“Think again,” he murmurs and grips my upper arm, tight enough to bruise me.
With a move so fast and effortless, he spins us around and slams my back against the far wall. It takes the air out of my lungs, and I laugh.
The pressure of his body against mine is immense, pinning me effortlessly. One of his hands is braced against the wall by my head, the other still gripping my arm like a manacle.
His mouth crashes down on mine. It’s not a kiss; it’s a brand of shadows and darkness. Hard, punishing, and utterly consuming. There’s no tenderness, only a raw, desperate hunger that I meet with a ferocity that shocks me. My tongue tangles with his, a battle for dominance that neither of us can win. He bites my lip, hard enough to draw blood, and the metallic tang on my tongue only fuels the fire.
His free hand drops to the waistband of my leggings, tugging them down.
I don’t stop him.
My only thought is: wait until Rynna hears about this. She will be ecstatic.
I almost laugh, but he swallows it as his hand pushes my thighs apart. He is inside me with one swift, brutal thrust, and I cry out into his mouth as his enormous cock splits me open. He pulls back from the kiss, his hand going back to the wall beside my head. “Eyes on me, slayer.”
My gaze locks with his, a silent, furious challenge. The pain is a sharp, brilliant agony that is already melting into a searing pleasure I refuse to acknowledge. This isn’t about pleasure. This is about who breaks first.
His thrusts are deep, punishing, meant to overwhelm and dominate. He’s trying to fuck the fight right out of me. The arsehole. I meet every brutal push with a tilt of my hips, my nails digging into his neck, trying and failing to draw blood. I will not be a passive participant in my own unravelling.
“Dreven,” I gasp, his name torn from me as he slams into me again, and again, setting a relentless, frantic pace.
His silver eyes are black holes of lust, all traces of his cold control gone when he hears his name tumble from my lips.
I poked the ancient, slumbering beast with a stick, and now it’s awake and ravenous. A part of me, the reckless, stupid part that sounds a lot like my sister, is thrilled by it. My body, traitor that it is, is arching into his, chasing a feeling that is sharp and desperate. He grips my wrists and pulls my nails from his neck, pinning them to the wall above my head, his power an effortless cage. The helplessness is infuriating. The pleasure is incandescent.
He drives into me again, a guttural sound torn from his throat. My head thuds against the wall, but I barely register it. Every nerve ending is on fire, screaming his name even when my mouth can’t form the word. This isn’t sex. It’s an exorcism. He’s trying to fuck the defiance out of me, and my traitorous body is arching to meet him, begging for more.
My vision whites out at the edges, and I close my eyes as my orgasm builds, a tight, coiling knot of need deep in my belly. I fight it, clenching my jaw, refusing to give him the satisfaction. But he feels it. I see the flash of savagetriumph in his silver eyes as he changes his rhythm, shorter, faster thrusts that target the coiling heat.
“I said, eyes on me, slayer,” he rasps.
“Fuck you,” I manage to choke out, but the words are lost as a shattering climax rips through me. My back arches off the wall, a scream tearing from my throat as pleasure, sharp and blinding, obliterates everything. The force of it triggers his release. He empties himself deep inside me, his body shuddering with a violence that makes me think consequences are going to come back and bite me.
“Fuck,” I pant. “So that’s what it’s like to fuck a god.”
His eyes flash. “And that’s what it’s like to fuck a slayer.”
“Get out,” I say, unwrapping my legs from around his waist, feeling his cock slide out of me. When my feet hit the floor, I pull my leggings back up.
He doesn’t move. “This changes nothing, slayer. You are still reckless, and you still need us.”
“This changes everything,” I snarl. “This was a mistake.”
“No,” he says, his voice a low murmur that sends a shiver down my spine. “It was an inevitability.” He takes a step back, the shadows in the corners of the room reaching for him. “And it will happen again.”
Before I can form a reply, he dissolves into the darkness, leaving me alone in the sudden, deafening silence, smelling of his scent and a war I just spectacularly lost.
Chapter 15
Nyssa
There isn’t a single part of me that regrets this encounter. My hands shake as I pull the hairband out of my ponytail and redo it, twisting the band tightly. A movement outside the living room window catches my attention, and I move over to it. Taye is standing in the middle of the small square of grass, her hair standing straight up in the air as she appears to be communing with a rose bush. I cross my arms and stare at her.
She doesn’t acknowledge me standing at the window, but I know she knows I’m here. I tap on the glass, sharp enough to make her look up. Her pale eyes meet mine through the rain-streaked window, and she smiles. It’s not a warm smile. It’s knowing, and that makes my skin crawl.
Crossing over to the front door, I yank it open and step out into the drizzle, not bothering with my coat. “What are you doing here, Taye?”
“You tell me,” she says.
