The Seeker's Return, page 5
I tilted my head up and caught sight of the scars again. This time, I ghosted a kiss over them once, then twice. And once I started, I couldn’t stop.
Rumple twitched under my touch, but he didn’t pull away. I wasn’t sure if he wanted to and was holding himself back, or if he spasmed because of the effect my kisses had on him. Either way, I continued the caresses, closing my eyes and pretending, for a moment, I could wash away his back like it was a canvas and I could free him of their hold.
The scars themselves marred his back, but I still found them beautiful. They were a unique component to who he was as a man, and I didn’t want that to change, regardless of how he got them.
But the pain and darkness that came with the scars...that was what I wanted to remove. I didn’t want him to continue to carry that burden, at least not when he was around me.
I took the arm still wrapped around his waist and dropped my hand until I felt his smooth shaft. He was already hard, and the second my fingers wrapped around him, he let out a low groan. He still hadn’t faced me.
I slowly moved my hand up his shaft, keeping a gentle grip, until I reached the tip. I could feel him drip with precum, with desire for me and me alone. I did it again and again. Rumple began to move in my hand as though he wanted to help me, help himself, and I pressed my face into his back, letting him.
“There you go, baby,” I murmured, my lips on his back. I watched in pure fascination as his skin erupted into goosebumps.
I did that.
That was all me.
“Alice,” he said through a helpless groan.
I whimpered at the sound, feeling my core start to drip with hunger. I slid my hand between my thighs until my fingers found my swollen clit while still stroking him simultaneously.
“Rumple,” I returned.
“Are you touching yourself for me, darling?” he asked.
I couldn't get out the words. I couldn't even nod. Instead, I grunted and hoped he understood what it meant.
Without warning, he turned so he was facing me. I had no time to be ashamed, no time to hide myself.
The truth was, I didn’t want to.
Because of this new position, I was forced to release him but it pressed into the side of my thigh. He was dripping with desire for me, marking me with himself, and the thought that I was worthy enough to be claimed by the prince of the Fae made me toss my head back and moan even more.
Rumple’s hand found my hip and he slowly eased me on my side before he curled himself around me. I didn’t falter in my caresses and he didn’t want me to. Now, his cock was pressed against my lower back.
I knew he was doing this on purpose. I knew there was this whole thing with the Fae and their scent and the fact was that he wanted everyone to know I belonged to him.
Me.
Some girl from Wonderland. A nobody.
Except, you aren’t a nobody.
You’re the daughter of one of the most powerful Fae ever.
Rumple must be proud of that. Instead of horrifying him, disgusting him, the thought turned him on. Made me even more desirable than he already thought I was.
I wasn’t sure if that was a good thing or not.
Quite frankly, I didn’t care. The thought that he could want me, love me, in spite of all that made me fall even more in love with him. I should have already known this, though. He loved me before he even knew who I was, back when we both thought I was just a human. Unmagicked. What had he called me? A Seeker. My unmagicked humanity was what was going to help us solve what happened to Anna. Now, though, now I realized I could still do that and have magic.
Rumple pressed his fingers against my dripping core and slid one inside of me.
“Jesus, you’re so wet,” he said, more to himself than to me. “I want to feel you come on my fingers. I want to feel you shake as I fuck you. Do you understand?” His voice was commanding, princely.
I had no choice but to nod since I couldn’t speak as of yet.
His other hand curved around my body until it clutched my breast. His thumb extended, tweaking my nipple gently, with just enough firmness to make it harden. The taps caused my pelvis to pulsate in time with him, and my eyes squeezed shut even further.
“Faster, darling,” he murmured, his breath caressing my ear.
I obeyed. I didn’t have a choice.
How silly of me to think that I possessed him when, really, I was nothing but a mere pawn, putty in his hand he could mold and shape anyway I wanted to. And I wanted him to use me. I wanted him to do whatever he wanted to me. If he told me to move my fingers faster against myself, I would. I would walk off a cliff if he called me by my name after giving me the command, and it had nothing to do with the power behind using my name either.
Damn him.
“There you go,” he said. His teeth grazed my shoulder, his tongue flicking out of his mouth to taste the sweat on my skin. “That’s it, darling. Just like that.”
Before I realized it, he stuck in a second finger, filling me up slightly. It still wasn’t the girth of his cock, but it was definitely more than I anticipated. I moved against him, adjusting, the curve of my ass touching the tip of his cock. He groaned, tightening his hold on my chest and grinded against me, using his fingers in tandem with his pelvis. He rubbed his moisture over more of my skin, and maybe this was his own way of possessing me. Maybe we could own each other, use each other, and love each other, all at the same time, even if the emotions were completely contradictory.
Suddenly, I realized I didn’t give a shit. I didn’t care one way or the other what other people said about healthy relationships and what emotions were allowed and which ones were toxic. Only I got to decide what was acceptable to me; no one else did.
His fingers curled inside of me. I released a breath, then another.
“I can feel you tightening up,” he said, lips vibrating against my skin. “God, you’re so close. Don’t stop, darling. Don’t stop. I want my sheets to smell like your come when you leave. I want to be overwhelmed by your scent. Come for me, Alice. Come for me.”
My body split at the seams and the tension burst out of me. I had no choice to obey his command. I twitched and spasmed against his fingers, against everything. A long, low moan filled his room, and I only realized it was me later. I felt like I was stepping off a cliff, floating to the ground, and then rushing back up to do it again.
The second I settled down, Rumple turned me so I was on my back. He locked eyes with me before putting his two soaked fingers into his mouth. He made a sound of pleasure at my taste, and suddenly, my mouth went dry. My pelvis tingled. It was too sensitive to pulsate, but desire was still there. How I had any left after last night, I had no idea.
“God, you taste fucking delicious,” he said, positioning himself over me.
He hooked his arms under my legs and pulled me to him, spreading my legs wide open.
“I can smell you from here,” he said. “God, I want to bury my face against your cunt and fill myself up with you so your scent will always linger on me.” He pushed the tip of his cock against my opening, teasing me, teasing himself. “I’m yours, Alice. I belong to you. You have everything. Every inch of me is yours. Even my heart.”
“Show me,” I managed to get out. “Fuck me so hard, you give me bruises. I don’t want to be able to walk tomorrow. Every time I hurt, I want to know it’s because of you.”
He shoved himself inside of me, without waiting to see if I would stretch. There was no gentleness about the act. He didn’t even pause, didn’t even hesitate.
Which was exactly what I wanted.
“Don’t you fucking dare stop touching yourself,” he murmured against my shoulder blade. “I want to watch you, I want to help you, as you meet your edge and then come all over my cock. I want to feel your inside squeeze me out, milk me, until my seed is so far inside of you, it refuses to come out. Fuck, Alice, I want to mark you as mine and mine alone, and anyone who so much as looks at you wrong, I want to shred them in two so no one will identify them again.”
My core clamped down on Rumple’s cock with every word out of his mouth. His words didn’t scare me, they thrilled me. It was nice to know I wasn’t the only one who wanted to possess him. In fact, it only furthered my want of him, the desire I felt for him.
My fingers began to move against my clit some more. I didn’t realize they had stopped at all until Rumple said something about it.
“I can feel you,” Rumple continued. “I know you’re almost there. Come for me. I want this room to smell like nothing but your wet cunt. I want to know it’s for me, for only me. I want you to scream my name and make me weak.”
His silver tongue had the effect it was hoping for. His words broke me, sent me flying off the edge. “Rumpelstiltskin,” I managed to say, closing my eyes and letting my climax take control of everything.
He never stopped thrusting, never lost his pace.
“Oh, darling,” he said. “Say it again. Say my name again.”
“Rumpelstiltskin,” I said. My pelvis continued to twitch. My grip on him tightened, and my fingers continued to fly across me, extending my orgasm even further, coaxing as much pleasure as I could.
“Once more,” he demanded viciously. “Force it out of me. Make me yours.”
I opened my eyes so I could lock my gaze with his. In a voice just above a whisper, laced through a moan, I said, “Rumpelstiltskin.”
His pace increased. Just as my climax finished, his began. He had no regard for me. His thrusts were desperate, needy, all for the sake of his pleasure and his alone. I knew there would be bruises on my hips as he pounded into me, trying to touch something not even I could reach. I couldn’t be upset with his selfishness. He made sure I was taken care of before taking his own pleasure, and that was something I appreciated even though I didn’t have much experience when it came to this.
When he slowed down, he hooked his chin against my shoulder, wrapping his arm around my waist and pulling me against his body. I arched back in his touch. I didn’t want to release him from the confines of my body.
Not yet.
His breath was miraculously even against my skin, but that knowledge soothed me. I closed my eyes, feeling my heart slow down as I began to relax my body against his.
“How do you feel?” he murmured, taking his fingers and brushing my hair away from my neck. Sweat tried to refrain from letting the locks go with ease, but he patiently combed through the strands until they obeyed his gentle caress.
“After that?” I asked in a low voice. I didn’t even open my eyes. “Blissfully, pleasantly, sleepy.”
He chuckled. “I mean, now that you’re here,” he corrected gently. “Do you feel better?”
“I feel better because I’m with you,” I admitted. I turned around so I could face him. Suddenly, my body ached, as though it was starting to catch up to the pleasure and pain I had inflicted and that had been inflicted on me. “I’m scared of my magic, Rumple. But being around you...I feel like I can do anything. Even control myself. I can be...who I’m supposed to be.”
“And who is that?” he asked, the corners of his lips ticking up into a small smile.
I lifted a shoulder, though that took much more effort than I expected it to. “I don’t know,” I said. “But if you’re with me, I’m not as scared to find out.” I tilted my head to the side. “Can I ask you a question?”
“You can ask me anything,” he said.
“Why are you here with me?” I asked. “Shouldn’t you be, I don’t know, looking for your sister? I don’t want to keep you -”
“Darling, I left you after something terrible happened,” he said, taking my face in his hand. “And I have no intention of ever doing that again. I will find Rapunzel. I have no doubt about that. But my concern right now is you. No other comes before you. Do you understand?”
I nodded, trying to keep the pleased smile from my face and failing miserably. Rumple leaned forward and caught the corner of my lips with his mouth.
“However,” he said, pulling away only marginally. “Now that you mention it, we must discuss the prospect of springing Hook from Neverland Penitentiary. I doubt I need to tell you it’s going to be difficult and dangerous. Unfortunately, we don’t have any other option if we’re going to find Rapunzel.”
7
The mention of Captain Hook brought me down from the high having sex with Rumple typically gave me.
The emotion and the adrenaline running through my body still lingered but my thoughts were sharper and I wasn’t so sleepy.
I turned in his arms to look at him, tilting my chin up so I could read his face. It wasn’t that I didn’t trust him. I did. And if he said he needed Hook to search for his sister, then I believed him. My issue was that Hook was a criminal. He supposedly kidnapped kids from his own middle school PE class. And Rumple wanted to free him.
“What’s the matter, darling?” Rumple asked, curling a strand of my hair around his finger and rolling it up as though it was curled. “You look...pensive.”
I sighed, dropping my eyes so it rested on the V that made up Rumple’s lower body.
Jesus, the man was the most beautiful thing I had ever seen. His body was taut, lean but rigid with muscle packed tightly onto his frame. I couldn’t believe he was mine. I still had no idea what I could offer him, especially now that Pan said I was practically a heathen for my mixed blood. What did he want from me?
Why do you automatically assume he wants anything from you? Why not just go with the fact that he says he loves you and simply trust him at his word?
“I just don’t know how we could possibly get Hook out of prison without it coming back to us,” I said, lifting my gaze until it locked with his.
He stared at me for a long moment before cupping my cheek and pulling me to him until his lips captured mine. My eyes slipped shut and I leaned into the kiss, opening for him as it got more passionate. When we finally broke for air, it took me a moment to catch my breath.
“What was that for?” I asked.
“The fact that you’ve already accepted breaking Hook out of prison,” he said as though it was obvious. “The fact that you’ve already aligned yourself to what I want without asking for anything in return.”
I swallowed, shifting with unease. “You don’t have to thank me for treating you the way anyone would want to be treated,” I said.
“You’re wrong, darling,” he murmured. “Humans treat each other with little consideration for anything but their own wants and desires. It is why I’ve preyed on them for as long as I could. But there are still good people in this world. You, my dear, are the best. And I am in awe of exactly who you are.” He took my hand and kissed the inside of my wrist.
I shuddered at the caress. I knew he was reminding me that despite what happened, he still thought I was good. I didn’t want to believe it. I didn’t want to forgive myself for something so terribly vile, but it was difficult not to when Rumple could be so convincing.
“Stop distracting me,” I chided him, but even he could tell my heart wasn’t in it.
“I think you like to be distracted, darling,” he said, leaning down and kissing the column of my throat.
I closed my eyes. He knew I loved when he kissed me there, right underneath my ear. It set my entire body on fire.
“Yes,” I admitted. It took everything in me to open my eyes, to look at Rumple even through the haze of desire, but I was doing the best I could. “Only by you. But not when we’re talking about something as serious as breaking someone out of prison in order to find your sister.” I blinked as my brain and logic slowly started to return to me. “If Hook can really find your sister, why not break him out earlier? Why wait until now?”
“The truth is, darling, I wasn’t sure she could be found,” he admitted. “But after I found Sadie, I found proof that she’s still alive.” He paused. “Sadie is siphoning her magic.”
I furrowed my brow. “What?” I asked slowly.
“Sadie is taking her magic from her, probably against her will,” Rumple continued. There was an edge to his voice now, his eyes lighting with fire. Anger permeated his body, causing his body to stiffen even as he held me. He was still careful with me, still gentle, but I felt it all the same. “I don’t know where Sadie has her, however. And Sadie’s magic is powerful enough to prevent me from tracking her.”
I pulled my hair over my shoulder as a frown touched my face. “How is it possible that Sadie has magic more powerful than your own?” I asked.
That didn’t make sense to me. Even the Red Queen feared Rumple to the point where he could go between realms without penalty and do whatever he wanted. How could someone like Sadie be able to challenge Rumple? The only person I could imagine doing that would be Pan, and even then, I didn’t think Pan could beat his older brother.
But Sadie? Especially as an older witch?
“What you must understand, darling, is Sadie isn’t using her magic,” Rumple said. His fingers began tracing the curves of my torso, dipping after my rib cage, flaring at my hips, before bringing them back up. “Sadie’s magic was already powerful. However, it wasn’t until she stole Rapunzel’s magic that she truly became a force to be reckoned with. You see, out of the three of us, Rapunzel’s magic is more potent because she’s the female. In our culture, the physically stronger sex might be male, but the more magically inclined has always been the female. In fact, Rapunzel’s powers were fated.”
“Fated?” I asked, tracing his shoulder with the tip of my finger. I reveled in this calm moment between us. Even though I knew he was sharing important information, I liked that he was comfortable talking to me about this. I loved the sound of his voice.
“There’s a ballad, a poem, if you will,” he said. “Believe what you will about fate, but this prophecy has been around for centuries, much longer than even my parents have been alive. It details that one female Fae - with a crown of thorns on her head and flowers in her hair - will possess the strongest magic the Fae had ever seen - and that it would be stolen from her. In order to repossess it, she must weave different magics together - not only her own but others as well, creating something of a quilted magic.” He paused, tucking his chin against his chest. “Am I making any sense to you?”
