The kiss is deep and overwhelming. Heavy with everything we didn’t say earlier.
I cling to him like I might float away otherwise, my chest tight, breath coming fast. The room tilts, heat pooling low in my body, my skin buzzing as if I’ve stepped into a live wire.
Behind me, the air changes.
Silas moves closer. I don’t see it, but I feel that electric presence at my back, his breath warm near my ear.
“Well,” he murmurs softly, approval threaded through the word. “That answers that.”
I should laugh.
Instead, my breath stutters.
Caleb’s hand settles at my waist then, anchoring me without taking control. The contact sends a different kind of shiver through me, intimate, dangerous in its own way.
I pull back from Boone just enough to breathe, forehead resting against his, my hands still fisted in his shirt.
“This doesn’t mean I have answers,” I say quietly. “It just means I couldn’t keep lying to myself.”
Boone’s thumb brushes my cheek. “That’s enough.”
Silas presses a kiss to my temple. Caleb’s grip tightens just a fraction, his presence solid at my back.
I’m surrounded.
My lungs burn, not from lack of air, but from the intensity of standing at the center of something I set in motion and can’t undo.
And because I can’t undo it, I lead them to my bedroom.
The door clicks shut behind us, a trigger pulled.
Boone’s hands find my waist, then slide lower, possessive and sure. His mouth crashes into mine, hot and ravenous, and then he’s turning me, pushing me back toward the bed. He needs me there.
His fingers grip the hem of my dress, dragging it up in one sharp, hungry motion. His breath stutters when he realizes.
“Fuck,” he groans, already unraveling. “You’re not wearing panties?”
I smile against his mouth, teeth grazing his bottom lip. “Nope, it seems I’m not.”
My nightdress slips off my shoulders. It wants to be taken. It puddles at my feet with a whisper, and the temperature in the room spikes. The air turns electric.
Caleb is suddenly there, sinking to his knees beside the bed, all heat and shadow and intent. His hands slide under my thighs, strong and urgent, as he pulls me to the edge.
I brace on my elbows, breath caught, pulse hammering. His eyes meet mine as his scruff brushes the inside of my thigh.
Behind me, Silas’s fingers skim down my spine. His mouth follows, trailing fire over skin. When he reaches my back, my bra unhooks with a practiced flick. The lace slides down my arms in a sigh.
And then Caleb’s mouth is on me.
Hot. Skilled. Starving.
He licks me, every stroke of his tongue slow enough to tease, firm enough to make me gasp. He doesn’t rush until he feels it. The tremble in my thighs. The breath that catches. The moment I start to climb.
Then he devours me.
It’s not gentle. It’s not sweet.
It’s messy, greedy, obscene. He eats as if he’s dying and I’m the only cure.
