When Carter realized I was joking, his face turned pensive. “Well, it wasn’t a real mole rat. If you’d given me a real one…”
After a quick walk to the end of the corridor on the second floor, Carter led me into a bright, airy bedroom with windows on two sides. One side looked out on a large pristine lawn bordered by flower gardens, and the other looked out onto a thick forest. “It’s gorgeous, isn’t it?” he asked, walking toward one set of windows. “I didn’t think I’d like it at first, but it’s growing on me.”
I watched his body move in that graceful way of his. “Yes. Gorgeous.”
He turned back to me. “The estate, I mean.”
“Mm. Come here, beautiful.” I reached out my arms for him, and he walked right into them.
We kissed languidly for a long time, simply enjoying the touch and feel of being together again. By the time we were ready for more, both of us were naked on the bed, and Carter lay sprawled half on top of me.
“Want you inside me,” I said in a rough voice. “Please.”
Carter’s hair was a complete mess from my greedy fingers, and his face was red with beard burn. Just the sight of him made me hard.
“Really?” he asked. “You do?”
“That okay?”
He closed his eyes and nodded reverently. “More than okay. I dreamed about being inside you.”
It took a while, too long if you asked me, but Carter was diligent about prepping me. He prepped me into a manic, panting mess. “Now,” I said for the millionth time. “Ready. Ready now.”
“Mpfh,” he grunted, stroking over my gland just hard enough to light me up without pushing me over the edge.
“Duchess. Fuck. Please.”
“Love to hear you beg,” he said with an evil grin. I grabbed his face and kissed him hard before grabbing his covered dick and trying to bring it to my body. “Okay,” he said with a laugh, batting my hand away.
When he finally pressed inside me, I felt like I could finally let go, could finally relax and know he was here with me.
“Love you,” I hissed on a particularly good stroke. “Missed you.”
Carter’s arms tightened around me as he slid into me again. “Love you too. Not letting you leave again for a while, okay?”
“Same.” I ended the word on a groan. Carter reached for my dick and stroked me until I couldn’t remember my own name, much less his. I came with an embarrassingly loud choking, grunting sound and barely noticed Carter’s own release as he pushed hard into me one last time.
Afterward, we lay there in a sweaty heap, tangled together and sated, at least for the time being.
It didn’t take long before we were at it again, grasping at each other’s bodies and lighting each other up with licks and kisses, greedy hands and thrusting cocks. I couldn’t get enough of him, but this time there was complete joy in knowing I didn’t have to. I had a lifetime of this, of him, ahead of me.
We continued on like that most of the night, only stopping long enough to sneak down to the kitchen for some of the snacks Kev had left behind. Finally, we fell into a deep contented sleep, curled around each other in Carter’s big bed.
I was finally, for maybe the first time in my life, at peace.
The next morning, I woke up to an empty bed. After a quick shower in Carter’s palatial bathroom, I found some pajama pants and a T-shirt in Carter’s dresser that fit me well enough to venture downstairs where I heard Carter and Kev talking.
“He gave you a naked mole rat, Carter. That’s like…” He sighed. “That’s like pledging lifetime fealty to the king of the muckrakers, you know?”
“Not really,” Carter said. I could hear the teasing smile in his voice. “But didn’t Hux send a case of ghost-forged glass hammers to the tribes on your outlying islands? How was that not a declaration of… fealty?”
I clapped my hand over my mouth to keep from laughing out loud. Kev sputtered.
“It’s… it’s not! He had to send me those weapons! It was the least he could do after sneak-harvesting my striped skunk yarrow.”
“Yes, but then he sold the yarrow at market for the highest price of the season. Had he not harvested it while you were sleeping, you would have only gotten thirty cents on the doll—uh, pip.”
I chose that moment to enter the kitchen. Carter’s hair was damp from his own shower, and he wore loose sweats with an oversized hoodie. I wanted to eat him up.
“Morning, sunshine,” I said, moving straight to him and pulling him in for a morning kiss. The kiss lasted way longer than I’d intended, and it didn’t end until Kev’s voice punctured my haze.
“Hey, Riggs! I didn’t know you were back.”