“Cole,” I protested, but it came out breathless and needy.
He pinched my nipple, twisting just enough to make me arch my back. “My perfect little masochist, getting wet for me because I’m hurting you, as I ruin my life for you.” His smirk was diabolical. “You love it when it hurts.”
The shame of it burned through me. “I didn’t ask?—”
“You didn’t.” He slapped my breast hard enough to make me gasp. “You never would. Never. And that’s why you’re worth giving up everything for, sparrow.” He ran his hands up my sides then slapped the same breast he’d teased, and the sharp pain transformed to the heat of pleasure. “You never ask for help. You give and you give, and the whole fucking world takes from you, and still, you find more strength to give. You’re so fucking smart, so fucking loyal, and you should tell us all to go fuck ourselves and never look back, but you never do.”
“Cole,” I choked, throat tight with emotion. His handsfound the button on my jeans and opened them before sliding them over my hips, leaving me in only my socks and panties, spread out beneath him and completely at his mercy.
Cole stood over me, smiling softly. “You’re so fucking gorgeous. One of these days, we’re going to have time for me to kiss every single one of your freckles, and I can’t fucking wait.”
The image took my breath away—the thought of him taking his time with me, of us having a future when time wasn’t always running out.
“Like that, do you?” His voice was rough with satisfaction.
He placed his hands on his covers between my legs and lowered himself to gently kiss my panties. My hips twitched. I wanted a hell of a lot more than a soft kiss. I needed him to devour me, to wreck me, to make me forget he was leaving me.
He chuckled then inhaled deeply, his nose pressed against the fabric. My cheeks stained red with embarrassment. “Cole.”
“Shut up,” he said, biting the inside of my thigh hard enough to leave a mark then soothing the ache with his tongue. “I love how fucking soft you are,” he said against my skin. “Love how you melt for a little bit of praise but how a little bit of degradation turns you into a feral slut for me.”
“Cole!”
His eyes met mine, full of merriment and sadness, and?—
“I want to touch you,” I pleaded quietly. “Please.”
He closed his eyes for a long moment, his jaw working like he was fighting for control. When he opened his eyes again, they were glassy. “I’m so fucking wrecked for you, you know that?”
“Please, Cole.” My heart ached for him, and all I wanted was to take him in my arms, to hold him against me, as if him moving out of this house I didn’t even live in was the end for us.
He peeled my panties down my legs with aching gentleness, taking my fuzzy socks with them, then attacked the mess he’d left at my wrists, with my layers and my bra and one of his socks, it turned out.
The moment I was free, I wrapped my arms around him, dragging his lips to mine once again, like I could make him stay if I kissed him hard enough. “You’re wearing too many clothes.”
I unbuttoned his shirt, keeping my body plastered to his as much as I was able, never releasing his lips from our kiss. I needed him so fucking badly.
“Eva,” he groaned when I scraped my nails down his bare chest, leaving red lines in my wake.
I slid his shirt off, revealing the golden skin and thick muscles I loved to touch. Next, I tackled his belt but lost it when he tugged my head back with my hair so he could scrape his teeth along my collarbone.
“So fucking beautiful,” he said as he sucked on my skin hard enough to leave a mark. He worked his way across my chest, making sure to leave them on my neck, under my jaw, fucking everywhere.
I moaned and shifted under him, wanting more contact, rubbing my bare pussy against the hard cock that pressed between my legs through his pants, hating the layers between us.
“Such a needy slut,” he murmured, working his way down my chest, kissing every inch of my T-shaped scar with devastating tenderness before bending to take a hard nipple between his lips.
“Yes,” I gasped. “Cole, I need you. Please!” The hard, rhythmic pull of his mouth sent pleasure straight to my core, building a fierce tension between my thighs.
He hummed and sucked on the delicate skin of my breasts, leaving marks on each one, and suddenly, I wanted to mark him too.
I wrapped my legs around him and twisted. To my surprise, he let me flip us so I rode him.
Cole at his cruelest had been devastating to my heart, but Cole at his softest, determined to be the best man he could be, his eyes filled with affection and sweetness and desire? I was so fucking gone for this man, and fuck him, he was leaving me anyway.
“Sparrow,” he rasped, setting his hands on my hips. I leaned down to brush my lips against his then kissed down his jaw and settled on his neck, where I nibbled and sucked until I too had left a mark, had branded him as mine.
When I rose, the satisfaction in his eyes fucking undid me. “Do it again,” he begged, stretching out beneath me like a mythical god, golden and beautiful and so fucking hot, I almost couldn’t think. “Mark me, sparrow. Make sure the whole fucking world knows who I belong to.”
