“Oh, don’tlieto me, Galilee.” He rose in a swift glide and stalked a step closer to the shower. “You want me to look at you like this, naked and wet and just an arm’s reach away, forwhat? Forcomfort?”
He took another step, and Gali had to force herself not to back away.
Leviathan grinned, his canines showing, then he dropped his voice. “Just say you want to be touched,” he said, and the words crept under the pounding water and licked against her skin.
Gali bared her teeth in response. “And what didyoudo in the garden?” She knew she hadn’t been imagining the looks he’d given her, the loaded conversation, the deftness of his fingers as he’d uncovered his chest for her. “You wanted to be touched just as bad. You probably still do.”
Leviathan laughed, and it echoed through the bathroom. His eyes warmed as his gaze dropped to her mouth, then trailed down her neck, following the water as it ran down her body. Her nipples tightened, and Gali almost regretted inviting him to look. She wanted him to lower his gaze. She wanted him to never stop looking.
He flicked a forked tongue out against his lips. “I did want to be touched,” he murmured. “Hell watch over me, I still do.”
Gali’s heartbeat was louder than the water, thundering in her ears. “Didn’t think you’d admit that.”
Levi stepped into the doorway of the shower. “Your turn,” he said, and Gali blushed. He gave her a look. “Is it really that difficult to admit what you want?”
It shouldn’t have been. Gali didn’t know why she was vacillating between anger and shyness, between certainty and hesitance. This wasn’t the Galilee Kincaid who had thrown a leg over Lucifer’s shoulder at the Onyearugbulem party. That girl had thought she was human, for one.
This Galilee reached out and tugged at the top button of Leviathan’s shirt without answering his question. The prince watched her quietly, her hands dripping water that pooled quickly on the linen over his chest.
“Luci will return,” he finally said, before she finished the buttons. “You two will mend what’s been hurt between you.”
Gali shook her head. “You don’t have to say that.” The grief rang tart and sharp in her cheek. “I hurt him every time I touch him, and that night I didn’t stop.”
Levi’s breath caught for a second, but then he exhaled, and Gali kept talking.
“I need to touch someone I can’t hurt,” she explained. “I need to feel real, and I don’t wanna be alone in this skin.” The last button worked free under her fingers, and Gali paused. He’d walked over, but maybe she was being presumptuous. “Unless you’d rather not?”
The Devil’s favorite prince slid a hand behind her neck and dragged her body against his.
“Don’t be ridiculous,” he said, then he crushed his mouth to hers, and Gali damn near whimpered with relief. Heat radiated off his body, like there was a furnace neatly layered under his skin. She wanted to flay him and climb inside. She wanted to drop her own skin and make a small cave inside his ribs, curl up in the space where his mortal heart should’ve been.
Leviathan wrapped his other arm around her, ignoring the water still pounding out of the shower and falling off her skin, and kissed her thoroughly, his tongue stroking deep into her mouth. Gali moaned against his lips and pressed herself closer to him, all the swathes of her wet, slick skin. He tasted like pouring fire. She gasped as he stepped into the shower and backed her up against the wall, dragging his kisses along her jaw and down her neck. His teeth scored her throat, and her body arched with sharp pleasure. Gali wrapped her arms around his neck and kissed all the skin on his face she could reach, the deep brown and the pale patches.
“Your hair’s going to get wet,” she said, licking his ear.
A low rumble sounded in the back of his throat, then he lifted her up and out of the shower, setting her down on the stone tile. Gali shook water out of her face and stared at how the wet fabric clung to Levi’s body, the shirt hanging off his chest and slicking to his abs, his thighs and the hard length of his erection easily visible through the soaked pants.
He gave her an amused look as he wrapped her in a towel. “Enjoying yourself?”
Gali winked, bold and certain again. “Sure hope I’m about to.”
God, his laugh was wonderful. Her heart raced against her ribs, her body tight and wet with anticipation. She didn’t care about Lucifer—all that was broken by lies and torture and secrets as old as her life. Gali planned to steal this moment with Levi, then she’d leave this old house and the princes in it and the troubling gardens, and she would return to her forests and her family, make her repairs there before returning to her loft in Salvation and her life with Bonbon and Oriak?. The princes would return to Hell with Lucifer, and they’d have to leave her alone now that she’d fixed their hellgate. All the scores were settled, all the ledgers balanced. Lucifer wouldn’t come after her this time because she would tell him not to. Even the Devil had to have limits.
Leviathan stood behind her and started drying her off slowly, like he was worshipping her body. It immediately drove Gali to distraction, but she wondered—would it hurt Lucifer if she fucked his prince? She almost hoped so. Maybe that would stop him from coming after her. Maybe doing this was the only thing that would keep them away from each other. Maybe Galilee was just a monster now, doing monstrous things, starting with this. Levi was squeezing her hair gently in the towel, his chest a heated wall at her back. Gali took a deep breath. The air between them felt like it was a plucked string, vibrating with intensity.
“You’re a goddamn tease,” she said.
He chuckled and let go of her hair, then Gali felt his hand slide over her rib cage to cup her breast, the weight of it heavy in his warm palm. His voice slid against the shell of her ear, silk falling in sheets. “Is this what you want?”
His damp thumb caressed her tight nipple, and Gali let out a soft cry,her knees weakening at the fierce jolt of pleasure that stabbed through her. Levi slid his other arm around her waist, holding her up.
“Would you like my mouth instead? My teeth?”
“Bastard.” Gali pushed her ass back against his erection and rolled her hips, dragging another rumble out of his chest.
“I did plan to take you to bed first, but I don’t think you can wait.” The prince rolled her nipple with one hand as he slid the other down her stomach, and Gali whimpered, widening her legs. She could feel Levi’s wet clothes against her back, but she didn’t care, because drunk electricity was singing over her skin, and his fingers were so close, and she was so wet andwantingwith all the new power she had.
“Greedy,” he murmured.
