Good God, she was already unraveling into an incoherent mess, and they’d barely talked—how was she going to keep it together enough for one dance? This was as poorly thought out as it was thrilling. Gali wanted to unbutton his shirt and run her hands over his chest, press her lips to the hollow at the base of his throat. He was almost a full foot taller than her, and his legs were long, his thighs thick as his shoulders were broad. She didn’t want to share him with the guests at the gala.
“Stop,” she said softly.
He obeyed immediately, looking down at her with a faint frown.
“Do you desire another deal?” he asked, and something about the wording nudged at the back of her mind, but she ignored it. They were in a small palace, not a dirt road. The worlds could stay good and separate, damn them.
“Nah,” she answered. “Just wanna touch your skin.”
She lifted a palm to his jaw and stroked her thumb against his cheek. He hissed, and his eyes bled black from corner to corner, and Gali held her breath.What was that?Old pictures floated through her head, those gangling creatures with backward joints loping through dark, swampy groves. Gali pushed them away, focusing on the hunger in his face and how it had sharpened to a burning edge.
“What if I want a kiss?” she asked, staring into his blacked-out eyes. “Should I be afraid, Helel?”
“That’s not my name.” He slid an arm around her waist, pulling her against him. “But yes,” he murmured, his lips curving into a smile. “Be afraid.”
Gali’s pulse jumped as the stranger with the false name lowered his head and kissed her. He was slow and deliberate, teasing her mouthopen and sliding his tongue inside. Lightning shot through her veins, white-hot and searing, and she kissed him back, making soft, hungry sounds as his tongue stroked hers, as his hand cupped the back of her neck, holding her in place. When he pulled away, all Gali could do was stare up at him as her nerves sang with electricity and wetness pooled in her silk panties.
He wasn’t human, not with those black eyes under his lashes. It should have alarmed her more than it did. Gali didn’t knowwhathe was—possessed, maybe—and that was enough reason to run down the endless hallways until she was too far from his touch to want it. Instead, she wanted him to pull up her dress, slide his hand between her thighs, andfeelwhat he was doing to her, before doing more. So much more.
“You owe me a dance,” he said, watching her with his inhuman eyes, almost as if he was daring her to ask all the questions anyone else would ask. Gali almost laughed, drunk on illicit pleasure. She wasn’t anyone else. She was a Kincaid, and if she wanted to play with a monster, then she’d goddamn play with one.
“I could give you something better,” she offered.
He tilted his head to one side. “Another deal?”
“No.” She might be reckless, but she knew one deal was enough. “A gift.”
“Ah. Then I would owe you.” He bent and inhaled deeply from her neck. “A wise offer.”
Gali tried not to dissolve even more into his arms. “That’s—that’s not how gifts work.”
“It’s how they work with me.” He bit the junction of her neck and shoulder. She cried out, and he licked at it to soothe the mark. “Give me whatever you want. I’ll take it all.”
Gali grinned a Kincaid grin and pulled away from him, backing up till there was a wall against her shoulder blades. Her breath was weighted, collecting in her chest as she pushed her hips off the wall andwidened her legs, never taking her eyes off his. When she slowly pulled her beaded dress up to her waist, the stranger went predator-still at the sight of her silk panties, the pale pink fabric blushed dark with desire.
“Are you sure?” he asked, his voice a low growl.
Gali couldn’t believe she was doing this right there in a hallway that almost certainly had security cameras, when her friends could turn the corner at any point on their way back to the gala. “Better make it quick,” she said, a little shakily.
He flicked his fingers, and Gali’s eyes widened as a cloud of darkness rose up from the floor, swirling around them. Shadows brushed against her legs. The stranger walked up to her and dropped to one knee.
“Come here,” he said, and lifted one of her legs over his shoulder, her crystal stiletto dangling against his back. Gali gasped and clutched at his hair to keep her balance. It was soft and woolen and deliciously thick. She should’ve been at least a little worried about the whole summoning-darkness thing, but when he pressed his mouth to the gusset of her panties in a firm kiss, Gali was no longer capable of thinking.
“Oh, God.” She looked down at him, her body trembling with anticipation as he kissed the inside of her thigh, right where her skin was a spill of hyperpigmentation, and slid his hand up to cup her ass. The stinging in her bones clacked its teeth, asking for more. “Oh, God,please.”
“You’re so perfect,” he murmured, glancing up at her with voids crawling over his face. “What’s your name?”
“Galilee Kincaid,” she gasped. “Everyone calls me Gali.”
He slid one finger under her panties and pulled them to the side, his warm breath brushing against her slick flesh. Gali whimpered and tugged at his hair, her rings glinting among his curls.
“Galilee.” He rolled her full name inside his mouth like it was sugared. “I like you like this, Galilee, all desperate and pleading.”
She threw her head back and tried to breathe, fighting the urge to hold his head in place and rub her clit against him. “What about yourname?” she threw out instead, scrambling for something to hold on to. He dragged his tongue up her center in response, then swirled it around her clit, and Gali screamed, her back arching off the wall. “Aw,fuck!”
His grip on her ass tightened, and then his mouth was on her, ravenous and deliberate. Gali spun away, the crash of pleasure feeding her want, summoned shadows swirling around her. Her hands fisted in the stranger’s hair, and she rode his face hungrily, nearly sobbing as her orgasm drew closer and closer. His tongue slid around her clit, and she could’ve sworn it was forked, caressing her from both sides in a rasping pattern that was about to send her over the edge.
“Don’t stop,” she begged, grinding against his face even faster. “I’m so close, oh, fuck...”
