CHAPTER 24: LOVE SHOWER
Maya’s POV
“How come the haughty princess is still allowed to participate in the Luna Trials?” Valerie huffed, helping me reorganize the supply cart.
I shrugged. Royal privileges, I guessed.
I stifled a yawn. I was dead tired.
Inside the quiet medical tent, I rocked the triplets’ bassinet gently as they finally drifted into sleep. The poor babies hadn’t shut their eyes all night. Yet, despite the chaos, they hadn’t cried once, staying silently tucked together while I patched up soldier after soldier.
Watching their tiny chests rise and fall so peacefully tugged at something tender in my heart. They were so little yet so understanding.
I moved towards the medicine cabinet, clearing away the empty vials and syringes. I wanted to dispose the bio-waste myself before anyone got ideas about tampering. After recent events, I trusted no one with my tools and medicines.
“And why is she allowed to participate in the Luna Trials in the first place?” Carl asked.
“What do you mean?” Valerie asked, wiping her hands.
“One of the rules of the Luna Trials is that the participants should not have seen the King’s face. Apparently, she is the King’s childhood sweetheart. That is what she claims. If that is true, then why is she allowed to participate?” He asked.
“That is a valid question but I think separate invitations go to all royal families regardless. She is clearly a brat born with a silver spoon in her mouth. She has undue advantage as well as deceitful tricks up her sleeve. Just thinking about her makes my wolf want to tear her apart,” Valerie spoke with passion, the sleep in her eyes replaced by fire.
I laughed, despite the ugly grunts that came out of my mouth.
“What?” Valerie asked, her anger morphing into amusement. She claimed that she loved watching me laugh.
I shook my head. “Nothing. You are funny,” I signed and Valerie smirked.
“You are cute,” she grinned.
I scribbled quickly on a piece of paper. “You guys go rest. I’ll finish the last box and take the kids,” I wrote on a paper and showed it to Carl and Valerie.
Carl surprised us both by taking Valerie’s hand and brushing his lips across the back of it. “Shall we, my Lady? You must be tired.”
Valerie blushed. Profusely.
Her mouth clamped. Back went ramrod straight.
She only managed to nod her head.
My eyebrow rose. The most confident and sharp-tongued woman I ever knew turned into speechless mush with just a kiss? I never knew a day would come when Nurse Valerie would behave like a blushing, virgin bride.
Chuckling, I waved off the lovebirds and turned back to my tasks, my spine begging for mercy and my feet yearning for even a moment's rest.
Suddenly, a crack of lightening burst through the dark sky, sharply lightening up the dimly-lit tent before thunder crashed through the silence, the boom loud enough to rattle the tent poles. A strong gust of wind stormed into the tent, nearly toppling the medicine box.
Fear overtook my senses. How was I going to carry three tiny pups through the sudden storm? Even rainwater had started to leak into the tent.
As if he could sense my fears, he appeared against a flash of light when the next bolt of lightning struck. Scooping the dead-beat babies in his arms, the lycan vanished.
I blinked my eyes. He was at the tent’s entrance one second and then blurred away the next.
A soft smile crept across my lips as I watched the flaps flutter in his wake. I let him sneak the kids into his quarters before I retired to my own. The babies were safer with him than with me tonight.
Just as my work drew to a close, so too did the storm.
I stepped outside.
The rain poured leisurely to a steady beat while the first rays of the sun broke through the clouds. The charcoal sky started to melt into hues of golden.
I tipped my face towards the sky, the drops soothing every inch of tiredness away. My lips parted, the drops trickling inside my mouth and parching my thirst.
My arms opened on their own accord, welcoming the cool shower wholeheartedly while my feet turned slowly. Peace washed over me for the first time in ages just as a soft wind broke out, pulling a smile on my lips, despite the tiredness. The raindrops hit my body gently, cool and clean, rinsing away the fatigue from my bones.
A warmth pressed against my back before strong arms wrapped around my waist. Eager lips traced across my face, tracing a slow line along my jaw. His scent curled around me, warm spice and clean rain.
“You always know how to find peace in a storm,” he murmured into my ear, his voice deep and reverent. His lips brushed along my neck, my heart stuttering mid-beat as warmth unfurled through me like a flame awakening in the rain.
I tilted my head back. Closed my eyes. Let my body melt into his.
He hummed, as if satisfied by my body’s response. He pressed me even closer to himself. My breath caught, when he removed my hair to one side and bit over my neck! He was getting bolder day by day.
“Maya,” my name rolled off his tongue, his fingers gliding slowly along the dip of my spine, making my stomach contract in response. “Dance with me?”
I didn’t nod. I didn’t sign.
I just leaned back against him and began to move, letting him guide me. Our fingers entwined. Arms raised in a beautiful arch, encircling around his neck behind me, all the while swaying in rhythm to the music the storm played just for us. We were simply lost in each other.
We just moved slowly.
The world melted away.
His hot ministrations made me arch against him while his naughty lips delved into the deepest recesses of my neck.
Suddenly I remembered.
I gestured with my arms in a cradling pose. Babies?
His response was to drop a finger over my chest and trace it south over the most sensitive regions, making every nerve ending dance and my stomach flutter.
“Don’t worry,” he caught the bottom of my ear and played with its shell. “They are in the palace. With Zane.”
Oh.
“With Zane? Now, I am worried.” Titan gruffly said, shifting and taking control over the king, making me chuckle, or close to whatever sound I made. He looked down fondly at me, easily towering over me. “Mate,” he greeted with a soft kiss on my nose. “You were amazing out there.”
I blushed and looked away. It was nothing.
I felt the shift behind me before a chuckle reverberated deep from his chest.
“Shying away from me? Mate?” He teased.
No. I shook my head.
“Really? You run into danger without a thought and now you are running away from me? Not dangerous enough for you, am I?” His hands started trespassing into forbidden regions.
I tore away from him, feeling abashed and shy and tried to run away from him but he snatched me back.
“Where are you running off to? Hmm?” He slid off the soaked white coat off my shoulders. He brushed it off completely, fingers dragging slowly down my arms. Goosebumps rose in their wake. “When I finally have you all to myself.”
I moaned and struggled in his hold while he claimed my neck. His mouth moved lower, pressing reverent kisses down my bare shoulder as rain poured around us.
He groaned, snuggling his face deeper in my neck. “You are so addicting. I just can’t get enough of you.” He scented me all over like a possessive beast going mad over his possession. The beast and weather were untamed. There was no control over them whatsoever.
His hands roamed freely. His need to feel every inch of me seemed to grow with the speeding rain. He touched every bruise, every scar. He sharply turned me around a gasp flying out my mouth. He knelt before me and worshipped me as if I was his goddess.
I trembled from the way his words and hands filled all the empty places I had learned to ignore. When his lips touched my bare stomach, I felt my soul make a mad dash for him.
“You keep astonishing me every day,” he whispered against my skin, licking away my wounds. His lycan healed me. “You are mine, and I would drown in a thousand storms to hold you like this.”
My breath hitched. My cheeks burned. I glanced away, pretending the compliment didn’t ripple through my chest like thunder in my veins. How could anyone love a “mutt” like me?
“You saved all my soldiers,” he continued. “They came to me, bloodied, bruised, but alive. They pledged their loyalty to you … in front of their King. You made MY warriors vow to protect YOU.”
His hand drifted along my stomach, fingers splaying softly over my navel. My body trembled, the cool wind causing goosebumps along with his touch, lighting up something fragile and fevered inside me. I shivered.
“I watched you,” he murmured, his fingers tracing slow, burning circles along my waist. “Watched you carry stretchers alone. Watched you set up camp when even my men hesitated. I was scared for you but you exceeded every fear, every expectation.”
His voice dropped.
“I am so jealous … of anyone and everyone,” he whispered, kissing back his way all to the top. “Even as King, I can’t claim what is MINE. Am I only meant to watch you win everyone’s heart from the sidelines, hmm?”
I gasped softly when he lightly grazed his fangs along the side of my neck, a tease, a whisper of danger wrapped in affection. The Lycan King was just moments away from marking my neck. Reigning control over his overwhelming desire to brand me as his, he pressed me closer to his chest, peppering kisses wherever his lips touched. His lips competed with the rain, kisses dropping faster than the raindrops.
“I am addicted to you.”
The rain soaked us through, clothes clinging like second skin. Yet neither of us moved to retreat. I was falling for this man and the power he held to break me, terrified me. Once broken, twice shy.
“I love you so much,” he rasped into my hair, voice breaking like the sky above us. “I can’t imagine my life without you now. I will die if anything happens to you or our kids.”
Huh?
And then he kissed me, gently at first, then deeper, like each drop from the sky carried his devotion.
A cool wind danced around us, but it only fanned the flames.
The storm sang its wild lullaby.
And in his arms, dripping, trembling, adored, I forgot the pain, the past, the trials.
Only love reigned.
Only we reigned.