“Gentle,” he murmurs.
I pull. Smoke floods my mouth, harsh and unfamiliar. I swallow instinctively and it hits my throat like fire. I cough hard, turning away, hand flying to my chest. Tears spring to my eyes. The taste isawful–burnt and chemical and wrong.
Hunter’s hand hovers near my shoulder, almost touching, but not quite.
“Yeah,” he says dryly. “That’s the usual first review.”
I’m still coughing, laughing a little through it. “That’s terrible.”
“Told you.”
Eyes watering, I say, “Again.”
His mouth tightens. “You’re stubborn.”
“You already knew that.”
A beat passes. Then he brings it back, closer this time. I don’t miss the way his gaze drops to my mouth as I lean in again. “Small,” he says quietly. “Just hold it.”
I draw in a shallow pull and keep it there. The smoke sits on my tongue, acrid and strange. I let it slip back out. It curls between us.
“See?” he says. “You’re not missing anything.”
I’m closer than I realized, standing between his knees now, the space narrow and warm. His hand with the cigarette rests on the counter beside my hip, caging without touching.
“It tastes like you,” I murmur.
His eyes lift, darkening. “That’s not a selling point.”
“I didn’t say it was bad.”
Something in his throat shifts.
I take the cigarette from his fingers. Our skin brushes–quick and electric. I copy what he did, smaller this time. Hold. Release.
He watches the smoke leave my mouth like it’s doing something to him he doesn’t want named.
“Still awful,” I decide.
“Good.” I hand it back. He takes a drag immediately, like he needs the reset of it. The air between us has changed and I’m not ready togo back to the way we were before. I close the gap until we’re inches apart.
“What are you doing?” he asks, voice low, careful.
I look down at him–really look. The strong line of his jaw, the cut cheekbones, those pale eyes that always seem to see straight through me. My heart is already hammering.
I swallow. “Can I sit on your lap?”
He studies me for a long beat–searching, weighing. Then he gives a single nod.
I climb on carefully, straddling him, knees bracketing his hips. The chair creaks under our combined weight. I settle down, and the hard length of him presses right against my core through our clothes–thick and insistent. Heat floods me instantly, mixing with the lingering ache from the welts, turning pain into something desperate, hungry.
We’re face to face now. Close enough that I can see the faint scar under his left eye, the way his pupils have blown wide. His hands settle on my hips–not gripping, not yet–just resting there, warm through the fabric.
This is new, the two of us touching like this. New, and scary. I don’t back off.
“You could fuck me,” I say, voice barely above the music. “Damon would.”
His tongue darts out and wets his bottom lip. “This is a risky game, Hex.”
