I moaned in response. He touched me, tracing circles around the swollen bud of pleasure that sent sparks through my legs, my stomach, and every part of me that had long slept. A finger slipped into me, then another, moving in time with my breath, each motion driven by the sheer force of passion.
With the heel of his palm, he still pressed against my clitoris, the movements making me lose all control. He pushed up, lifting me to my toes, and I leaned on his hand and held on to him. He caught my nipple with his other hand, pressed it between two fingers, and then I felt it, the promise of release, that tidal wave beginning deep within and rolling through my body like thunder.
It was unlike anything I had ever felt. Light exploded behind my eyes, and a broken cry tore from my throat as I clung to him like a lifeline. It had taken him—what?—less than a minute to push me over the edge.
My head fell back, and suddenly my mind opened to the wild possibilities of a fracturing world. Images cascaded in a torrent. Time bloomed outward in a thousand petals of light, faces, places, pasts, all burning behind my eyes. For a breath, I saw everything, and nothing at all.
I didn’t know echoes could be so ravishing.
I shattered beneath his gaze, dark as a storm threatening a clear sky. And when the light dimmed, the only image that lingered was Kael’s shadow, younger, lighter, a boy running through the woods with a bow and arrow. The memory felt like rapture.
Then the power withdrew into its box, leaving me trembling in the delicious ache of release.
When we locked eyes again, Kael watched me with the hunger of a wolf that had finally caught its prey.
“Kael…” I could barely shape his name.
And I saw it in his eyes, that enthrallment that made prisoners of us both.
“I made a mess of you in seconds,” he rasped, a smirk cutting across his face.
Heat rose to my cheeks. He lifted his hand, brushing his fingertips against my lips slowly, pushing his fingers between them. I was entranced, unable to protest, letting him draw me into the taste of what he’d made of me. Rain and ruin.
He drew back with a low growl and claimed my mouth again. His tongue crashed against mine, his teeth finding my lips until I gasped. He kissed my mouth, my throat, my chest, his hunger deepening with every breath. He wanted to go lower; I could feel him. The gown clung too tightly over my chest, denying him what he wanted most.
Frustration roughened his movements. He cursed under his ragged breath, tugging at my gown, but the fabric refused to yield. My height made his every movement a struggle. I could feel the tension building in him, the fight between desire and control. He bit me through the fabric, my breasts, my stomach, my thighs. I closed my eyes and bore the pain as Kael grew ever wilder.
“Why did you have to wear that gown?” he said between angry breaths. “I want to see your body, to taste all of it. I want you naked and trembling for me.”
His hand caught the two sides of my gown.
“Please don’t tear it,” I whispered. “I paid a fortune for this.”
“I’ll get a tailor to fix it.”
He took my lips again. I chuckled against his mouth, the sound turning to a gasp when his grip tightened at my back and his teeth sank into my lower lip once more.
Then light flared behind my eyelids. For a heartbeat, I thought I’d lost my mind—until the pain came. Tiny bites seared across my skin like red ants clinging to flesh, and it burned sharper with every breath.
“You’re fucking gorgeous, Evangelina. I’m going to make you entirely mine tonight. Finally.”
His words slid through me like a rhapsody of sin, desire dripping along my thighs, warring with the sharp, rising pain of his touch. And then, pain won. The light swelled through my closed eyes.
I cried out as power struck my shoulder, the sound torn from my throat. It was agony, blood crystalizing and ice slicing through my veins. I opened my eyes wide.
“Kael!” I cried. “What’s happening? Kael!”
I had to bring him back to me—back to reality—because Kael was engulfed in white light, bolts of lightning tearing through and reentering his skin. He looked at me, his eyes turned white as stormfire.
He leaned in as if to tear through my lips again.
“Kael!” I shouted, voice breaking. I pushed him away, tears spilling unchecked from the pain still burning through me.
And then something snapped back into place. The light dimmed. The storm died.
The look of horror on his face made my blood turn cold.
He stared at my shoulder, where the agony had struck. Blood, darkened by lightning, branched across my skin like roots made of fire. The mark glowed faintly, a pale trace that shimmered like frost in moonlight.
