Page 58 of Laced in Longing

Wants. Needs, if I read his body language correctly.

“Mine,” he breathes as he grips my waist to lift me against him like I weigh nothing at all. “Say it back.”

My legs wrap around his lean frame. “Yours.” The word tastes like the first thing I’ve ever meant.

He carries me toward the bed, and I stop thinking about tomorrow, about the cost of my decision, and all the reasons I don’t deserve this.

For once, I just let myself have it.

He lays me down on the mattress like I’m something breakable. Thankfully, the springs barely protest under our combined weight.

The overhead light is off, but the city bleeds through my thin curtains—the perpetual amber glow of urban life.

“I still can’t see you,” I whisper.

His face rubs against my palm as he leaves a kiss in the center. “You’ll see me soon. When you join me in my world, you will look upon me every day for the rest of forever.” His voice frays at the edges. “And I will never tire of watching you look.”

His mouth finds the hollow of my throat, any coherent thought scattering on nonexistent wind as he sucks the space between my collarbones.

He works his way down slowly, so slowly it’s almost cruel. Every kiss is deliberate, mapped as he traces my curves. His lips trail over each collarbone, down the slope of my chest, and when his mouth closes over the peak of my breast, I arch off the bed with a gasp that echoes.

“That’s it,” he breathes against my skin as he groans. “Let me hear you, Maven.”

I claw at the shoulders of his coat because he’s still fully dressed and the contrast between his rough wool and my bare skin is obscene. “Off,” I manage. “This—take it off.”

He chuckles, rising just enough to throw off his coat. The shirt beneath follows, and even in the dim light, the lean cut of him calls to me—each shift of muscle a promise of the purest pleasure. My palms flatten against his chest, and his heart thunders beneath my hands, skipping every few beats.

“You’re nervous.”

“I am terrified,” he corrects, catching my wrist to drag his teeth across my pulse point. “That I will wake and find this was only another dream. That I will blink and you will be gone, running into another life where you tell me no once more.” A deep breath. “I do not think I could survive it again. Not after this.”

The vulnerability in his confession hurts. He’s still scared I’ll disappear. Like I’m the powerful one here.

“I’m not going anywhere,” I tell him, my hand gliding through his thick hair, yanking him down until our mouths crash together.

The tenderness disappears after that. Both of us groan when my pelvis grinds against his cock—something I repeat several times before his hand slides between my thighs.

His fingers find me already slick and aching; the sound he releases is animal, tortured. “Fuck, Maven.” He drops his forehead to my sternum. “You’re ruining me.”

I gasp as he circles my nub with a precision that makes my hips buck off the mattress. “Good.”

He laughs—actually laughs, a dark rumble against my ribs—and then he slips one long finger inside me, and I lose the ability to be clever. My back arches when a second joins and he curls them just so. I moan, my nails dragging down his spine, as he works me open with maddening patience. Curses fly from my lips when his thumb flutters where I need it most until I’m writhing beneath him, chasing a pleasure that keeps building and building.

“Ash—” His name breaks apart in my mouth, and he catches it with his.

His lips hover over mine. I have the sense he’s watching me closely. “I know. I have you now. Let go for me, my flower. I need to feel you.”

And I do. The tension snaps, pleasure flooding through me in intense waves that leave me trembling and gasping, my thighs clamping around his hand as I ride it out. Stars burst behind my eyes—actual light, blooming in the dark. I’ve never come like this with anyone. Never let myself be this undone. I think I’m screaming.

Before I’ve even finished shuddering, he’s shifting, hips settling between my thighs. The head of his cock slides through my arousal, pausing at my entrance. I was too far gone to notice him fully undressing. But I don’t care, I need him inside me now.

“Look at me,” he says.

My eyes snap open as I pant. “I’m looking.”

“When I take you,” he murmurs, pushing forward just enough that the tip stretches me, “there is no version of you in any world I will not follow. I have chosen you across every death. Now you have chosen me.” His hand slides beneath the small of my back, tilting my hips, forcing his length in another millimeter. “There is no going back from this, Maven. Tell me you understand.”

I hook my legs higher around his waist, drawing him closer. “I understand, Ash—stop making me wait.”