We make it to the door of our Airbnb, a creaky old house tucked down a narrow lane with flickering porch lights and the scent of jasmine clinging to the steps. I fumble with the key, the lock ancient and stubborn.
Candace presses up behind me, her hands sliding under the hem of my shirt, fingers splaying across my abs, dragging lower. Her lips brush the back of my neck, a featherlight kiss that makes me growl.
The heat of her touch scorches straight through me, chasing out the night’s cold. Her hands shake slightly, but the need is real. Desperate. Grounding.
“Need help unlocking that door?” she whispers.
“Not if you want me to make it inside before I take you up against it.”
The lock finally gives. I shove the door open, grip Candace’s waist, and drag her inside. Her laughter is breathy and wicked.
The second the door clicks shut, I turn and pin her to it. Her mouth finds mine again, hot and hungry. My hands slide to her thighs, hiking her dress up, and she wraps her legs around my waist the way she was meant to.
Her nails dig into my shoulders, marks I’ll wear as scripture. She’s not holding back tonight. Neither am I. Clothes come off in a messy blur, lace tearing, buttons popping, breathless gasps swallowed between kisses that leave us drunk on each other.
Her hands claw at my back, nails digging in, while her moan vibrates against my mouth with the urgency of a plea she can’t contain. The sound rips through me, need threaded with something deeper. Hunger. Relief. She’s here. Choosing this. Choosing me.
I drag her with me toward the bedroom, barely breaking contact, her body tangled with mine, both of us afraid of what might crawl into the space between us if we let go. The hallway blurs past in shadows and gasps until we crash through the door, and I spin her, pressing her against the cool wall of the bedroom.
“You remember what I said before we left?” I whisper against her ear, my hands roaming with reverence and fire, sliding the last of her dress from her skin. “About how I’d worship you until you were dripping and begging?”
She breathes my name, a sound I feel in my spine.
“I meant every fucking word.”
I drop to my knees in front of her, a worshiper starved for his altar, kissing a trail down her abdomen, hands parting her thighs as I anchor her to the wall. My fingers hook into the waistband of her panties and drag them down slowly, letting them fall to the floor. Her skin is hot beneath my palms, silk over muscle, trembling with anticipation. My breath fans overher, and she shivers, the sound she makes somewhere between a gasp and a plea.
Her scent hits me—wild, clean, edged with salt and something so uniquely hers it knocks the air from my lungs. I want to drown in it, memorize it, wear it as a second skin. When my tongue meets her heat, she jerks, a gasp tearing from her lips as her fingers tangle in my hair, frantic and firm. Her taste floods my senses. It’s sweet, intoxicating, threaded with need that surges straight through me. Groaning against her, I drag a slow, deliberate stripe with my tongue, and her whole body shudders beneath my hands. I shift, lifting one of her legs over my shoulder, opening her wider, giving myself deeper access to the fire she’s offering. Candace writhes over my mouth, alive and trembling, and I devour her, starving and finally allowed to feast.
I tease her, slow at first, light flicks and deep strokes. When her hips jerk, I pause; not to catch my breath, but to press my mouth to the soft skin of her inner thigh. “You’re so fucking wet for me,” I murmur, voice thick with hunger. “Taste like sin, baby. Built for this.”
Her gasp breaks on a moan, thighs trembling around my head. I dive back in, relentless, my tongue working her over until she’s shaking again.
I pause once more, just long enough to drag my lips over the pulse in her hip and growl, “I’m the only one who’ll ever make you fall apart this way. You’re mine.” The sound she makes is wrecked, desperate. Her hands clench in my hair. I press her harder into the wall, anchoring her, and take her apart all over again. She tastes like fire and surrender.
“Please,” she whispers, breathless and trembling. “Please, Malachi.”
That word wrecks me. I double down, sucking and swirling until her cries crack open something deep in my chest. Candaceshatters against my mouth, slick and shaking, her whole body pulsing around my tongue. Her nails scrape down my back, the sting only spurring me on. I don’t stop until I feel her go limp, boneless and undone, her thighs twitching with aftershocks.
I rise slowly, wiping my mouth on the back of my hand as I scoop her into my arms, her breath hot against my throat. Her skin glows, flushed and damp, and I feel her heart pounding through every point where we touch.
“That’s one,” I murmur as I carry her to the bed, her body still trembling from release. “I promised you worship, baby. And I’m just getting started.”
I lay her out gently, reverently, a sacred thing, arms stretched above her head, hair fanned across the pillow, her skin kissed pink and glowing in the soft moonlight filtering through the window. She looks up at me, eyes heavy-lidded and dazed with pleasure, but still hungry.
The moonlight stretches across her collarbone, catching on the bruise at her jaw that hasn’t fully faded. I know it’s from training. She started sparring again with Coach Tompkins, but it still makes something tighten inside me. I want to erase every mark life left on her that wasn’t made by pleasure or choice.
I crawl over her slowly, trailing kisses from her collarbone to the curve of her breast, nipping gently, tasting the salt of her skin. She arches into me, hands threading through my hair as I worship every inch of her, just the way I promised.
“I want you to feel how much I need you,” I whisper against her neck. “How much I want you. How fucking good you are.”
Candace whimpers when I slide into her, slow and deep, and I swear it nearly undoes me. Her body wraps around me, perfectly fitted for this, for me. Tight, slick, and pulsing with heat that drags a groan straight from my chest. She’s so warm, so impossibly perfect, and the way she clutches at me, holding on as if I’m the only thing keeping her grounded? It wrecks me.
I move with patience, but inside, I’m unraveling. Every slow thrust is a war between restraint and the primal need to lose myself in her. Her breath stutters, lashes flutter, and her nails scrape across my back, leaving marks of possession. It’s not about rushing. It’s aboutworship.
It’s about a promise I made earlier tonight, to strip her down, kiss her until she forgot everything, and make her come so hard she forgot her name. Right now, I’m keeping that vow with every slow roll of my hips, every whispered curse against her skin.
Candace grips me tighter, her legs locked around me, drawing me deeper. When my name falls from her lips in that raw, trembling moan, something inside me shatters and reforms.
