“Yes, you can.” She slipped her hand from his lax grip and captured him again, less gentle this time but with a firmness that said he must.
“You’re enthralled,” he groaned even as she ran her fingers over the anticipatory slickness at the head of his cock. “You can’t tell me no.” He snatched her hand away again.
“Because of the talisman?” The answer hung in the quiet between them, filled only with deep breathing and the shifting of their bodies beneath the linens. “But that’s what keeps us together.”
Damien still had a hand on her throat, and he slid it up to herjaw, turning her head so he could look down into her eyes. Her lips were wet and parted in the soft moonlight, her brows drawn with worry, and her gaze traveled over his face until it met his.
“If the talisman weren’t inside me, we would be apart.” She was whispering, but the arcana still lingering under her skin made her voice thunderous. “I haven’t been able to separate myself from it because I don’t want to be separate from you. Not ever.”
Her words rumbled into Damien, and as if he’d been struck, his breath was stolen. The fissure that had drawn itself through his chest cracked fully, like hardened bark falling away, the raw and soft sapwood inside him exposed.
“I’m sorry,” she said. “I know it’s selfish and—”
Damien kissed her, the only way he could put an end to her pointless apology. She was startled beneath his mouth, her lips catching up as he pulled away. “If that is what keeps us together, then be selfish,” he said, “but do not think I keep you around because of that talisman.”
“But you always say—”
“I say a lot of idiotic things,” he grumbled, grip on her wrist and jaw tightening. “What I mean is that I want to keep you, your body, your soul. I want every beat of your heart for my own, and I want to be consumed by you.”
Amma had fallen still again, glassiness to her blue eyes.
“You’ve ruined me, Ammalie,” he said with a chuckle. “Enthralled me completely without even using magic.”
She hummed a sweet sound then, the vibration of her throat tickling his fingers. Delight broke on her face under the moonlight—not terror nor disgust at hearing how he wanted her, but satisfaction. “Not true,” she said, trying to shake off his grip on her wrist as her smile turned playful, “if I had you enthralled, you would fuck me when I ask.”
Damien was stunned but not enough to let her nimblefingers slip away again. “It seems our morals have completely flipped.” Swiftly, he wrenched her arm up and pressed it against where her other hand lay on the bed. Releasing her neck, he caught both of her wrists together and trapped them in a more secure grip.
“It’s your fault—you’ve made me wicked,” she said, and he thought he might die by her words alone. Hands caught together in his grip, she instead wiggled her hips backward. With only the light fabric of his trousers between them, she fit his persistent length against her ass so perfectly he nearly didn’t get the chance to give her what she wanted before coming undone himself.
Regardless of what they confessed to one another, though, the talisman was still inside her.
Damien jerked away, but she was ravenous. He clamped his free hand down on her hip and dug his fingers in, holding her still. Neither of them would be getting any bloody sleep at this rate—shehadto be satisfied. Perhaps it was just his cock thinking, but it occurred to him then that she was correct: he was choosing to not take her despite her requests, or her demands, more like, and was that not the same? Removing her choice completely?
“Please, Lord Bloodthorne,” Amma whined, fighting against his hold to wiggle up against him, “just let me be bad for you.”
Perhaps there was something he could do, something that might even satisfy them both.
“If you insist on acting this way, I will be forced to respond in kind,” he grunted through grit teeth.
He could hear the grin work its way across her lips in the darkness. “Do your worst.”
CHAPTER 18
A NOT-SO-BRIEF WEAKENING OF CONSCIOUSNESS AND CONSCIENTIOUSNESS
For a single, glorious moment, Amma thought Damien had relented when his hand came away from her hip. She squealed happily, intending to roll toward him and rip off the hateful layer keeping hispulsing manhoodfrom her. But instead, his grip on her wrists only tightened, and she remained pinned to the bed on her side as a sharp slap landed on her ass.
Amma gasped, shock running through her right alongside the brief sting of pain. She whined, or at least intended to, but it came out as a breathy catch in her throat.
Damien’s chuckle crawled up the back of her. “Come now,” he purred, “that wasn’t nearly as hard as either of us would have really liked.”
Amma thought she should protest, but his hand remained, rubbing over the place he’d swatted, sending tingles through her, though they didn’t go very far, pulsing between her legs.
“Now, are you going to hold still and behave?” Damien’s hand wandered lower to the soft flesh at the very top of her thigh. “Or am I going to have to make you behave?”
“I won’t try anything again,” she responded, perhaps too quickly. “Promise.”
“You’re lying,” he said as if he knew, which, of course he did, because she absolutely was. His hand slid back up, grazing her stomach as it snaked around. She rolled her hips the moment his grip was gone, breaking the vow immediately. “Why would youlie to me when you’re in such a precarious position?” Damien’s hand found her breast, carefully cupping it and then giving her nipple a light pinch.
