“You,” he said.
She swayed in his arms. “You.”
“You are my ruin. And I want to be completely, utterly ravaged by you.”
He cupped the back of her neck, his caress sending a thrill down her spine. His other hand dropped to her waist, and it felt like the dance all over again, but this time, she pressed willingly into his touch. Her hips brushed his, and she felt the cool slick of his urumi against her belly. Warmth flared down her legs, making her weak. Elena shuddered against him, her lips just a breath before his.
“Then ruin us,” she said.
He kissed her. Hot, slow, taking care to taste her lips and dance his tongue along the edges of her teeth. Elena gave a slight moan. She was falling, falling.
She forgot about the beach, her promises, her failures, as she raked her fingers through his hair and tugged him closer. He moaned into her mouth. Ran his hands over the bare curves of her stomach, as if to memorize every inch. His mouth became hungrier, harder. She bit down on his lip, and he gasped, his chest quaking against her fingertips. She wanted to tear him apart, to peel back the layers and see what lay beneath. To see the monster and bare her own.
The desire to see him fully filled her with a heady yearning. She grasped at the buttons of his shirt. With a simple, effortless pull, Samson tore it in two. She saw the faded scar running down his chest to the ridges of his upper abdomen. When she traced it, Samson hissed against her neck. She wanted to take it away from him, the memory and the pain it carried. She kissed his neck, his chest, his scar until he growled low in his throat.
“Elena.”
Samson pulled her back up, kissing her with a renewed passion that made her knees buckle as his hands cupped beneath her. She gasped as he hoisted her up with a sudden strength.
She wrapped her legs around his waist as he shielded the backs of her thighs from his urumi. He kissed her neck, her breasts, his chest pressing into the curve of her stomach. When he nipped at the soft skin beneath her collarbone, Elena groaned.
“Sam, wait,” she said.
He paused, his eyes glazed and unfocused. “Do you not want—”
“No,no.” She pressed closer, shivering as she felt his hardness pressagainst the inside of her thigh. “Just… not here. We should leave and go—”
Where?The palace? Farin would find them there. His men were already on their way to the beach. No, they needed to leave Tsuana. Now.
“The bounders,” she began, when a sudden sound to their right made her stiffen. Samson stilled beneath her, his voice coming out in short, hot gasps.
“What is it?” he said.
His lips were slick and wet underneath the moon. Instinctively, she wiped the corner of his mouth, when the sound came again. A sharp crack, like branches snapping underfoot.
This time, Samson heard it too. He dropped her immediately and pushed her behind him, reaching for his urumi, but it was too late.
A pulse ripped through the night, shattering the quiet. Samson dove, pulling her down with him. He draped his body over hers as the night erupted with shrieking birds and pulse fire.
“Sam,” she cried in warning.
She saw a shape out of the corner of her eye, and suddenly rough hands were pulling him up, pulling her away.
She yelled, kicking, hands sparking. Elena drove forward, kneeing her opponent as her flame roared to life. She twisted, calling for Samson, when someone rammed the butt of a gun against her temple.
Her head whiplashed back. A high ringing filled her ears. She tried to turn, but then a soldier punched her in the liver, and she crumpled in two like a fallen petal.
“Sam,” she rasped.
Shapes spun in her vision, quick and efficient with violence. Something flared, and her vision cleared for a moment to see Samson, half-dressed, summoning a flame. It rippled down his urumi with a crack that thundered through the garden. He whirled, the twin blades cutting through a soldier with a vicious, practiced beauty. Another brought up his zeemir, but Samson cleaved it in half. He was a flurry of motion and fire and god-given rage. A monster, and hers alone.
“Sam!” she cried.
He whipped around at the sound of her voice, and in that moment she would remember forever, in that moment she would come to regret, hiseyes crashed into hers. She saw his blazing fury, his wrath—and his tenderness. Even in ruin, he had love for her.
And it would haunt her forever.
The soldier came from the undergrowth, from the other side. She saw the glint of silver, a flapping sleeve. Samson spun, trying to dodge his attacker, but he was off step, off rhythm.
