Have I told you guys lately that you all are really awesome? If not, then let me do that now. You guys are really the best! Thanks so much! Throwing out loads of love for my beta, Deathsembrace 137. You're so fabulous!
Hiro Mashima owns Fairy Tail.
CHAPTER 14: DREAM A LITTLE DREAM...
Five weeks gone...
"Gajeel," she called softly, her voice tinged with wonder as he took her in his arms. She snuggled into his warmth, everything in her sighing in contentment. He was here. Gajeel was really here. Lucy blinked away tears as he lifted a hand to her face, gently tilting her head up to look at him. His crimson eyes drifted across her face until they touched on her mouth, and his head lowered, taking her plump lips in a slow kiss of greeting.
Her lips parted on a sigh, and he dipped his tongue in, sliding sensuously over her own, moving in an unhurried pace. He tasted her, learning her through their kiss. Slipping her hands up his chest, the blonde pressed closer, completely submitting to his attentions. He was everything she wanted, everything she'd ever desired.
A tear slipped down her cheek, for once a tear of happiness. He was finally hers, and she resolved to be everything he needed. She would be just what a dragon mate should be. She would hold onto him with all of her strength, and never let him go.
His hands drifted down her curvy body, easing over the swell of her back side, and she moaned, feeling heat pool low in her belly as he pulled her flush against him. His mouth left her lips, nibbling down the column of her neck, and Lucy tilted her head to give him better access.
Gajeel pulled back long enough to push her back onto the bed, before ridding himself of his shirt and climbing up to join the waiting woman. He leaned down and pressed a kiss to her collarbone, sliding a hand to the top button of her shirt, easily flicking it open. He moved on to the next one, his mouth trailing behind, kissing over her skin as it was revealed. By the time he'd gotten to the last button, Lucy was breathless with anticipation.
She wanted him so badly, her body aching to feel him inside her, but he wouldn't be hurried. She lifted off the bed at his direction, and he slid his hands over her shoulders, pushing the fabric away before divesting her of her bra. Giving a small nudge, he waited until she was lying prone again, before resuming his exploration. His fingers drifted back down to her ample chest, lightly caressing over supple skin as he moved slowly toward her breasts.
As he closed over them, Lucy sighed, arching into his calloused hands as he fondled her aching mounds. He thumbed the peaks, rolling over them, teasing them until they pebbled under his attentive care. Leaning down, he caught one in his mouth, sucking it lightly, his tongue curling around the hardened nub. Lucy threaded her hands into his wild hair, moaning out her pleasure as he laved over her heated flesh.
Giving it a final suck, he released the tender breast, and drew back to grasp the top of her skirt, tugging it and her panties down her shapely legs. He stood to his feet, still watching with hungry eyes, and she swallowed hard as he deftly undid his pants and dropped them to the floor. Climbing back onto the foot of the bed, he reached for her legs, tapping one, and saying with a rumble, "Open for me, beautiful. I wanna taste you."
Her breath hitched at his words, and without pause, she followed his instructions, spreading her legs wide to accommodate him. He kissed his way up her thigh, stirring her hunger for him even higher, and then he was there at the center of her need.
He teased over the curls with his nose, then trailed his hot tongue over Lucy's spread lips, drawing a moan from her throat. He licked his way up to her clit, flicking it lightly, soothing it with a kiss. He sucked the bundle of nerves into his mouth, lapping at it with his tongue and pushing the quivering woman higher and higher as she gasped out a ragged, "Gajeel!"
Lifting his mouth, he murmured, his breath whispering over her damp flesh, "God, you taste so good," before delving back in, his tongue immediately dipping into her core. Her hips lifted at his entrance, raising to meet each of his thrusts as her hands clenched the blanket tightly, her voice wailing out, "Oh God...yes..."
She could feel the orgasm swell, the wave building up until it could go no more, and then it hit, crashing over her like a tsunami...and then, the dream broke.
She awoke, jolting up in bed, sweat beaded over her skin and her panties damp with her release. She sniffled, trying to hold back a sob as the realization hit her that it had all been a dream, a beautiful, wonderful, heartbreaking dream. She pressed a hand to her mouth, stifling the sound that begged to escape, and slipped from the bed, stumbling across the room on unsteady legs, as the first wave of anger hit her from Gajeel.
Grabbing some clothes, the shaky woman retreated to the bathroom, her emotions contradictory in the wake of such an experience. It was always like this after a dream of him, her body still thrumming with desire even while she mourned the loss of the fantasy. Lucy didn't think she'd ever get used to the feeling of having everything in her hands just to open her eyes and see it was all a lie. It was like losing him over and over again.
She turned on the bath, forgoing a shower as she always did after these episodes. They wiped her out, seeming to suck the life right out of her with every climax she reached. Maybe it did. It had been over a month since she'd left, and she was definitely feeling the strain. She had already lost so much weight, and Wendy had reminded her again just yesterday that it would only get worse.
Sinking into the heated water, she sighed, weariness spilling over her. She might as well have not even lain down, for all the good it did her. It was quickly becoming pointless for her to sleep. It did nothing but cause her to dream of him, and then she'd awaken more tired than the day before, battling waves of fury from Gajeel. She wasn't sure how much more she could take.
Wendy had kept up an almost constant plea for us to go back, saying that everything would be okay, that somehow it would all work out. Lucy could see blunette's worry was increasing, getting worse every day, but she didn't know how to ease poor girl's mind. She couldn't go home to Fairy Tail. Her heart could barely handle the pain now. If she returned, there was no doubt it would completely break. Lucy couldn't be there in the guild every day and watch the man she loved hang all over another woman, even if the other woman was his girlfriend.
She had endured it for so long, but now after the mating thing, she couldn't bear to see his devotion to his blue-haired lady. It would hurt far too much, especially after how plain he'd been with how he felt about her being his mate. Levy was his choice. It would never be the Celestial mage.
Wendy argued with her on that, swearing that time could change how he felt, but Lucy was neither a fool nor an optimist anymore. She didn't believe in a happy ending for herself. He and she both wanted what they wanted, and she certainly wasn't it for him. They were just stuck. She couldn't make him love her, and he couldn't make his heart feel something it wouldn't.
Hell, even if he could somehow force himself to love her instead of Levy, she knew he wouldn't. He would dig his heels in, if for no other reason than to avoid being with someone who wasn't his choice. Somehow, without even knowing why, she'd become a pariah to him. It didn't matter now, and it wouldn't matter later on; he was never going to want her, and that thought nearly killed her with every dream she had. It was a painful, pitiful joke to be cursed with such vivid, beautiful dreams of a man who hated the very breath she breathed.
A sob caught in her throat, and she finally let it go, allowing herself this one moment of weakness, just a moment to mourn the loss of all her pathetic dreams. After this, she would put herself back together, stacking those walls high once again, so high the pain couldn't find her, couldn't decimate her existence.
She'd find some way to let him go. She just needed this one moment to deal with her grief, and then she would be strong again. She'd face the day, push past the strain on her magic, past the ever-growing ache in her chest, and do what she had to do.
Fury swept through her being, flowing through the connection with Gajeel, and she shuddered at the depth of his anger. She shouldn't have been surprised at his reaction to the dream or to her breakdown. It always felt like he was livid with her, but those two things seemed to really set him over the edge.
She let out a shaky sigh, and pulled her sadness back in, stuffing it deep down into that part of her that was still her own, the one place he could never touch. She sucked it all back in and closed it off, locking it tightly inside her until she was certain he would get not even a drop of her emotion. Nodding once to firm up her resolve, she finished her bath. It was time to get on with her life, such as it was.
"Goddamn Lucy!" Gajeel snarled as soon as the dream spit him out, his body straining with desire and his mind full of the two of them together. "Goddamn mating shit!"
These dreams were getting to him, no more than that. They were pissing him off. He grudgingly admitted that she couldn't control the frequency of the dreams, but that was as far as he was letting her off the hook. The mating may provide the bridge between them, but that didn't mean she had to fill it with all those dreams of them fucking.
He growled low as he corrected himself yet again. If the dreams had just been of them fucking, he probably wouldn't be so damn mad. That, he could explain away as a side effect of the mating and their separation, but it was more than that. That fucking woman was dreaming of him caring for her, and she had no right.
"Stupid fucking woman," he groused again as he rose to his feet and lumbered to the bathroom of his new prison. He flipped on the shower, and jerking off his shorts, stepped under the spray. He leaned an arm against the wall, and dropped his head on top of it, closing his eyes immediately. He was so goddamn tired, tired of this fucking connection with her, tired of this rage that consumed him all the time, and tired of that woman pumping his mind full with all her needs.
Why couldn't she leave him the fuck alone? Why couldn't fate have chosen differently? He had lived a huge part of his life completely alone, and though he had hated it, he'd give anything right now to feel so alone. He hadn't wanted this attachment to her; it was supposed to be Levy. He'd settled on her as his mate, he'd accepted it, and that's who he should have gotten.
Instead, he'd been stuck with a woman he barely knew, one that had never entered his mind before. How the fuck was he supposed to accept that? That firefuck acted like he'd just won the fucking lottery, finding his mate. Gajeel wasn't about to bow down to tradition like that just because that's what they were supposed to do.
He'd still done what Master had said for him to do. He'd gone out and looked for the damn woman, but it was just in name. He couldn't have given two shits about finding her, because he hadn't wanted her here fucking with his head. Hell, he didn't want her in the same town, but considering where he was now, it didn't look like what he wanted mattered all that damn much to anyone but him.
He was trapped like fucking animal all 'for his own good'. Who the hell did they think they were kidding? He knew what Master was up to. The old man was just waiting to spring her on him when they finally found her. Gajeel knew Makarov believed the same thing Natsu and Laxus did, that the mating would do its job and bring them together if Bunny Girl came back, but they were wasting their time. He was never going to take her as his mate. They could all kiss his ass.
As he stood there under the water, he got a flash of emotion from her in the form of a massive wall of sadness smacking into him, and his temper snapped, sending his fist smashing into the shower wall. "Son of a bitch!" he cursed viciously, feeling that well of wrath explode like a bomb going off.
God, he was so sick of this, of her and all her damn feelings. He didn't want to be tangled up with her anymore. It was like everything he'd ever been was being washed away to make room for her. He was losing himself, and it was all for a woman he hadn't picked. Everything of her was all twisted up inside him, and he didn't want it. He didn't want her.
He wanted to be rid of this bond between them, wanted to cut her out of his thoughts and dreams, but the truth was it wouldn't be getting better. No...from here on out, it could only get worse.