Page 51 of Darkest Kiss

She looks down, her hair covering part of her face. She’s shy. That’s one of the things I love about her. She’s pure, and I don’t mean some bullshit concept like being a virgin.

Her soul is pristine.

"Tell me what you want," I murmur against her throat. “What do you need me to do to you? Hmm?”

She bites her lip and the flush on her cheeks deepens. "Touch me? Please?"

Running a finger up her slit, I groan. “Like this?”

“Oh.” She nods emphatically. “Yes. But… more?”

I slip two fingers inside her and she gasps, her hand flying to my forearm. She's tight and hot and so fucking wet that the sound my fingers make is obscene. I curl them, searching, and when I find the spot that makes her hips buck off the mattress, I press into it again and again.

"Right there?" I ask, even though I know the answer. I just want to hear her say it.

"Yes. God, yes. Right there."

My thumb finds her clit and I work her in tight circles while my fingers keep their rhythm inside her. She's making sounds that I want to record and play on a loop for the rest of my life. Little gasps and broken moans that get louder every time I curl my fingers.

Make her scream, Beast growls. Make her come so hard she forgets her own name.

"Look at me," I order. Her eyes snap open, glazed and desperate. I hold her gaze while I fuck her with my hand, watching her fall apart piece by piece. Her thighs start to shake. Her walls flutter around my fingers.

Noemi’s hand snakes out to grab my wrist. “Wait. I– I want us to come together.”

My throat closes. Beast makes a sound that I've never heard from him before, something low and wounded and raw. I swallow hard and nod because if I try to speak right now, I'm going to break in a way that I can't put back together.

She cares about me. She wants me to feel good. God, what did I ever do to get this girl?

Other than stalk her for months, buy her from an auction, and kill every man that hurt her.

“Is this okay?” She smoothes her hand across my abs.

“Yeah.” The bullet hole in my arm is healing, achy and itchy, the wound still covered with gauze and tape. I try not to flinch as she runs her hands over my shoulders and chest, tracing the tattoos there.

“Your tattoos are surprisingly intricate.” She pauses to pull the t-shirt that she’s wearing over her head.

Her breasts are two perfect mounds tipped with pink velvet. I reach out and squeeze one, groaning. Leaning down, I capture her hard nipple in my mouth. It’s every bit as soft as it looks, so hot under my tongue. She squeaks, surprised, as I press my face between them, licking her breastbone.

“Now your turn again.” She moves her fingers lower, down my happy trail to the dark curls leading to my cock. I let her, gritting my teeth through the sensory overload of her fingers on my waistband. Her eyes fix on my cock, and she sucks in a breath as my rigid cock jumps beneath her attentive fingers. “What is…”

I watch her face as she reads the tattoo etched on my skin. Her name, NOEMI, inked along my shaft in clean black letters. I got it three months ago, sitting in a tattoo chair in Brooklyn, hard as a rock while a stranger etched the name of a woman who didn't know I existed onto the most sensitive part of my body.

"That's my name." She looks up at me with a curious gaze. "On your cock."

"Yes."

"You had my name tattooed on your cock before we'd ever met?"

"Yes."

I'm braced for the scream. For the bolt. For the confirmation that I am, in fact, the most unhinged human being she's ever encountered. Beast coils tight, ready for the rejection that he's been expecting since the moment I first saw her through the bookstore window.

Instead, Noemi reaches out and traces it with a fingertip, slow and deliberate. Starting at the N, moving along the curve of each letter, all the way to the I. Her touch is featherlight. My entire nervous system crackles and threatens to detonate.

“How could you get my name here?” Noemi asks, amused. "You're insane!” But her voice is warm, her finger is still moving over the ink.

And she's not running.