“Tell me to go if you don’t want this,” Klyde said, so close she felt the brush of his low plea on her lips. “Give me a reason not to touch you. Convince me you still belong to another, so I don’t take you to bed and kiss you until I can’t breathe. I’ve lost the will to fight against what I want.”
There wasn’t another. No other man who stirred her like him. No other touch she wanted but his.
Lucenna was done denying what she wanted, too. “Stay.”
He shuddered. “Thank the Gods.”
The roughness of his reply made all of her warm. His mouth captured hers again and she melted into the sweep of his tongue and the grip of his hands on her waist.
“It would be irresponsible of me not to address an important matter first,” he said, and she already knew what he would ask. “Are you?—”
“Yes.”
“You won’t?—”
“No.”
The shortest conversation she ever had about contraceptives, but Klyde understood her perfectly.
He pressed her into the wall as he continued to kiss and explore her neck, coursing down to the soft plush of her cleavage. With every press of his lips, her sighs tangled in a moan. She gasped softly at the stroke of his hand tracing up her leg still wrapped around him. Her pulse sped with each caress, warming her skin.
“This changes nothing,” she said between kisses. “I still despise you.”
Klyde’s fingers threaded through her hair as he cupped her head to him, gripping tight enough to make her shiver with delight. “I love it when you lie,” he ground out, slowly rocking her against him. “Your eyes always tell me the truth.”
Lucenna really couldn’t hide from him anymore, and she didn’t care.
She tugged up his shirt, and he lifted her arms as she pulled it off him, dropping it at their feet. His lashes drifted closed at the first graze of her hand on his chest. She lightly traced his scars, exploring every hard inch of warm skin, savoring the chiseled ridges of his body. She nipped his neck and the rumbling sound he made vibrated in her pulse.
He reached up her dress, and she heard fabric tear as he dragged off her undergarments, exposing her to the air.
His firm hands traveled up her thighs to the source of her need. Her breath caught at the first stroke of his fingers, and she dug her nails into his back. Her breath came in soft pants as he created a building demandshe couldn’t take anymore. She tugged at his britches, and they were gone in her next breath. Klyde hoisted her up onto his waist. Wrapping her legs around him, he pulled her close, and she felt how much he craved her.
He carried her to the bed without releasing her mouth. Sitting on the edge, he scooted back with her still straddling him. He grabbed the hem of her dress, lifting it up and off over her head. There was nothing between them but this moment. His dark, heavy-lidded gaze trailed over her body, his chest rising and falling with shallow breaths.
“Gods, you’re beautiful…” His husky voice, so laden with desire in the dimly lit room, made Lucenna shiver.
Klyde held her waist as he kissed the sensitive curves of her cleavage languidly. Every press of his heated mouth made her body hum with electrical currents. His lips moved on to her neck, and she leaned her head back as he learned the beat of her pulse.
The purple light of her Essence flickered around them, dancing like fireflies. His every touch pulled on threads of her heart, lacing them with his own. Breath trembling, she ran her hands over the hard lines of his forearms to his shoulders, feeling the muscles flexing with movement as his hands slid up her back.
Klyde panted a breath before saying faintly into her ear. “Tell me what pleases you.”
“I have a feeling you already know.”
Because even when she tried to deny it, when she lied to him and to herself, he always could see through her.
Lucenna wanted him to take her tenderly. Then wildly. To tangle his fingers in her hair and lose himself in the arches of her skin. She wanted his teeth to mark her with his need. For him to tame the tempest inside by taking her breath away. She had enough of his wavering and restrained desire. She wanted to feel the crash of his waves and know that she wasn’t drowning alone.
Klyde flipped her onto the bed beneath him. Her eyes rolled closed as his mouth slowly made its descent over her body. He trailed kisses over her heartbeat, down her stomach to her thighs, and lower, until he had her writhing. Lucenna gasped and clutched the bedding in tight fistfuls. With every touch of his lips, he imprinted webs of stars across her body and made her his. Pressure rose in her, building and building until she was crashing on his shores.
Klyde’s lips returned to hers, and he breathed her name mid-kiss. Each vowel curled up her spine. Whenever he spoke her name,everything else seemed to stop. Lucenna couldn’t decipher what they were anymore. She didn’t know what she wanted them to be. Only that she had to hold on for as long as she could.
He rose on his arms above her, and she saw the storm in his eyes. “Should you come to regret this tomorrow, know that none of what I feel for you is a lie.”
She shook her head and wrapped her fingers around the back of his nape. “Klyde, shut up and kiss me.”
He did. Deeply, tenderly. As his body joined hers, filling her so perfectly, Lucenna decided tomorrow didn’t matter.
