Page 18 of Yuletide Orc

I chuckled dryly. “Yeah, as fine as I do, I’d imagine.”

Bikkar sat on the edge of the bed with me still cradled in his arms. This size difference between us would never cease to surprise me. Thisanythingbetween us never would. Hours ago, I’d been ready to kill him and now I was in his arms while recovering from a dizzy spell.

Bikkar laughed, too. The sound was so unexpected, sobeautiful, that I couldn’t help but smile. “We’ve become a spectacle, I’ll admit that.”

“You can say that again.” I nodded to the snowstorm outside. “All thanks to your holiday traditions. Sorry I’ve not been the model guest. You didn’t have to show me kindness. I’m grateful for it now. I should have been earlier, too.”

Bikkar grunted an acknowledgement. “I understand why you didn’t trust me.”

“I do now.” It didn’t hit me that that was true until I’d said it. But now that the thought was out there, spoken aloud and confessed, I saw it as clear as day. Before, respect for him might have been mixed with fear. But the trust had started long before our encounter in the woods earlier.

I glanced up at him. “One question, though.” Now that I was thinking about it again.

“Hmm?” he asked.

I affixed a mock-serious expression to my face. “Do you vow to claimallof your enemies in the middle of the woods as punishment for being bad guests on Yule? Because I might have to visit yearly?—”

Bikkar laughed as he leaned in and kissed me, swallowing my words. I didn’t mind. With my hands free, I enjoyed holding his face, keeping him close as we kissed. He was warm—from the fire and the fight. His warmth staved off the last of my shivers from running outside in nothing but a shirt.

When Bikkar pulled back, I saw lust once more in his eyes. “It is unfair the things you do to me.”

I ran my fingertips gently over the scar on his eye, tracing the wound I’d given him months ago. “I could say the same.”

He smirked. “With the way you were mewling earlier, I’d say it was anything but unfair.”

My tongue fell between my molars as I smiled at him. Okay, he’d gotten me there. “That, I had no control over. You made sure of that.”

“I did, didn’t I?”

The smug look in his eyes—this humor and back-and-forth—was so out of place, I wasn’t sure what to do. But then an overwhelming need came over me to make him cry out my name, too. To have him writhing beneath me as I’d done earlier.

“How about this…” I worked my way off his lap and to my knees before him. “If I can make you beg, instead of turning me in tomorrow when Yule is over, you allow me to work with you and your tribe against the hell-wolves. And to create peace.”

Bikkar rested a large, warm hand on my cheek. “I was no longer convinced to turn you in. And I don’t beg.”

I tapped my lips with a finger. “I seem to recall saying the same thing.” I slid my other hand up his inner thigh to the bulge between his legs.

Bikkar’s eyes tracked the movement. He swallowed hard. “What happened to resting?”

I was feeling better now. My thoughts and vision no longer swam. I needed sleep, and so would Bikkar, but… “It helps to exert oneself before sleep to get good rest.”

Bikkar inhaled sharply as I began to untie his pants. His hand left my cheek to rest on my fingers. “Elysia…”

“Trust me.” The words came out so simply, but the weight of them was immense.“Trust me.”Bikkar had asked for trust in his orcish tradition and I’d denied him that. Then, I’d been forced to trust being naked beneath him earlier. Trust between enemies was rare, but not unheard of.

But we were no longer enemies, right?

Intense attraction burned in Bikkar’s eyes, where before there’d been rage. A feeling I was scared to identify bloomed in my chest. Not fear. Not worry. Not guilt. Something else entirely.

Yes, this was no longer an enemy situation.

Bikkar nodded and removed his hand. I smirked and undid the ties of his pants teasingly slow. By the time I’d reached a hand inside to withdraw his massive length, it was as hard as steel. I smirked as I wrapped my fingers around it. My hands were simply not big enough, but I stroked him slowly as my thumb ran circles over the head.

I leaned in and brushed my lips against the head of his length. Bikkar hissed a breath and his legs tensed. His fists white-knuckled there too, but he didn’t remove them from the tops of his thighs. What control he must have been exerting right now. He’d been in charge earlier, plunging into me and holding me captive as I writhed beneath him. But Bikkar was playing along for now, and I was oh-so-eager to see how long that would last.

With a last look at Bikkar’s straining, huge length, I opened my mouth and took him in. Just a little at first, testing the limits, because there was no way I’d fit all of him. Bikkar groaned deep in his throat. One hand lifted to fist a handful of my blue hair, but he didn’t push my head down or force me to take him.

I rewarded him for that with a hum as I took more of him past my lips. I worked him slowly, stroking with my hands as I went. Bikkar threw his head back and his jaw locked. His fingers tightened their grip in my hair. I took it as encouragement and sped up my movements, plunging him deep into my throat and back out again, my tongue working him where it could.