“Ivy.” He moans my name and his mouth dips lower, kissing my flushed chest over the thin fabric. I want to tell him to tear it, rip it with his teeth, that I don’t care, but I can’t seem to find my voice.
I’m swept away in a tide of wanting. I am reduced to nothing but Emmett and the warmth of his hands, his mouth.
That mouth.It’s sucking a bruise into the hollow of my throat.
I press both hands on his shoulders, and tip him against thelove seat. His head lolls back and I hike up my skirts and climb onto his lap.
“Emmett,” I sigh as I capture his earlobe between my teeth, tugging on the crystal earring there. Was there a reason we shouldn’t be doing this? The thought floats out of sight like a petal on a breeze and I no longer remember or care.
He captures my chin with his hand and turns my face to him. His lips catch mine with the force of an inferno.
Nothing has ever been sweeter than the taste of his tongue invading my mouth. My teeth clack against his as I try to bring him even closer. I despise any space where we are not touching.
He winds one hand through the hair at the nape of my neck and presses the other against the small of my back. His wandering hands have never been less polite.
I can’t break the kiss, not even to breathe. I’m drowning in it, but nothing, not even air, feels more important than him.
Emmett. Emmett. Emmett.
I want to die like this, pitched about like a sailor in a storm, lost in the tide of him. I used to think I’d never wanted anything as badly as I wanted Emmett De Vere, but now it feels as if I’ve never wanted anythingbuthim.
“What are you doing!” Lydia’s voice pierces the candy-floss-pink fog of my mind.
Still, we keep kissing. His mouth is so soft, so warm. I bite at the juncture of his neck and shoulder, then lick to soothe the toothy bruise I just left there.
“Emmett,” Lydia says louder, and Emmett breaks our kiss with a gasp. He stumbles over his own feet as he stands up.
A sob starts in the back of my throat. “No, please. I need him.”
He turns to Lydia, his face shattered. “I can’t do this, I’m sorry, I’m so sorry.”
The worst part is feeling the loss of his body heat as he runs away. The second worst part is that I don’t know which of us he was apologizing to.
I’m properly crying now, hiccupping, barely able to catch my breath. It’s as if I’ve lost a vital part of myself, like I really might die if he doesn’t come back and keep ravishing me.
Lydia sits down next to me and captures my face in her cool hands. My skin is burning as if with fever. “Ivy, calm down.”
I wheeze in a breath, but the tears just keep coming. “You took him from me.”
“What did you drink?” Lydia asks urgently.
“I—” I hiccup. “I don’t know.”
Lydia leans down and picks up an empty vial. The glass is an ornately engraved, soft fuchsia ombre that ends in a narrow, rounded tip. “Did you drink this?”
“I don’t think so? Maybe while I was dancing? I wasn’t paying much attention.”
Lydia curses.
Through the pink haze, the logical part of my brain prickles with fear. I look up and see a crowd of faeries peering over the hedges, laughing. Their open mouths look like jackals, their cackles sharp and animalistic.
“Get me out of here,” I whisper urgently, and Lydia hauls me to my feet.
I’m unable to stop crying all the way back up to my room. I try to run down the hall to Emmett’s door, the need for him still clawing at my insides.
Lydia snatches my arm and pulls me back.
“No.” I struggle against her grip.
