His eyes were glittering in anticipation of what he already knew to be true. “Say it,” he commanded.
The confession came as quickly as if he’d stolen it from my tongue. “I’ve wanted you since the first night we met,” I breathed.
I searched his eyes for signs of surprise or even dismay, but foundonly dark desire. At once, he released my hands and pulled me closer; our mouths met in a brutal kiss. Experimentally, I traced the seam of his lower lip with my tongue. When Casimir’s lips parted, he groaned into my mouth, and I felt a thrill of triumph.
The hard angles of his body melted against the dips and curves of my own until we were fused together, like two celestial bodies hurtling toward some dark unknown. I drank him in with my lips and tongue, memorizing each contour and plane of his body until I knew him by touch alone. I forgot about my betrayal and my bloodbargain. I even forgot to gasp for air until Casimir tore his lips away and resumed his exploration of my throat.Yes.Yes,finally, I thought. When I reached to tug at his belt, he stayed my hand.
I froze, afraid he was going to stop me, but to my surprise, he quirked a brow and asked, “Should we… go upstairs?”
“Yes,” I said, so quickly and with such eagerness that he laughed.
I was trembling with a cocktail of nerves and excitement by the time we reached the loft. And the massive white bed I’d once slept in. I shoved away my anxieties and slid across the bed, pulling my knees in toward my chest and glancing uncertainly up at Casimir. He was still standing next to the bed, his brows furrowed with some internal conflict.
“We can just go to sleep, if you prefer,” he suggested, a wary expression lining his features. “You must be exhausted.”
I frowned. “Is that what you want?”
“It isn’t up to me.”
“No,” I argued, “You’re the one who keeps hitting the brakes.” But an icy doubt crept into my thoughts, and I began to wonder if Casimir didn’t want me quite as much as I wanted him. Maybe mortal women didn’t hold the same appeal as female Daemons.
“What’s with the face?” he inquired, sinking onto the bed and crossing one leg over the other.
“Nothing,” I grumbled. “I’m not going to force you to do anything you don’t want.” I turned to face the wall so he wouldn’t see me pout.
He barked out a laugh, and I whipped around to glare at him. “Is that what you’re worried about? That you’re forcing me?”
“What else am I supposed to think?”
His face was torn between amusement and disbelief. Leaning forward, he cupped my jaw in his hand and tilted my chin toward him. His eyes darkened, but I saw the fire and the restraint in them. “And if I told you that in all my years roaming this earth, I’ve never met anyone as stubborn and impossibly irresistible as you? Would you call me a liar then?”
I was momentarily robbed of the power of speech.Stubborn and impossibly irresistible? My mind was reeling at his words, but their effect was instantaneous, like an electric jolt straight to my core. I took a calming breath. “Then I suppose the only problem, Wrayburn, is that you keep making excuses to avoid this.” I gestured to the air between us.
Again, I read the uncertainty in his gaze, the fear that I might regret this tomorrow.
“Casimir,” I implored, maneuvering across the bed to tug on the loops of his belt. “Please.” I was not above groveling. My need for him was that bad.
The sound of his name on my lips struck him like a blow, rippling across his marble features. A low noise escaped his throat before our lips finally collided, and it sounded, to my ears, like a resignation. An unleashing. At last, he’d come undone.
“This is probably a very bad idea,” he muttered as he climbed over me.
My heart fluttered against my ribs, heady anticipation flooding my veins. The trembling in my limbs returned with a vengeance.
“Please shut the fuck up,” came my hushed request.
Despite the frantic urgency of my kisses, Casimir took his time, exploring the curves of my mouth with the edge of his tongue as though he had centuries to spend in this way. I arched my spine until our bodies were flush, sighing as Casimir slipped a hand around me to press me harder against him.
A familiar warmth in my core began to build again as if no time had passed, and I encouraged his touch with small gasps and noises of pleasure. While he explored my collarbone with his lips, I took the opportunity to rake my hands through his thick curls, relishing their velvet softness, wishing I could sink into this moment forever.
He frowned when I pulled back to gaze down at the Moros branded into his bicep.
“I hope you know that you didn’t deserve this,” I murmured.
He shook his head. “No more talking,” he said, and then he was kissing me senseless.
As I whimpered beneath him, Casimir’s carefully wound restraint began to slip and falter. I could feel it in the way his kisses became more punishing, in the way his hands gripped me more roughly, in the way he grazed his teeth against my neck a little too sharply. In return, I dragged my tongue along his throat and nipped at his ear, all while arching my hips to grind against his. All of it only served to unravel him more.
“Tell me to stop,” he said, his voice rougher than before. The sound of it sent another jolt of electricity pulsing through me.