Iris had been waiting for this text for what felt like decades. It was simple, asking what she was up to, if she was free this evening and wanted to come over. But there it was - she'd been waiting for him to text anything at all that indicated she'd be getting alone time with him. There had just been something about him that was bothering her and she couldn't decide if it was because the only fae she'd ever been at all interested in, or if he was using their mutual pull against her, or WHAT but it didn't matter. She was hooked. And he hadn't even touched her.
She knocked with confidence and a small smile - she was a guest here, after all, didn't want to come on too strong.
Nate was, admittedly, a little high when he started texting Iris. He'd pondered over the last few messages that they'd exchanged for some time, keeping his mind occupied with thoughts of the lithe redhead lest he accidentally set the curtains on fire. Luckily, he hadn't smoked enough to start loosening his control on his magic, though the room had started to grow warm with the thoughts of Iris in the green dress she'd worn at the club.
He was genuinely surprised when Iris was receptive to his messages having thought that he might have been too cautious, left it too long. With so few fae in town his first instinct had been to remain entirely platonic, but in reality how was that even remotely possible with such a delectable female? Nate knew he needed a taste and it was only when his guard was down that he invited her over.
By the time Iris arrived at the house, Nate had burned off most of the high through sheer force of will - and magic. It resulted in literal heat, losing his shirt in a bid to cool down. So that was how he opened the door, half dressed and phone in hand from trying to distract himself with that stupid snake game while he awaited her arrival.
Was that dessert? An amused smirk slid onto his face. "Hey. You know you didn't have to bring anything, right?"
"I know," she said with a coquettish shrug and a pout. "I was told once that as a guest you should always bring a gift for the host," even if her body was the gift... No! Don't think that! "I thought a bottle of scotch might be too presumptuous," she added with a wicked little grin.
"How are you tonight?" she asked, looking up and down his perfectly toned, and very bare chest. "Still want company?" she asked, unsure suddenly.
“Well,” said Nate, graciously taking the tiramisu with a sly smile after slipping his cellphone into his pocket, “for future reference I don’t mind presumptuous.” But if she was in the mood for scotch tonight, he was sure that he’d be able to satisfy that request. Between him and his housemates, the house was usually well stocked and often with top shelf bottles.
Since he’d felt like he’d been pretty clear about his intentions when inviting her over, Nate wasn’t shy about letting his gaze roam. It had been a while since he had felt so hungry for someone and the skin that was peeking out of her outfit looked perfect to taste. “Much better now you’re here.” He’d only started smoking for something to do, going out of his mind with boredom. With one strong hand holding the dessert, his other hand reached for hers. “And I definitely still want company.” That first touch was electric - it could easily have been a century since he had been with another fae. “How about I put this away and get you a drink?”
Iris couldn't help the way she sucked air in so sharply when he touched her. It was... incredible. She hadn't touched a fae outside of her family in decades but it hadn't felt like this. There was something about Nate, something... different, even amongst their kind. No wonder she hadn't been able to get him off her mind. It was official, he was under her skin, and she knew there would be nothing or everything tonight. And she wanted it all.
She followed him as if drawn, and when he offered her a drink she nodded, "dealers choice," she requested. She'd drink anything, which she was pretty sure he knew. She also had some oxy in her purse just in case he wanted to have a different level of run. Maybe that was why he'd asked her here, right? She couldn't get her hopes up, she kept trying to tell herself. But that touch... that feeling. Surely he felt it, too.
Nate stilled, the charge in the air tempting him with myriad ways to dispel it. If he kissed her now, he told himself, he might not want to stop. Maybe that was why it had taken so long for him to make a move. He was a fire fae and even though that wasn't where most of his power lay, fire consumed.
He found a home for the tiramisu in the refrigerator between bottles of beer and another type of liquid sustenance for Cris, trying to keep the urge to just pin Iris up against the kitchen counter to a low simmer. Every inch of him felt very aware of her presence and there was part of him that wanted to examine why that was. You just don't spend time with others like you, he told himself. Of course it feels more intense. And you're still a little high.
As if anything involving Iris wouldn't have some sort of intensity.
Nate's hand found hers again, dark gaze settling on her freckled face. "Iris," he said, drawing her close, "do you have any objection to us taking a bottle of something to my room?" In truth, he wasn't sure that they would even get as far as drinking it, but he'd offered and he was a man of his word.
The word came out a near whisper when she answered a simple, desperate, "Please," at the idea of going to his room. His hand on hers again made her other hand twitch with the need to touch him. Even just to run her fingers down his arm, caress his cheek, squeeze his thigh - she needed contact, any contact.
He led the way, but she couldn't tell you after how they had gotten here. Could fire fae fly? She knew they couldn't - but maybe? No. She licked her lips as he closed the door. "Nate," she started, and then to distract herself she dug through her purse quickly and pulled out two bottles, "I have party favors if you want... either way, too, uppers or downers," she always came prepared, after all. She looked back up to his face and her mouth went dry with want, again. Why was she being so fucking awkward? Normally she'd just attack someone! In the best way, of course! But here... The need was choking her.
Nate released the breath he had been holding. For a moment, he thought maybe he'd read everything wrong and Iris just wanted to drink and find something to watch on cable. But there, that whisper was all the confirmation he needed. The Queen of Consent, she'd called herself, and here they were.
En route to his room he acquired a bottle of scotch and a couple of whisky glasses, though they felt increasingly surplus to requirements. His bedroom was his sanctuary, decorated with old furniture, bookcases and heavy curtains. The window was open after his earlier smoking session and, after he closed the door, Nate took a moment with his back pressed against the cool expanse of the door to attempt to compose himself. He had been near Iris before but something seemed to have shifted with his decision to actively pursue whatever this was.
Nate gently placed the bottle and glasses in a clear spot on an antique dresser, taking his time and moving deliberately to slow himself down. "I don't know about you," he said carefully, "but I don't think I need anything else in my system." The weed had nearly burned out of him now, replaced by whatever was in the air between them. He plucked the bottles from her fingers and stashed them on the bookcase without his gaze ever leaving her face. Nate raised a hand to cup her cheek, stepping so close that he almost thought he could feel her heartbeat, though perhaps that was his own, thundering in his chest.
It was too much. Nate couldn't bear the tension a moment longer, dipping his head to press his lips to hers.
Iris allowed him to take the pill bottles, surprising herself, but she was pretty sure that if he asked her to jump off a cliff without wings, she would in this moment. She just needed to know she could have him afterwards. She would do anything to have him. To let him burn her up. Her face was hot when he cupped her cheek and she cocked her head to lean into his hand. As he finally bent closer to her, her body gravitated closer to his, the roughness of the fabric of her dress scratching against his bare skin as she allowed him to kiss her - finally, finally.
Her hands came immediately to his hair; she grabbed at him in abandon, pulling him closer and pouring all of her pathetic desperation for him into her kiss. She bit and nipped at his lower lip, licking at him to soothe where she'd pinched him, and her body molded to his just unable to get to close enough. One leg came up around his own and pulled him closer still.
His hand sliding around to the back of her neck, Nate curled his other arm around her lower back, holding her steady as she pressed her body against him and his mind went to so many places he could touch her and how glorious she would be to taste. He felt his control loosen with every passing moment, fingers curling into the thick fabric of her dress, until something seemed to unknot around his solar plexus.
For so long he had kept his magic tightly bound so that it resembled most other fae, but Iris drove himself to such distraction that his control came loose in a pulse of desire and heat and hyper-focus on the female in his arms. Embarrassment flashed through him for the briefest second at such a basic lapse in restraint, and he murmured, "Shit," mostly to himself, his lips trailing down the pale column of her neck as he tried to rein in the aura of his magic to something more manageable.
"Can you feel what you do to me?" he asked raggedly, lips brushing her décolletage, shifting his hand to grasp her thigh as Iris wound her leg around him.
The sudden wave of intense heat had her near a sweat. His power was unlike anything she'd felt; even among other Fae, even fire Fae, even with just a little lapse like that. She shook her head when he cursed, "No, don't apologize," and she let her power flow out for just a second to show him just how intensely she felt about him.
Nodding, she sighed a long exhale. "I feel it all," she admitted in a raspy whisper. She took advantage of him kissing down her throat to pull at the buttons barely holding her dress together. As she scrambled with buttons she let her power - the breath of life and healing and feeling everything flow out of her for another moment, letting him feel what she was making him feel. Everything. The way he consumed her.
"I want it all," she admitted in her frenzy.
Nate nearly shuddered with the feel of her and the magic she showed him. It was lust and need on the surface but there, beneath that heat, it grounded him and stopped him spiraling into flames. Feeling more stable in his own head again, Nate helped her with the last button so that she could shrug off her dress. He took only a moment to admire the female form in front of him before his hands found her thighs so that he could lift her bodily and carry her to his bed.
A long time ago, Nate had discovered that while he could manipulate someone's fears, he could also bring their desires to the surface. With Iris's confession that she wanted everything, Nate was sure he would never need to tug at that particular strand of magic. And what a turn on that was to have someone so expressive in his grasp, the thought heading straight between his thighs.
He deposited her on the edge of the bed, kneeling before her. Nate rested his hands loosely on her knees, kissing the soft, pale expanse of her thigh and glancing up at her through dark lashes. Oh, he had dreamed of what it would be like to taste her. Just being this close had him achingly hard.
Stretching luxuriously on the bed she looked down between her legs to find his eyes blazing. Just the look on his face had her wet and ready and she knew she needed him to taste her. "Nate," she said, the whisper long gone, her tone near that of a command. Why was he teasing her? It wasn't like they wouldn't be able to go round for round. Human needs weren't exactly an issue between the two of them, right? It was almost like now that the tension had been broken, she couldn't hold it back anymore. Surely he knew how she'd been pining, waiting for him.
She spread her creamy things further for him and sighed, her bright gaze never leaving his, an invitation and demand.
There was a challenge in her eyes and Nate smirked back at her. He could sink into her this very minute, but this vision of her spread out before him was something he'd so desperately hoped to bring into reality when he'd text messaged her. Nate trailed barely-there kisses up her thighs until he could swipe his tongue in a flat stroke up the center of her. Making a satisfied sound, he set his mouth to work, wanting to tease her to heights that little pills couldn't touch.
Nate's hands, greedy to touch more of her, grasped at her ass, fingers pressing into the soft curve of her body. Since they had both shared their magic, however briefly, he could feel the way their powers mingled, giving him feelings of log fires smoldering, something burning low and steady beneath this current blaze of need.
She was a feast for his senses, spread out on his bed so wickedly like this, all for him. All for him. That was a heady idea, spurring him on to bring her to completion.
That first flat, slow taste of his tongue had her moaning loudly, all decorum forgotten. His name was a litany on her lips as he got going, and before she knew it the feel of her stoked desires and feeling his through their magical link had her falling over the edge, quickly and abruptly and it damn near sent her into shock. Coming to a bit, her hands moved to Nate's hair, where he'd been lazily lapping her thighs.
"Nate, need you," she panted out as she tried to catch her breath, tried to straighten her thoughts. "Need your fire," she admitted, without knowing quite what she met, and she pulled at his hair to pull him up her body. "Nate," she nearly shrieked, "get undressed you fucking tease you," it didn't matter that he'd already made her cum - he was gods-damned teasing her and he knew it.
Nate chuckled, tongue sliding over her clit for a final time and sending her a mental image of hands fisted in bedsheets and warm flames lapping at a crackling log before he raised his head. He licked his lips, glistening with her arousal, and rose to his feet with a graceful move. Nate could feel the tension in her, feel it in himself, and it took every ounce of concentration not to let his hands shake as he crawled onto the bed over her.
He pressed hot, lazy kisses to her hip, her stomach, her collarbone. "You can tease me all you want later," he promised darkly, hoping fervently she would. Iris would be the most exquisite torture, he was sure. Nate's hardness nudged against her, so ready for her to take him that it was nearly painful to hold back even this long.
She half giggled half growled when he licked her sensitive nub again. Fuck him! Ugh! But that mental image, sent over their connection, had her sending back what he looked like down there between her legs, so gorgeous and devilish looking, even if they were children of the daylight. Take that. Gods, she didn't remember that fucking someone like her could be nearly this fun. Though, come to think of it, and her face reflected her thoughtfulness, the last time she was with a fellow Fae, it hadn't been like this. This... connection. She narrowed her eyes for a moment, "Why does it feel like this?" she asked him, half in a trance. Did it always feel like this for him? So many questions. She pulled him more fully up her body but her hands pushed him back so she could look him in the face and maybe get some answers there.
Blinking, Nate exhaled raggedly. Why the fuck was she asking questions at a moment like this? Except the same question was swimming in the back of his mind. This wasn't just intense because she was a firecracker of a female, of that he was sure, but he had never connected with any woman like this. "I don't know," he admitted, wishing that her hands would pull him near once more. "I don't know what this is."
But maybe, tucked away somewhere in the depths of his brain, there was an answer. Maybe there were even words for connections like these.
"If it's too much…" He had to give her a final out of this entanglement, even if his instincts were saying that it wasn't anywhere near enough.
She shook his head with his admission that he also didn't know and nodded, her look stolid and steady. They were in whatever this was together, and that was that. When he spoke again her eyebrows knitted together - was he trying to stop them? This? No, no! That wouldn't do. She sputtered, "No! Don't even think about it," and her hands scrabbled at him, pulled him close again in a panic, he couldn't even think about leaving her hanging with this... feeling.
"Please, Nate, please," she begged, pressing naked body against him before her hands moved to his pajama bottoms and scrambled to push them down. She needed him closer, before whatever distance he was trying to put between them took hold. She hated how her voice sounded so reedy, unsteady, desperate, it was unlike her. And yet, she felt so strongly like herself every time their eyes took hold of each other. Like he was anchoring her in something deeper than her usual self. It was unsettling in its own way.
Iris begging made heat blow through him and he claimed her mouth in a brief, searing kiss before Nate reared back, divesting himself of his pajamas and tossing them to the other side of the room. He didn't even want to think about being anything other than naked with this female for a very long time.
His world narrowed down to the touch of her skin against his and the need to be inside her. Nate braced his weight, eyes locked to hers as he pressed against her entrance. "Fuck," he exhaled and slid home.
Iris had never been more grateful she didn't wear underthings, because holy shit his body against hers was surely what humans thought of when they imagined heaven. And then he was there, between her legs, and getting closer and closer to hitting him and stretching her so deliciously. She panted with him, pulling him further in, trying to slow herself down to feel every single bit of it. But she needed him and the frenzy in her, the fire that she couldn't separate from him was burning her up and finally she was fed up and pulled him hard, and he was bottoming out inside her. The curses that passed her lips would make most blush but she didn't care, she didn't care how loud her voice was or that he had housemates - he was finally inside of her and she felt an overwhelming sense of home and complete and heat.
Everything in the world felt stable and solid beneath Nate, despite the need that burned through him, as though he could set fire to the whole room and they would be absolutely fine in their tangle of limbs and heated breaths. Whatever this connection was, the way their magic melded was dizzying and exhilarating.
Nate reached down, grabbing her behind a knee to pull her leg up as if he could get even deeper into the hallowed bliss of her. Somehow his mouth found hers again, quelling those curses with lips that couldn't get enough of the taste of her. As her leg shifted position, he felt her shoe nudge against him and he realized that they hadn't been able to wait long enough to even get her out of her heels. The urgency was still rocketing through him, guiding every thrust into her perfect heat.
She panted hard, every thrust knocking the breath out of her in the best most painfully perfect way. Her legs moved as he needed them; her whole body did - he could have asked her anything, asked her to move the Earth itself with her power and she would, if only this feeling, this connection wouldn't end. Fuck, she wouldn't be able to call this a one night stand, she wouldn't be able to quit him, she already knew.
"Nate," she got out between heaving breaths and staccato thrusts, "Yes," she shouted, as he hit exactly that right spot over and over again. And then she whispered, "Come with me, darling, fall apart with me," and she felt a tenderness as she said it that scared and startled her.
Nate was nearly overcome with sensation, both physical and magical, eyes closed as he dropped his head to press his face into the curve of her neck. He could feel the thrum of her pulse beneath his lips, his beard rubbing against her skin with a jolt every time their bodies came together. By focusing on that one detail he was able to stop himself from ending this all too soon.
When Iris called him darling he almost came undone in that moment, faltering in his rhythm. His hand gripped her leg harder as he tried to delay just a little longer, his body tightening ready to spill into her. "So close," he promised her like a prayer, sending the feeling that unexpected endearment had garnered right back to her. His breath hit her skin, hot and hard. "Want to feel you come." Nothing would make this sweeter, nothing, nothing…
He didn't know who reached that peak first, all he knew was Iris and the universe crashing down to focus entirely on her. As his breathing slowed and he felt the right itself, Nate felt an aftershock, not from Iris but the house itself. Though he was loath to, he turned his head, spotting furniture and books strewn across the floor from their personal earthquake. A surprised laugh rumbled out of him and he kissed Iris again, sure that something irrevocable had just happened in this bed. "We're going to have to get a handle on this, darling," he murmured, knowing this couldn't possibly be a one-time thing. "Either that or end up fucking the house down."