“Yes.” The word was a whisper from her lips.

Earnest turned toward her hand, capturing it with his, and placed a light kiss on her skin. Ronnie shivered. “I need you to be sure, Rainmaker Veronica Taylor. I won’t contribute to your shame if you decide to have regrets, and should you say no, I swear never again to broach the issue.”

Ronnie hated both the title and her full name, but coming from him, like this? “I’m sure.”

His hand tightened around her nape, enough to pull her toward him, fingers dancing over her pulse. The deep and velvety green in his eyes had expanded to take over the whites. Earnest stopped and hovered right about her lips, giving her one last chance to say no.

Her own hand pulled him across the last distance until their lips touched, causing that fire to race across her skin. She whimpered. His other hand wrapped around her, pulling her into his lap, her lips and tongue moving to deepen the kiss.

He broke it off as quickly as it started, panting slightly. “Let me show you what that human fool could not.”

“I already said yes, asshole.” Her words were harsh, but there was no edge to her tone.

His lips twitched. “Perhaps you again failed to understand the implications.” He pushed her forward, adjusting them so she was comfortable on her back. His hand played at the hem of her borrowed shirt while his lips trailed kisses under her jaw.

“I understood just fine.” Ronnie pushed him to his back, moving the sheet out of the way and kissing him deeply again.

Quick as she could blink, he’d pulled her shirt back off, flipping her back to their previous position. “No.” His fingers played lower on her skin, running down her thighs. “I don’t think you did.”

He punctuated his words by dipping his lips to a nipple and running his thumb over her clit.

Unlike last time, her urge to fight him — to take control of the situation — melted under his touch. She gasped as her back arched on its own, her lips pressing against his, her thighs pressed together, trapping his hand.   

Those green eyes flicked up to meet hers, sending a flush through Ronnie’s cheeks and allowing her brain to catch up a little; she was naked, but he was still fully clothed. And while she knew the mechanics, that human fool, as Earnest had called him, hadn’t used his hands on her, at least not how she did when she was alone.   

Not the way Earnest was clearly planning, and suddenly the cocky certainty from a few seconds ago felt more like foolishness again. “I…I’m…” Was she really this much of an idiot?   

He slipped his hand from between her legs, withdrawing from her to pull his shirt over his head and tossing it on the floor. His eyes never left hers, and she brought an arm over her chest, searching blindly for the sheet, but then he lowered himself back down, this new expanse of skin hot against hers. He propped himself up on one elbow, the fingers of his other hand tracing her lips before tangling in her hair.   

She closed her eyes, her heart feeling like it might explode as his lips pressed to hers in a chaste kiss.   

“Too fast?” Inwardly, she winced. Two seconds ago, she’d thrown herself naked on top of him. “Maybe? I don’t know. Sorry?”   

His lips ghosted along her neck, pulling gently at her hair to open her throat to him. “You have nothing to apologize for.”   

She fumbled with her hands, pressing them open and palming against his bare chest, the heat coming off of him making her fingertips tingle. She could almost feel the scales, an impression of them just under human skin, and felt his heart racing as much as hers.   

Then he kissed her again, and it wasn’t a delicate request. His mouth demanded, and her lips parted, allowing him to drink from her. Simultaneously, she felt his magic rove against hers in a sharp flash, heat forcing the forest into hard shadows, and he groaned against her lips. Pulled back, lingering to suck on her bottom lip.   

“You’re starting to see,” he whispered, those long fingers sliding from her hair and along her neck, tracing her collarbone before he replaced them with his lips, tongue, and a soft bite.   

Sparks lit in those shadows, but the wind called them into the light, only letting fire claim the fringes, those corners lush and blooming, and she swore she smelled honeysuckles and lilac on the air.   

Earnest laughed, the sound absolutely delighted, and she grinned at him when he looked up, his eyes shot with sunlight between the emerald shine. “Your magic…,” he whispered, leaning down to suck gently on her earlobe as a hand cupped her breast, making her whine and push into his palm, the whine becoming a whimper as his fingers pinched at her nipple. “I would devour a weaker woman, burn her down without trying, make her lost and able to forget herself under a single touch. But not you, Ronnie.”

“Don’t understand,” she gasped out before his mouth crashed over hers again.   

Heat rippled through her, through the forest, but the leaves didn’t wilt; they turned aside, letting the fire cut a path, the soil black and rich in the wake.   

She moaned into his mouth and he pulled back, the kisses he pressed on her throat more frantic now, quickly lowering, teeth grazing her other nipple before he said, “I could lose myself in you, Rainmaker, the way we will dance.” He sucked her breast into his mouth, tongue chasing the soft curve. “Let me lead you for now.”   

His hand snaked down her stomach, tracing along her hip bone and resting on top of her thigh. Her legs were still pressed together, but she felt the heat building at her, the wetness there making her shiver and blush, turning her head to the side. Earnest waited in silent question, his fingers moving in small circles, his mouth still attending to her breast as he waited.   

It felt like fire wherever he touched, making her about mad with need from so little; she was almost scared of what might follow. Weakness had many forms and took a lot of shapes. It scared her how much she wanted him to show her everything he promised, scared her the way he wove through her soul in an inferno, but he’d never offended or burned anything that wasn’t offered. When he cut through her like lava the first time she tapped him to cast, he could have torched everything she was; she’d been so unprepared, and he’d been nothing more than a winding, controlled river.  

Ronnie whimpered again, biting her lip, feeling him at the edge of all her senses, tugging, asking, waiting. She’d said yes, and she meant it. She wanted him, wanted this, and she trusted him — was that the part that scared her?   

“Ronnie,” he whispered, lips brushing hers again. “If you want to stop, you only have to tell me. At any point.” Another kiss, this one lingering. “Do you want to stop?”   

She swallowed, and something about the confirmation she could stop this pushed the last of her hesitation away. “No.” And she let her legs relax, inhaling sharply as his hand immediately dipped between her thighs.    

Earnest showed no hesitation, his fingers deft as they explored her, finding and focusing on her clit in gentle circles. She moaned, pressing a hand over her face; he’d barely touched her, and she trembled, hips pressing up. He shifted so he rested beside her, his mouth claiming hers in a fierce kiss as he shifted his hand, thumb resuming those careful circles as a finger teased her before slipping almost lazily inside her.   

She had to break the kiss to draw a breath, her forehead pressing against his. Her senses were lost in the woods again, this time a glade, heated by the unrelenting sun, the very earth below magma under the roots. Nothing burned this time, but the feeling was there.   

Ronnie whimpered, her body too demanding for the landscape to hold her attention, especially when he added a second finger, curling them just so; she cursed and cried out as she thrust her hips again into his hand, a climax racing towards her, almost unbearably fast and relentless.   

“Yes,” she managed, “Just like that.”   

He pulled her tighter to him, and she gripped the sheets with one hand, the other grabbing his shoulder. He let out a sharp exhale when her nails dug into his skin.   

“Fuck…Earnest, I…” She came hard, bucking against his hand, crying out his name, shaking from the force of it. He whispered in her ear as she did, told her she was beautiful this way, promising more.  

As her body came down, her mind smacked with their tangling souls, a sky blazing with sunset, the forest washed in autumn colors, embers of the wind as the leaves for all their gilded beauty refused to fall to the ground.   

And then she found herself lost in another kiss, his lips hungry against hers.

Ronnie had never understood why they called an orgasm ‘the little death’ before. But now, she felt like he’d stolen a piece of her, burning that hesitation to the ground and replacing it with something more potent, needier. Every inhale brought him closer, driving his scent deeper into her body. Ronnie felt like the prairie after a wildfire- laid bare and ready for all things new. “Still with me, Rainmaker?” 

This time, there was no hesitation, only desperation — she longed to feel him, to have him join with her, body and soul. “Yes,” she breathed, her words ghosting over his lips. “I want you.”

He smiled, his eyes filled with nothing but the deepest green. “Then me you shall have,” Earnest replied, taking her hand and guiding it to the band of his pants. “Take what you want, Ronnie.”