"You matter more than I know how to describe."
Her breath catches. It’s a soft sound that fills me with the need to make sure this woman never suffers a broken heart again in her life.
"And you matter to me." Her chest rises with a steady breath. "The darkness in this city turns people. You said that. But you're not turned, Drake. You're not rotten. You use the darkness to protect the people you love."
"Katriana—"
"I'm ready."
The words hit me like lightning.
My God this woman is going to ruin me. I know what she means, but I have to ask. I want to hear the words from her lips. "Ready for what, little rose?"
I watch her gather herself. The resilience she possess humbles me. There’s not a soft bone in my body and I’ve accepted my soul is blackened with my sin. But she makes me want to be better, do better.
"You, Drake." She leans over me, the ends of her hair brushing my bare chest, and kisses me softly. "All of you. I'm choosing you, Drake. Not because of the contract. Not because I owe you. Because I want you."
I search her face for doubt. Hesitation. Any sign that she's not sure.
I find only certainty.
I cup her face and draw her in until our noses nearly touch. "Once we do this," I say slowly, "there's no going back."
"I'm counting on it."
I flip her onto her back. She gasps as I hover over her, my weight braced on my forearms, my body caging hers. I slip between her thighs, my cock nudging her bare pussy.
Oh, fuck me. She’s slick, swollen and so fucking hot. It’s all I can do not to fist my length and feed her every fucking throbbing inch of me right now. But I need to take this slow. She’s too important to me. I can’t hurt her.
My shirt opens to reveal her beautiful breasts. Her nipples harden under my attentive gaze and the sight is beyond heaven.
I drag my gaze to hers. "You're sure?"
She spreads her thighs more, offering even more of her to me. "I've never been more sure of anything."
I kiss her. Deep, slow, thorough. My hands find the hem of my shirt she's wearing and ease it up over her hips, her stomach, her breasts. She raises her arms, and then she's bare beneath me.
I worship her with my mouth. Her lips. Her jaw. The column of her throat. The swell of her breasts, each nipple drawn tight beneath my tongue. The soft plane of her stomach. The flare of her hips.
By the time I settle back between her thighs, she's panting, her fingers twisted in the sheets.
"You have all the control," I tell her. "If you say stop, we stop. No questions."
I pause. “And Katriana. We do this, I want to feel every inch of you. I have to give you every drop of my seed. You know what that means.”
"I understand. If it happens it happens. I want you, too. And Drake, don't you dare stop."
Seventeen
Katriana
He strokes the swollen head of his shaft through my folds and the look of raw hunger that drifts across his shadowed face feeds my soul.
“You’re dripping wet, baby girl.”
“Mm-hm.” I’m ready. Aching for him in ways I never knew my body could ache.
He pushes to his knees, kneeling between my opened thighs. Looking up at him, I see a man in pain and yet, soft for me. Tattoos, ink, shadows and secrets all color this man in different shades. Yet all I see is the man who protected me today at all costs. He proved to me I could trust him. Even if tomorrow we separate, I know he truly considers me precious. That's all I can ask for. To look at me and know that I am a woman worth more than words on a paper or something to be owned and used.
