Her head sinks back against me. I still don’t believe her, hands palming her body, frantic to find some sign of injury. Some hidden hurt.
She sighs at my touch, body alive and arching toward me, lips parting. An invitation.
But I can’t. I won’t.
Only I can’t stop, hands mapping her soft curves, finally giving form to my desire. When my fingers slide between her thighs, she moans—soft and vulnerable, voice throbbing with need.
I can feel it as if it’s my own, fingers sliding back and forth, giving her what she needs.
“Yes,” she whispers, tangling her fingers in my hair, breath warm against my cheek.
“God, I want you,” I sigh, body tight, alive to the last cell. “But I can’t risk hurting you.” I pull back, ashamed of myself.
“I’m fine,” she whispers. “Take me someplace… where we can be alone.”
Her hands tighten at my neck, fingers sliding into my hair. “And promise you’ll never leave me again, Kael. Please.”
Never again.
The words hang on the tip of my tongue. But I can’t say them.
Instead, I growl, “I can’t.”
She doesn’t like my answer. Yet her hands still cling. And my heart wonders how I could walk away twice.
The mountains hum, reverberating through me, intensifying the pulse in my tattoos, where she lives now. Where she’s already a part of me. We take off into the thickening darkness of twilight.
God, this shouldn’t be happening.
But it is… and I can’t stop thinking about it.
My hands slide against her soft flesh again—exploring, devouring through touch where my mouth and tongue long to be.
“You shouldn’t let me,” I grind between my teeth.
“I can’t stop,” she whispers, pupils blown when I sneak a look down.
We can’t make the ride all the way back to my place. It’s too much for Tempest, especially with two riders. Instead, we stop atthe mouth of a cave, hidden behind outcroppings of rocks, thick with mineral veins.
The kind of place Wildbloods once camped out, hiding from Sentinel incursions.
Where folks like me and my brother Clemson gathered before and after stagecoach heists to count loot and trade tales. The ache in my chest deepens, sorrow pulling.
He could still be here with me if he hadn’t tied his life to a mortal woman. Never understood it.
Seemed like the ultimate betrayal. A waste beyond measure.
Now all I can think about is sinking between Eliza’s legs and giving her every piece of me. Body. Soul. Mortality.
The cave is long, tall, and narrow. Tempest easily passes inside, though I have to duck my head.
“You ready to stop?” I ask Eliza, pressing my face into the crook of her neck, smelling her sweet perfume. Can’t hold back anymore.
She’s on my fingers now. A better scent than anything I can think of. Her arousal, my drug.
I’m hard as iron thinking about it.
“Yes,” she gasps, hands sliding into my hair, urging me to her. But I pull back, clinging to the fraying remnants of my self-will.
