Her challenge ignites the fire that’s been simmering in me since the moment I walked into this room and saw her again.
I drag her against me, and she gasps as my mouth claims hers—rough, hungry and desperate. It’s not forgiveness. It’s not love. It’s recognition of everything we were, everything we lost, everything we still are.
She tastes like blood and memory and the edge of danger. My hands slide beneath her robe, finding skin that feels too warm, too alive. The faint pulse of that other presence flares beneath my palms, and I want to rip it out, destroy whatever shares space inside her.
But then she moans my name, and I’m undone.
The room vanishes before the sound can catch up.
One heartbeat she’s standing in the living room, the next she’s pinned beneath me against the velvet-draped wall of my bedroom, breathless and trembling while the world is still trying to remember how to move.
I press her back against the wall, lips trailing down her throat, fangs grazing but not piercing. The sound she makes—the tiny, pleading catch of breath—shatters what’s left of my restraint.
I seize her mouth again, lifting her off the floor.
Her legs wraps around my waist as the robe slips, revealing skin pale as moonlight, marked by the glowing sigils along her ribs. They pulse faintly with each of my thrusts, matching our rhythm, until I can’t tell where she ends and I begin.
“We are not leaving this room,” I murmur against her skin. “Not till there’s nothing or no one between us.”
“I yearn for nothing else,” she breathes. “Please, Lucien.”
Elara
The moment Lucien’sfingers curl around the edges of my robe, I know there’s no turning back. The fabric whispers against my skin as he yanks it off and tosses it away, the cool air of the chamber raising gooseflesh over every inch of me.
His breath catches just for a second as his gaze rakes over me, dark and hungry, like a predator savoring the sight of his prey.
Candlelight flickers, painting his sharp features in gold and shadow, the glow licking over the planes of his chest, down to the ridge of his cock, thick and heavy between his thighs.
My pulse spikes. My nipples tighten into aching peaks, betraying just how much I want this. Want him.
“On the bed, arms up, thighs spread wide,” he commands, his voice a low growl that vibrates through me, settling deep in my belly. I don’t hesitate.
The stone beneath my feet is cold, the sheets rough against my skin as I crawl onto the mattress, my ass lifting just enough to tease him—to let him see how wet I already am.
The sigil on my spine twitches, a dull, throbbing heat that flares in warning. I ignore it. Right now, all that matters is theway Lucien’s eyes burn into me, the way his fingers flex around the hilt of the dagger he’s set aside.
Then he picks it up.
The blade catches the light as he turns it, the edge gleaming wickedly. A shiver runs through me, my breath quickening as he steps closer, the mattress dipping beneath his weight.
The first touch of the dagger’s tip against my collarbone is ice-cold, a shocking contrast to the heat engulfing me as he hovers over me. I arch into it before I can stop myself, a gasp ripping from my throat as he drags the blade downward, slow and deliberate, tracing the curve of my breast.
“Such a greedy, blood-thirsty little thing,” he murmurs, his free hand cupping my other breast, his thumb circling my nipple until it aches. “You crave this, don’t you?”
“Yes.”
“And the thing inside you, does it crave this too?”
The dagger presses just hard enough to dimple my skin, and just the threat of a cut makes my pussy clench. A whimper slips out before I can swallow it and my hips rock uselessly against the empty air.
“Answer me.”
“Yes,” my voice trembles in a single breath. “It feeds on what I feel,” I whisper, “And right now, all I feel is you.”
That undoes him completely.
I arch against him, my voice breaking on his name. Every breath gives feels like absolution and punishment both. “Lucien,” I gasps. “Don’t stop.”
