“But the part of my brain that hates spiders and screams at jump scares doesn’t care. It tells me I was vulnerable. It tells me I was helpless. It tells me no one in this galaxy could see me on the floor like that and still possibly... want me.”
She exhales deeply and tucks her hands into her armpits. “So, I was angry. I wanted you, and I was pretty sure you wanted me. And then you saw me on the floor, and I wanted someone to shoot me into spaceimmediately. I took it out on you, and that’s just... not okay.”
“Marlowe—”
She looks at me, finally, and smiles sheepishly. “Thank you. Seriously. And I’m sorry for the drama.”
“Marlowe—”
She flaps her hands as if she can wave it all away. “Eurgh, no, don’t. Just tell me this...”
I watch, with bated breath, as she rises to her knees and throws her shoulders back. Something like determination sets her features. I can’t name the gleam in those chestnut eyes, but I know the heat they send through me.
“Was I right? Are you attracted to me?Wereyou, before—”
“I’ve never been more attracted to anyone in my life.”
How can she possibly think otherwise?
I get a glimpse of a beautiful smile before she throws herself at me, and my arms are full of soft, fragrant skin. I pull Marlowe into my lap, slide a hand into those curls and kiss her the way I’ve been dying to. The noise she makes is something like a drug. When she sucks my bottom lip into her mouth, she punctuates it with the sinking of her nails into the nape of my neck. I can’t stop myself from gasping against her, all my inhibitions untethered.
Of course she would be wild.
Of course she would immediately get under my skin.
Her heart pounds against my chest as I slip my tongue between her lips and taste her. It’s the sweetness of melon and the bitterness of tea, and I sip from her lips like some starved thing. I’m so invested in exploring her mouth I don’t realise she’s unwinding my hair until the weight of it disappears and settles against my back. At once, her fingers are knitted into the strands, tugging, massaging. It takes all my willpower not to melt into a puddle. An embarrassing sound slips from me, and she drinks it down like nectar. I’m not some blushing virgin, not an amateur in bed—but I am surrounded by her, drunk on her, and it renders me pliable, soft.
I untangle a hand from Marlowe’s hair and take hold of her jaw. I want to coax every sound out of her; hear all the different ways I can break her. I want Marlowe to feel as wrecked as I do, just from this simple taste. I deepen the kiss, quickly becoming addicted to how she feels against me. When I suck her tongue into my mouth, she writhes in my lap shamelessly. Her fingers turn to claws against my scalp, and, carried away by desire, I disengage and bite down on the patch of skin below her ear.
I like pain, but it seems so does she.
Her moan unravels whatever threadbare self-control I had left. In seconds, I have her lying back on the blanket, and I settle over her, pressing her body down. Those gorgeous, dark eyes are lidded, full lips parted, pulse pounding against her neck. When she arches against me, she pushes her thigh between my legs and is rewarded with a noise that would embarrass me again, if I weren’t so far gone. I can feel the heat of her through my clothing. I need more, all of her, before I lose my mind.
“You want me?” she whispers into my skin, licks a path up to my ear and catches the lobe between her teeth.
Need, I correct mentally—barely stop myself from saying it.
“From the moment I saw you standing in my cabin, drowning in my clothes, shooting daggers at me with your eyes,” I whisper against her collarbone. “I hated treating you like that.”
“Oh,” she breathes.
I bite down on the delicate skin, drawing my teeth along bone, and Marlowe gasps. She bucks against me, hands anchored in the curtain of my hair and pulls me in. “Harder. I won’t break.”
I obey and lavish her collarbones with stinging bites and careful kisses, until she’s twisting beneath me and setting my body alight with every shaky exhale. She’ll be marked for days after this.
A possessive pleasure zings along my skin at the thought. I’ve never wanted to corrupt someone before. As if we’re sharing the same thought, Marlowe trails fingers over her reddening skin.
“Fuck, I’m gonna be so bruised,” she moans. Every word is laced with a sweet anticipation. Maybe it’s the reason she wanted me to sink my teeth into her, maybe it’s just a delicious side effect, but the idea excites her, too. This woman will be the end of me.
From the first demand she ever made of me, I’ve been dazed. No one has ever seen through me like Marlowe does. No one ever tried. But Marlowe stands toe to toe with me and sees, instead of a reason to turn away, a reason to parse all those messy parts of me that kept others at arm’s length. She makes it seem easy to be near me, when others always skittered. That she wants me is like an afterimage against the back of my eyelids, a sensation so bright it can only be fleeting.
I feel emboldened by her desire, riled by her need. I feel raw.
With Marlowe distracted, I take hold of her arms, slide up to catch her hands and pin them above her head. In the shadows of the room, her expression is open and heated. I want to touchevery inch of her body. I want to show her she was crazy to think anything could make me want her less than this.
I never imagined we could end up here, but now that we are, I’ll devour her. She’s a bolt of lightning tearing through me, the blood in my veins like liquid fire at the sight of her pinned under me. I think, looking at the urgency in her face, I could make her do anything right now. But all I really want to do is take her apart and worship her.
She squirms against me. “Tanisira.”
