Kraving Dravka by Zoey Draven

Chapter Thirty-One

“D-Dravka, p-please,” she groaned, her voice sounding nothing like her own. It was scratchy and raw from her hoarse cries and screams that Dravka had had to silence with his kiss.

It felt incredible. Valerie could feel the endless amount of teela he’d pumped inside her, slick and hot against her walls. She was more aware of her body, of the little places she’d never even known existed, than ever before.

She felt like someone else entirely. Writhing on the bed, as orgasm after orgasm after orgasm crashed down on her, stealing her breath from her lungs, making her heart thunder in her chest, her nipples pebbled so tight they were almost painful.

Valerie was rolling her hips across the damp blanket, seeking, searching for him—but Dravka was at her side, propped up on his elbow, watching her with glowing opal eyes. His fingers stroked lazily over her flesh, starting at her hips, up across her belly, before lightly thrumming his nails across her peaked nipples. It made her gasp, made another orgasm rear its head and shatter her.

Sensitive.

So sensitive, she thought in disbelief, surprised she was even capable of thought at that point when her mind and body felt like mush.

A wonderful mush.

“Dravka,” she whispered, her panicked gaze flying to his, catching his wrist when his fingers started to stroke over her clit, making her belly contract in helpless pleasure.

“You’ve had enough?” he rasped. His own voice sounded unrecognizable to her as well. Smooth and dark, sinful velvet, with just a hint of roughness.

Never, she thought. She would never have enough of him to be satisfied.

But right then?

As much as she wanted to please him—and Valerie had found that he loved watching her in this state—her body couldn’t take much more.

What are bones?she thought, huffing out another breath when another orgasm made her back arch off the bed. Because I can’t feel mine.

His hot teela throbbed inside her, like it had its own heartbeat.

“Y-yes,” she murmured, rubbing her cheek across his palm when he cupped it. She sucked on the tip of his thumb when he brushed her lips, making him growl, making his still-hard cock bob against his abdomen.

He’d come inside her four times that night. And he still wanted more?

Dravka pushed off the bed, taking his sweet time heading to the washroom, sliding open the door. He collected something from inside, she heard the water turn on briefly, and then he was back, watching her at the edge of the bed, watching as she rolled and squirmed, her thighs squeezing together, her whole body flushed pink.

“Vellka,” he murmured, trailing his finger across the swell of her breast.

Valerie moaned.

Beautiful, he’d called her.

Then his eyes saw something on the bed and he cursed. When she turned her head to where he was staring, through her blurry vision, she saw blood. Red blood. Her blood.

She frowned in confusion just as another orgasm made her jerk and cry out.

Dravka knelt between her thighs. She felt the warmth of water, she felt his fingers, gentle inside her. His touch made a sizzle run down her spine, made her moan and writhe.

Then, all at once, Valerie felt like she could breathe again. Air invaded her lungs and she gasped, panting. She still felt Dravka between her splayed thighs and she realized he was cleaning his teela from her body.

Back at the brothel, Madame Allegria had always had a steady supply of neutralizers for the clients. Once inserted, a mist was released and the effects of the teela would immediately cease.

But of course, they didn’t have access to those here.

Which was why, even after he went to dispose of the washcloth in the washroom, Valerie still felt the slight warmth and pleasure of the lingerings of his seed. Not nearly as intense as before, but certainly still noticeable.

When Dravka returned, he motioned for her to come to the edge of the bed. He was still frowning.

The blood.

Her shoulder.

Right.

“I am sorry, mellkia,” he rasped, his voice quiet. “I should not have pushed you that hard. Not when you are still recovering.”

Valerie stared up at him. Though her body was completely exposed to him, though he’d seen her that night as he’d never seen her before, there was an intimacy in this moment, one that hadn’t been there prior.

“I loved every moment,” she told him, not wanting him to think he’d hurt her. “I don’t feel any pain.”

Dravka still frowned. “You’re certain?”

“Yes,” she said, smiling up at him, reaching up her hand, though it felt boneless and jelly-like. “But I know you’ll want to check anyways.”

That elicited a small smile from her male. He took her hand, gentling pulling her to sit at the edge. He took off her bandage at her shoulder, making a small grunting sound in the back of his throat when he saw her wound. She saw that the blood had soaked through it. Their vigorous activities must’ve aggravated the lasering seal.

“Come,” he murmured. Then she was up in his arms and growing more sleepy by the second, now that most of his teela was out of her system.

He brought them both into the washroom and he turned on the flow of water in the shower tube. It was a small, cramped space, but Dravka kept her in his arms when he stepped inside, only sliding her down onto the floor when he needed to wash her front.

There was a small, exhausted smile on her face and she leaned her cheek into his chest as he washed the wound on her shoulder carefully. She didn’t feel anything though, no stinging pain, no aching throbbing, because of the medicine he’d brought her.

A few minutes later, he turned off the water and stepped from the tube, grabbing a clean towel to dry both of them off with. Once they were back in the bedroom, he stripped the thin blanket from the bed, got a new set from the secret cabinets in the wall, and only once everything was clean and fresh again did he let her lie back down.

Valerie’s eyelids felt heavy but she watched him, her cheek pressed to the mattress. Watching him made her heart throb with happiness and excitement. He didn’t look like human men. Keriv’i were hairless, for starters. Their skin was a dark indigo blue, with patches of mottled grey and black. His eyes were dark and swirling with color. His cheekbones were so sharp that sometimes she thought she might cut her hand on them if she stroked his face. His lips were full and soft, his nose incredibly structured and straight.

“Kruvu?” he murmured as he reapplied the bandage to her shoulder, his brows furrowing as he concentrated on the task.

“You’re so handsome, is all,” Valerie told him softly, feeling drugged and delirious. She wondered if she could get drunk off sex because that was how she felt.

A flash of an expression crossed his face. If Valerie didn’t know any better, she’d have thought he was embarrassed. Shy.

But this was Dravka.

She couldn’t quite picture what he would be like shy.

He didn’t say anything and Valerie felt her eyelids sink. A moment later, when he was pleased with her bandage, he crawled into bed beside her, moving her so she was tucked in his arms. Her lips pressed against his chest and she felt his chin settle on the top of her head. His legs threaded between and around her own as his cock settled against her belly.

This feels so right, she thought, blowing out a long breath. Finally.

“Was it good for you?” she whispered, the question slipping out before she even realized it.

But maybe that question had been inside her all along. She wanted it to be as good for him as it’d been for her. Given that he worked at the brothel on Everton, he’d had his fair share of sex, something that had burned and clawed at Valerie as surely as it had burned and clawed at him.

A part of her had been afraid that sex would just become sex to him. That sex with her would be no different than the sex he’d had with the others.

Thinking that now, Valerie knew it was ridiculous. She was a little ashamed, actually, that she’d thought such a thing.

“Good?” he asked, grunting. He leaned down to peer at her, his eyes narrowed, as if he could read her mind. “Try vauking amazing.”

Valerie chuckled, relieved, slightly breathless with her tiredness.

“Still, I should not have pushed you so far,” he murmured after a brief silence. “I forgot myself.”

Valerie sighed. She brought her fingers up, traced them over his lips and pressed a small kiss to his bottom one. She recognized the heat flaring in his eyes, felt his cock twitch against her belly.

“You’re impossible,” she whispered.

“You make me crazy,” he countered.

She chuckled again and his eyes went all warm and molten, that look enough to steal her breath entirely.

God, she loved him.

How could she not?

“It’s weird being here,” she murmured quietly. “It’s weird feeling this happy.”

Dravka swallowed, reaching up to stroke a hand through her hair.

“You’ll get used to it,” he told her, his lips quirking. “And then, you won’t remember what it’s like to feel unhappy, pax? I’ll make sure of it.”

Another small laugh left her throat.

She heard some laughter coming from outside their window, echoing up and around. Drunken laughter by the sound of it, and not human in the slightest. Their room was situated on the third floor of the inn so it sounded close, yet far away, given the way the colony was structured.

“What’s it like out there?” Valerie asked him. She’d barely been able to see Nimida. It was made up of long corridors, like streets on Everton, but they all seemed to be in a circular shape, one big lap around the colony, all ending in the very center, which was where she knew the transport depot was.

“It’s surprisingly clean,” was what Dravka replied with.

She frowned. “Clean?”

She wouldn’t have even thought to look at the surroundings for cleanliness. Then again, she’d grown up on the New Earth colonies her entire life.

Dravka, on the other hand…

“Jrika was filthy,” he rasped, his arms tightening around her ever so slightly at his admission. “Filth and disease and greed. Everywhere.”

Jrika was the colony Madame Allegria had found him on. It was the colony she’d found all of them on, actually. Desperate and jaded. No wonder they’d agreed to come to Everton.

“I never told you,” he murmured, something in his voice making her look up at him, “but on Jrika, I had just started to sell myself.”

Her heart ached at the thought.

“Really?” she asked quietly.

She’d known that Tavak had already been selling himself for credits before Everton. He’d needed to, for his and his brother’s sake.

But she hadn’t known that Dravka had.

She didn’t judge him for it. From what little he’d told her of his life before Everton over the years, she knew that Jrika had been hell. He’d been hungry. Homeless for a time before he could find shelter. He couldn’t find steady work and so he didn’t have savings for passage off Jrika to find better work.

Valerie didn’t fault him for his decision.

“It was only twice by the time your aunt found me,” Dravka said. “And it had been surprisingly…easy. The money was good. But I should’ve told you. A long time ago.”

Valerie frowned. “It doesn’t change anything, Dravka. You thought it would change how I felt about you?”

His sharp inhale told her that he feared it might have.

“You did what you had to do to survive. The same thing you did on Everton,” Valerie whispered, stroking his cheek, the knowledge of what he’d had to endure on Jrika making her throat feel tight. Her kind, strong, confident Dravka. “I would never judge you for it. Ever.”

“The others feel it too, I think,” Dravka murmured.

“Feel what?”

“The uncertainty. The fear,” he murmured, swallowing. “We don’t want Dumera to be like Jrika. That was what we feared when Khiva first asked us all to go with him. But now…”

“Everything’s different,” Valerie whispered. “You know Dumera’s not like that now. Thanks to them.”

Dravka inhaled sharply. “Pax. So when I look around Nimida now, all I can think is how clean it is. How clean it feels. The shopkeeper tonight was kind to me. He helped me pick out your medicine. I didn’t feel threatened. I didn’t feel like he would rob me. It’s different.”

Valerie swallowed hard.

It was tragic to her that a small bit of kindness felt different to him, but it only showed her why the Keriv’i had been so hesitant to leave the brothel before. Because this was unknown territory. There had been a level of safety on Everton. A familiarity.

“You’ve been through so much,” she said. “You all have.”

“You too,” he murmured.

She sighed, nuzzling deeper into him, pressing closer.

“I think, for once, we should try being optimistic,” she said. “For once, I think we should actually expect that good things will happen to us now, instead of always fearing the worst.”

Especially her.

Just twelve hours ago, she was certain that she’d be marrying Gabriel Larchmont and that she’d have to say goodbye to Dravka forever, that she’d never see him again.

“Because good things are in our future,” she whispered, smiling. And maybe it was just feeling a little drunk on sex, on him, or lying in the safety and warmth of his arms, but she said, with unwavering certainty, “I can feel it. I know it.”

Dravka pressed a kiss to her lips, lingering a bit.

“I love you, Val,” he murmured. “Have I ever told you how much before?”

Her throat tightened and she blinked away the glassy tears that had begun to form in her eyes.

“You never needed to,” she whispered.

Dravka chuckled softly, the sound warm and making her shiver with pleasure. She loved his laugh. He didn’t do it nearly enough but she promised that she’d make him laugh every moment she possibly could.

“Sleep, my little mate,” he murmured to her, brushing his lips over the shell of her ear. “We have all day tomorrow to spend in this bed and I intend to take full advantage.”

Meaning…she’d need her rest.

Valerie fell asleep that night with a smile on her face.