Chapter 148: Good girl...
Nerissa’s challenge hung in the heated water between them like a gauntlet thrown.
Vince answered it without words.
He shifted his weight, using the gentle current to roll them so that her long caudal fin was pinned more firmly beneath the length of his body. The powerful muscle of her lower half flexed hard against him—an instinctive test of strength—but he held, knees braced in the soft tide-sand, one hand still spanning the sensitive junction where scales met skin. His other hand slid higher, cupping the full curve of one breast through the thin, water-slick fabric of her armored bodice. His thumb found the peaked nipple and circled it with deliberate, unhurried pressure.
A sharp, involuntary trill tore from her throat. The sound vibrated through the water and straight into his chest.
"Still not commanding me to stop," he murmured against her mouth, voice low and rough. He nipped her lower lip, then soothed the sting with his tongue. "Interesting."
Nerissa’s claws raked down his back hard enough to draw thin threads of blood that diluted instantly into the warm current. Her golden eyes blazed. "You talk too much, for a surface-dweller."
She surged upward again, twisting with the sinuous power of a predator born to these depths. For a moment she almost flipped their positions—almost—before Vince caught the midsection of her tail in both hands and squeezed. Not cruelly. Just enough pressure against the thinner, more sensitive scales to make her entire body jolt. A broken moan escaped her, bubbles spilling from her lips and rising in a silver stream toward the arched ceiling.
The bioluminescent jellyfish beyond the open archway drifted closer, their soft glow painting shifting blue light across the wet sheen of her sapphire scales and the pale stretch of her throat. The endless black of the abyss pressed in from outside, cold and watchful, while inside the chamber the heated hydro-currents swirled tighter around their tangled bodies, carrying the sharp mineral scent of pearl and the deeper, saltier musk of rising need.
Vince lowered his head and bit the elegant ridge of her collarbone again—harder this time. She arched, caudal fin thrashing once against the sand and sending a thick cloud of white grains swirling up around them. He used the momentary distraction to tear the front of her bodice open with a single sharp pull. The fabric gave way easily in the water; her breasts spilled free, full and pale against the darker scales that framed them. He did not ask permission. He simply took one peaked nipple into his mouth and sucked, hard and rhythmic, while his free hand slid lower—following the elegant line of her waist, then lower still, until his fingers found the delicate, heated slit hidden where her torso met the powerful beginning of her fin.
Nerissa’s entire body locked.
A raw, startled sound tore from her throat—half snarl, half something far more desperate. Her claws dug into his shoulders hard enough to bruise. "Vince—!"
He lifted his head just enough to meet her eyes, lips still wet from her skin, the warm water between them thick with the taste of salt and her. His fingers stroked once, slow and deliberate, along the outer edges of that sensitive entrance. She was already slick—slicker than the surrounding ocean—and the discovery made his smirk darken with pure, predatory satisfaction.
"Still waiting for that command, Commander," he said, voice velvet over steel. He pressed the pad of one finger just inside, not deeper than the first knuckle, and held there while her inner muscles fluttered and clenched around the intrusion. "Tell me to stop. Or tell me how deep you want me to go."
Her pride warred visibly across her face. The warrior who had held Nethros for fifty years bared her teeth. The woman who had never allowed herself desire trembled.
Outside, a distant current shifted, carrying the faint, cold scent of abyssal kelp through the open archway. Inside, the only movement was the slow, relentless circle of his thumb against her clit and the deeper, teasing press of that single finger.
Nerissa’s free hand finally left his shoulder. It tangled in his hair and yanked—not to pull him away, but to drag his mouth back to hers in a kiss that was all teeth and hunger and the sharp, metallic taste of the blood she had drawn from his lip.
When she spoke, the words were gritted out against his mouth, low and shaking and full of reluctant fire.
"Deeper," she ordered. "And if you stop before I tell you to, I will drag you into the black and leave you there."
Vince’s answering laugh was dark, delighted, and entirely without mercy.
He gave her exactly what she demanded—two fingers this time, sliding in slow and deep until the heel of his palm pressed firmly against the swollen bud of her clit. He curled them, found the spot that made her entire caudal fin lock rigid beneath him, and stroked it in steady, ruthless rhythm while the heated water carried every broken sound she made out into the watching dark of the abyss.
Nerissa’s head fell back against the pearl frame of the bed. Her golden eyes fluttered half-closed. The powerful length of her tail coiled tight around one of his legs, scales scraping, muscle flexing, as if she could not decide whether to pull him closer or throw him across the chamber.
Vince leaned down, lips brushing the fluttering edge of her gill, and whispered the only words that mattered in the thick, salt-scented dark:
"Good girl."
Then he set about proving just how thoroughly a surface-dweller could make a siren come apart.
PING!!
The system chimed, a purple interface displaying across his vision.
[ACTIVE WORLD QUEST: PROCESSING...]
[TARGET: NERISSA THE TIDE CALLER OF NETHROS.
TAMING PROGRESS: 75%...80%...85%...]
We’re almost there Nerissa. Vince thought as his grin widened.
He picked up the pace sliding in and out of her with two fingers as her head rolled back and teeth clenched as she tried to control the pleasure.