Page 181 of Safe Word

I did. Without hesitation.

He took my mouth again, stealing the breath out of me.

‘Why did you leave?’ The question broke from me, fragile and shaking as my hands gripped the front of his shirt. The words hung there shakily, as if they’d been lodged in my throat for days and only now had the strength to tear out.

He locked in place – not loosening his grip, not letting go – as if I’d disappear the second he did.

And maybe I would. Into nothingness.

‘Isn’t it obvious…’ he rasped, his hands roaming all over my body. ‘Obsession…’ he murmured, dragging his teeth along my jaw, nipping the corner of my lips, his breath scorching. ‘Addiction. I can’t stop, Paula.’

The hard shaft was already pressing into my belly with a dark promise of more.

I spread for him. Needing to feel him again. ‘We can’t. Not here.’

‘We’re fucking doing this right here,’ he rumbled, pressing me harder into the tiles. His hand released my hair, slid down, and wrapped around my throat the way it used to: gentle, possessive, absolute.

‘They’re just behind that door,’ I hissed, voice barely there.

‘I don’t give a damn.’ His tone dropped between a threat and prayer.

‘Cain…’ I croaked, his scent flooding my senses. Spice and sin and him.

‘You’ll be a good… quiet girl while I fuck you right here.’

Oh… my God.

His hand ripped off my thong in a single, swift motion.

He sank to his knees before I could answer, his breath ghosting hot between my thighs, palms urgently tracing up my calf. Fingers spreading, guiding, forcing my leg up and open.

‘Fuck, Cain, stop! They’re—’

The protest fell apart into a gasp as his mouth met my soft heat. His moan vibrated against my skin, the rough scrape of his five-o’clock shadow sending shocks up my spine.

I bit my lip until I tasted blood, my fingers tangling into his hair as he nipped and licked and damned me more with each move.

His name burned through my mouth.

And when his lips sealed around my clit, I nearly cried out.

I needed him – needed him violently lost in me.

I teetered on the edge, seconds from madness. He growled into me before he spread me further with his other hand, thumbs dragging along the crease of my thigh as if he were prying open a secret he already owned.

Then his tongue scuffed over that aching bundle of nerves again with a hard and punishing stroke—

And again.

And again.

Each pass shattered me a little more.

My hips rolled greedily into the rhythm he dictated, as if my body had been attuned to move for him only. Desperate to be branded again—

Not by Ghost.

By Cain.