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I should move away. Should stop him from touching me.

I don’t.

“Does that scare you?” he asks.

Perhaps it should. These men should terrify me. I shake my head in response, and Reyes’s smile is soft and brilliant. “Good. Ezra would never want to hurt you, and neither would I.”

“But why was he there?” I demand, frustrated curiosity rising within me.

Reyes’s brow pinches again. “That’s…” He blows out a breath and lifts his other hand and strokes the pale strand of hair hovering on the side of my face, tucking it behind my ear. “Ezra’s abilities are a bit … different from mine. It’s up to him to tell you about them. All I can tell you is that Ezra understands the struggle with your magic far more than any of us.” His fingers descend, grazing the side of my neck, lingering at the pulse point like he can feel how wrecked I am. How badly I want—

No.

How many times will it take until I learn my damn lesson? Wanting something only ever makes me vulnerable. Longing only ever ensures that the object of my desire will be taken from me.

Reyes smiles. Slow. Knowing.

My heartbeat hiccups.

“I’m sure you’re already aware, Haven, but if not, let me be the one to tell you…” Reyes’s words are barely audible, so much so that I have to strain to hear them. “You are everything we’ve been waiting for and more.”

I close my eyes. Just for a second. And in that second, I feel the warmest press of lips on mine. My eyes slam open again and find that Reyes is kissing me. Not just kissing me but devouring me.

Not like the dream. Not like Cameron. Not like Lyall. But like the real Reyes—visceral and merciless.

A kiss. An inevitability.

And I’m tired of fighting it.

CHAPTER 35HAVEN

A child unborn with the grace of the Divine and witch-wrought blood entwined shall bear hence a truth sought for centuries. A curse held. A curse cracked, not broken. Salvation or calamity. Whether shall she balance the blood of our children or set it aflame, I know not. Only that much pain will be felt and death before the end.

—PREMONITION, SPEAKER UNKNOWN, SALEM COVEN, 1691

Reyes is different.

It’s as if the life before this never existed and there are only two souls that have ever been in existence.

His and mine.

“Fuck.” The sharp expletive bursts from his lips, the warmth of his breath hitting my cheeks. I stare at him, at the wetness coating his lips. “Again,” he says, voice harsh. “I need it again.”

Before I can say yes or no—his mouth is back on mine. His lips crush into me as his tongue slips against my own. A moan rumbles up my throat, unbidden and a shock to my system. I sag against Reyes’s chest, my knees weakening as all my attention—all my conscious thought—centers on the kiss that is turning me from a separate individual being and into his captive.

It’s nothing like the kiss we’d shared in the dreamworld. That had been born of desperation and the hope for survival. This is more.

Reyes kisses me like it’s the end of times—like ash is falling around us and we’re standing smack-dab in the center of Pompeii the morning that Mount Vesuvius erupted thousands of years ago. I can’t stop him. I don’t want to stop him.

I open my mouth and accept his harsh offering. With Lyall, the kiss had been a surprise. A warm welcoming that was a shock of arousal and a soothing of the wolf’s honorable intentions. If Reyes has any honor, it’s not here with us now.

His hands are in my hair, gripping it hard and tight, keeping me pinned against him. My breasts ache with a need to be touched. Desperation claws at my skin. It’s like it’s my first time all over again—all the sensations are new, as if there are no barriers yet to tell me if it’s wrong or right.

I grip on to him too. My nails sink into his shoulders as our heads turn and his mouth takes me anew. A shudder works its way through me, and he must sense my delirium getting the best of me, because in the next moment, his hands close around the backs of my thighs.

Our lips part, and I gasp for breath as he stands and pulls my legs around his waist. Left with little other option, I hook my ankles at the small of his back as he supports me with his hand and drops back down on the couch so that he’s sitting and I’m perched atop him.

“Haven.” Reyes slides his hand up my back and into my hair once more, gripping it tight. His eyes glitter in the near darkness of the room. “Open your mouth again,” he demands, ragged breathing filling the air between us. “I’m not done with you yet.”