“The worst I’ve ever had.” He stepped closer, drawn to her like a moth to flame. “Catastrophic.”
She didn’t move away. “And yet?”
“And yet,” he reached for her, fingers trailing down her arm, “I can’t seem to stop.”
The contact sent a ripple of awareness through him. This wasn’t like the other times between them—the raw, angry passion or the calculated seduction and control. This was something quieter. Almost tender.
Which made it all the more dangerous.
When she took his hand, lacing her fingers through his, it felt like surrender. Whose, he couldn’t say.
“This is madness,” she whispered, even as she moved closer.
“Undoubtedly.” His free hand brushed her hair back from her face.
“We should stop.”
“We should.”
Neither of them moved away.
When their lips met, it wasn’t with the desperate hunger of previous encounters. This kiss was slower, deeper, an exploration rather than a conquest. Her hands slid up his chest, coming to rest at the back of his neck, drawing him closer.
He felt the shift between them—something fundamentally changing in the gravity that drew them together. The volatility was still there, the history of blood and vengeance that could never be erased. But alongside it, something new had taken root. Something neither of them had anticipated or sought.
His hands traced the curve of her waist, the delicate line of her spine, memorizing her as if this might be the last time. As if tomorrow the world might end—which, given their plans, wasn’t entirely implausible.
They moved together toward his bedroom, shedding layers of clothing and pretense with each step. By the time they reached his bed, they were stripped bare in more ways than one.
In the silver moonlight that spilled through the windows, he saw her true form—the pale green-blue of her skin, the opalescent shimmer of her eyes. No disguises, no facades. JustNadi, the fae assassin who had come to kill him and had somehow become essential to his existence instead.
As they came together on the bed, skin against skin, breath mingling, Raziel found himself confronting a truth he’d been avoiding.
This wasn’t just physical desire anymore.
It wasn’t just manipulation or strategy or momentary weakness.
This was intimacy. Real, terrifying intimacy.
Her legs wrapped around his waist, drawing him closer as he entered her. The sound she made, a soft gasp of pleasure, affected him more deeply than he cared to admit. He moved slowly, savoring each moment, each sensation—the heat of her body, the rhythm of her heartbeat, the way her fingers pressed into his shoulders as if anchoring herself to him.
“Raziel,” she breathed his name against his lips, and something in him broke.
He captured her mouth with his, deepening the kiss as they moved together. No power struggles, no domination. Not this time. For once, they were equals—both vulnerable, both surrendering something precious to the other.
And he felt as though he wereclaimingher in a way that he never could with all his collections of toys and chains and leather.
As they climbed toward release, bodies entwined and breaths synchronized, he knew he had to face the truth.
He had fallen in love with her.
He loved the woman who had sworn to destroy him.
More than anything else in his life,he loved her.
And he needed her.
And somehow, that felt like the truest thing he’d ever experienced.
