‘Touch me however you want.’I pushed his fringe away from his eyes.‘And stop whenever you need to.’
The sudden chill of his fingers made me gasp, then groan when I realised he wasn’t going to make this easy.He drew light teasing circles of torment with his fingertips, never pressing hard enough to give me what I needed.I writhed, trying to increase the friction, but he anticipated my every movement.
My mind was already slipping.I knew I wouldn’t last long when he made real contact.But I needed this.I needed him to be my undoing.
‘Raleigh,’ I groaned.
‘What do you need?’His voice was low, every syllable dripping with a hunger that betrayed his feigned innocence.
I closed my eyes, humiliated that he would make me say it.‘Touch me properly.’
‘How?’I could hear the smirk in his tone, feel the ghosting of his fingers.I bucked my hips, grinding against his hand in protest, eliciting a deep sound of amusement.
‘Tell me,’ he murmured.‘How do you want me?Like this?’He slid one long finger inside, warmed from my own slickness.I gasped at the suddenness of it, the rightness of it.At the unbearable pleasure of knowing it washim.‘Or do you want all of me?’
A second joined the first and they curled as one, pressing into my walls, coaxing me ever closer to oblivion.
‘You,’ I gasped.‘Always you.’
Raleigh withdrew slowly, leaving me empty and desperate, then positioned himself.He lingered there, eyes roving my undone form, looking like the devil himself carved from marble.I searched him for the hesitation from before, but he was fully present this time, the evidence of his enjoyment pressing firmly against me.He caught me looking and kissed me again, swallowing the question he knew I’d ask, then swallowing my moan as he inched his way inside.
‘You’re so warm,’ he whispered.
He was not.I could feel the full coldness of him with every movement, as if he were made of glass instead of flesh.But I was the one who was made of glass.With every stroke of his hips, I felt fractures spreading out under my skin.His elegant, terrible hands pressed spirals into my mound, shattering my hold on reality.I could feel him crumbling too in the growing pace of his thrusts, the way he stopped breathing as my own breath grew erratic.His whole body trembled.My name fell from his lips, so that when his eyes fluttered shut I knew it was me he saw behind his lids.
‘Raleigh,’ I whispered back.I took his face in both hands, ‘I love you.’
His expression was enough to make me shatter around him.He let out a strangled cry, meeting me at the peak of my pleasure.On the edge of my consciousness I could hear him whispering an echo of my own words again and again, staccato cries punctuated by each wave of his pleasure.
He buried his face into the crook of my neck and was lost.
We stayed tangled in each other for some time, me catching my breath, him catching his sanity.When he finally peeled himself away, Raleigh looked drunk.His red lips and mussed-up hair sent a ripple through me I didn’t have the stamina to match.
‘I wouldn’t have waited so long if I’d known it would be like that.’
I shoved his shoulder playfully.‘You wanted me to hate you.’
‘I still can’t believe you don’t.’
I ached with the loss of his weight, but he was only gone long enough to extract my shift from the pool of long-forgotten clothing.
‘Here,’ he said, pushing it into my arms.‘You’ll catch your death of cold.’
I didn’t feel cold, though it was barely warmer than freezing outside.All I wanted was to sleep.I laid back on the floor, drowsiness taking me, and wanted to cry when Raleigh laid down beside me, a protective arm coaxing me into his chest.
‘Are you comfortable?’he asked.
‘Not even slightly.’But the last thing I wanted to do was move.I buried my face in his chest, warmed by his presence despite the chill of his skin, and let the carriage rock me into a sleep like death.
Thirty
IWOKE SOME HOURS LATER, still cradled in Raleigh’s arms.My whole body ached from the hard floor, and my skin was chilled to the touch.
‘Clara.’Raleigh’s voice was soft against my ear.‘We’ve stopped.I think something’s wrong.’
Suddenly I was wide awake.I went to the window, peering out through the curtains.‘It’s still daytime.You should get in your coffin.’
‘Chest.’
