I didn't do this for my fucking wings, Ivy." He shoves his foot into his boxer briefs, then the other, yanking them up and situating them on his gorgeous body. Damn. He's a specimen. Beautiful. Fit. And he's got wings, which have now somehow melted into his back so they look like a tattoo. Damn.

"Then why?"

He's pulled on his jeans and is fastening the button. "For you. To keep you fucking safe, so you could go and get your sister. And—" But he stops and instead looks for his t-shirt.

I want to know what comes next. What's after that and. "And?" I ask, my breath caught in my chest because… I'm not sure what I want, but I feel like his answer has the potential to make me happy or to tear me apart. Only that can't be so. It's illogical. I hardly even know him.

Well, I tell myself, a winged man isn't really all that logical either.

"Never mind," he says, shrugging into that red t-shirt.

"Never mind?" There's definitely something wrong, and I recall what he said earlier: This bond means more to me. "Wait." I scramble from the bed, still naked but for my bra that we never took the time to remove. His eyes skim me, and I can see he's still interested, his tongue darting out to lick his lips. That buzzing heat moves under my skin, radiating to my clit. I could moan with it, but I squeeze my eyes shut and breathe through the sensation. "I don't understand," I say.

His eyes meet mine and hold steady. "I know you don't. None of this was fair to you, and now it isn't fair to me. But whatever. It is what it is." He turns away and grabs the door handle, but before opening it he says, "Get ready. I'll get my brothers. We need to go if we're going to get to Onyx City by tomorrow."