“That sounds perfect, Greid.” Beryl wrapped her arms around my neck and hugged me closer, burying her nose in my hair. “I’d love to. Thank you.”

“Okay.” I ducked my head to hide my grin. “Great. Um, the only thing is that we’d have to get up pretty early…”

“That’s okay. I was actually thinking about texting Corva and seeing if she wanted to go for a drink on Saturday evening. This gives me a good excuse to go home early if I hate it.”

I frowned, twisting to look up at her. “Why would you hate it?”

“I don’t mean I’d hate Corva’s company. I like her. But…” Beryl squirmed behind me. “If it gets too weird and she’s asking me about stuff I can’t answer, I just… you know.”

I pursed my lips and smoothed my hand up and down her calf. “I’m sure it’ll be fine, Beryl.”

“Mm. The documentary’s starting,” she said quickly. “Can we lie down?”

“Sure.”

I shoved all the empty wrappers into the bag and leaned over to dump it on the floor. I knew Beryl had intentionally changed the subject, but I wasn’t going to force her to talk about stuff that made her uncomfortable. I wasn’t a pusher, and I didn’t think it was my place to try and tell her how she should handle her past around new people. I wanted to be the person she could tell anything to, who would just listen without constantly trying to offer unsolicited advice or tell her what to do.

Agma had been the opposite. If I’d ever vented about a difficult client, just wanting to get it off my chest, she’d gotten righteously indignant and started demanding that I march upstairs and send them a scathing email, or cancel their order, or jack up the price of their commission just to be a dick. I knew she’d thought she was helping—in her own very bossy way—but it hadn’t helped. At all. I may have acted like a big kid sometimes, according to her at least, but I’d started and grown my business on my own. I was actually capable of doing adult shit when I needed to.

As long as it didn’t require, like, meeting people in person or being interviewed for indie artisan magazines or—god forbid—networking. I’d turned down many, many invitations to conferences and networking events, as well as many, many requests for interviews. In doing so, I’d accidentally created a weird mysterious air around myself in certain circles. I was pretty sure that was why Agma had been interested in me to begin with.

As soon as I lay down, Beryl was shifting onto her side and resting her head on my chest, angling it so she could still see the TV. I wrapped my arm around her and slid my hand down her side to her hip, absently tracing the very faint furrows I could feel stretching to the top of her backside. Once she’d finished wriggling to get comfortable, I settled my hand on her ass, unable to stop myself from giving it a light squeeze.

The TV screen went dark, before a human-sounding voice started speaking. “You hear all these rumours about what it’s like down there, but the demiurgus themselves are so secretive about their homeland.”

“What?” I snorted. “No, we’re not. All you need to do is look at a freaking tapestry or painting.”

“Well, I wanted to find out for myself,” the woman’s voice continued before she appeared on the screen, addressing someone just beside the camera against a plain backdrop. “So I did it. I went down there. And I saw.”

“We don’t believe you, lady,” Beryl told the woman on the screen, making me huff with amusement.

The documentary started playing ominous music over a reel of ‘artsy’ shots of things like a demiurgus hand sweeping over a tree trunk, a pair of big yellow eyes staring directly into the camera and black-and-white drone footage of those looming checkpoint guards holding their guns as they ushered people through the trees and into the big, heavily guarded hole that led to Deep Earth. The screen went black, before the words What I Saw Beneath the Surface faded in.

“Conspiracy nuts,” I muttered as Beryl shifted again, slinging her leg over my thigh.

I was instantly distracted as her ass flexed under my palm. My fingers tightened in reflex, and I had the sudden realisation that they were long enough that all I had to do was shift my hand a little lower and stretch them out, and I’d be able to slide them over her pussy. My gut tightened, cock twitching yet again. Fuck, I wanted to touch her. She’d been so soft and wet against my tongue. I wanted to get that wetness all over my hand and use it to jerk off.

“Sorry if I fall asleep.”

Beryl’s mumble snapped me out of my pervy thoughts. Suppressing a despondent sigh, I stroked her backside and craned my neck to kiss the top of her head. “That’s okay.”

Definitely no more sex tonight then. Which was fine. Totally fine. I was just being greedy.

I’d just politely wait until morning and ask if she wanted to sit on my face then.

OceanofPDF.com

Chapter Forty

Greid

Sleeping in my humanoid form was weird. I hadn’t done it all that often, and whenever I had, I’d woken up with my back kind of tight, like it had been aching to stretch and elongate.

This time when I woke up, I was hit with a mild wave of vertigo despite still lying down, as if my body knew it was way higher off the ground than normal. My jaw cracked as it stretched open wide around a yawn, a hand sneaking down to scratch my belly and give my morning wood an absent stroke.

Without opening my eyes, I grunted and rolled onto my side. My arm flopped over something small and soft, and my face was suddenly buried in a mass of curly hair, tickling my nose. Naturally, my dick bucked with excitement when I remembered I’d slept with Beryl. All night. In her bed.

I had vague memories of half waking up at some point to see the credits rolling at the end of the documentary. Beryl had fallen asleep within about five minutes of it starting. I’d turned off the TV and dragged myself out of bed to blow out all the candles, then wriggled irritably out of my onesie because I’d been too hot before collapsing back into bed.

Apparently I’d at least had the sense to bunch it against the front of my hips so my dick didn’t accidentally hurt Beryl in the night if it got hard. The soft fabric rubbed against my morning wood, and I resisted the urge to grind into it seeing as I wasn’t too sure Beryl would appreciate being woken up like that.

Her soft, even breaths told me she wasn’t awake yet. My chest had gotten all tight and hot when she’d fallen asleep on me last night, her small body curled into my side. I’d been exhausted too, but I’d tried to stay awake for as long as possible so I could savour it.

I’d failed though, because I was pretty sure I’d fallen asleep about ten minutes after her. I’d just been so comfortable. And relaxed. And happy.

Beryl made me really freaking happy.

She let out a tiny grunt as she started waking up, her fingers wrapping around my wrist and tugging my arm closer to her chest. It settled between her breasts, and my fingers twitched with the urge to slide my hand lower and cup one of the small mounds. My dick bucked, and I knew she felt it through the bunched-up onesie, because she let out a tired chuckle.

“You’re awake then.”

My ears fluttered. “Only for a couple of minutes.”

Stretching with a yawn, she shifted onto her back and blinked sleepy green eyes up at me. My hearts went a little nuts, insides scrunching up all tight. I wanted to see this every morning—Beryl with her hair a wild bird’s nest around her head, her eyes heavy and pillow creases on her cheeks.

“Did you sleep okay?” She rubbed one of her eyes. “I know you’re not used to being so high up.”

My hand skimmed down over her soft stomach and settled on her hip, fingers stretching to the curve of her backside. “I slept great. Did you?” I froze. “Oh shit, did I kick you in the night?”