I can’t tell if he pulls me or if I move on my own accord, but suddenly, I’m on his lap. He presses his hips towards mine, proving to me how affected he is by this. How ravenous he is for me, just as I am for him.
Desire slips out of me in a low, needy moan, and I feel him shudder all over in response. His lips travel to my neck, as if searching for the source of the sound. One of his hands fists my hair, pulling it to allow him a better angle, while the other tightly grasps my hip.
He tastes every inch of my skin, injecting divine pleasure into each touch.
“Abaddon,” I whisper. “I need you.”
He stops to graze his teeth over the skin of my neck, just over my jugular. “No. It is I who needs you.”
To emphasize his point, he thrusts his hips upwards, rubbing himself against me. Even with our clothes separating us, his hardened need finds friction against the throbbing, sensitive flesh between my thighs. A small sound, something caught between a whimper and a moan, escapes me. He soon echoes it with one of his own, gripping me harder, grinding against me again, again, and again.
If he doesn’t stop this torturous foreplay in the next few seconds, I’m going to start ripping my clothes off. “Please, Abaddon. I can’t bear it. I need you.”
“You are not mine to take yet.” His voice sounds pained, as if he just swallowed hot coals. “But you will be.”
Suddenly, he bites down on my neck with enough strength to make me yelp in pain.
Were I any less aroused, I would be appalled. But since I’m madwith lust, I shudder through the deep kiss he tops it with.
“When you are ready—body, mind, soul—I will be here to claim you,” he growls, sending a rush of heat between my thighs in erotic anticipation. “There will be no escaping me after that. You will be completely, entirelymine.”
In the blink of an eye, he’s suddenly put several feet between us. One second, I have the warmth of his entire body pressed against me. Next, I’m on unsteady feet against the wall, fighting back whiplash.
“I shouldn’t have done that,” he says in a throaty, breathy voice, as if he can barely breathe without me against him. He stands next to the bed with disheveled hair, a sizeable bulge clearly visible in his thin trousers, his breath ragged.
And he looks at me like I just tamed the sun.
“You shouldn’t have stopped,” I growl back, unable to think straight.
I try to take a step forward, but he shakes his head, holding up a hand to stop me. It lights a different kind of fire inside me, one that is nowhere near enjoyable.
“You’re seriously pulling away right now? Do I need to spell it out for you so it’s finally clear?Fine.The world is ending, and I don’t have time for games. You’re either going down this path with me, or you’re not. No more back and forth.”
His eyes flash with insult. “This isn’t agameto me. I just told you I’m willing to commit to you for all of eternity, Kae, but you are not ready for that. I’m trying to be patient for your own good.”
“I don’t need you to protect me. I am more than capable of deciding when—” I cut myself off as Abaddon jerks his head towards the window with a sudden, intense focus, seeming to hear something I can’t. “What? What is it?”
A second later, a flash of light falls over his body. His bedclothes morph into matte black armor, fully covering everything but his head.
I stumble backward, eyes wide with shock—and then I hear it. A hum, reverberating off the walls, growing louder and more prominent by the second. I can’t quite tell what it is, but it’s horribly foreboding.
Abaddon doesn’t say a word. He looks at me for a moment, his facelooking more fierce than I’ve ever seen him, as if he’s preparing for war.
And he is.
For the first time since I’ve met him, Abaddon spawns his weapon.Hisweapon, the one that was forged in Heaven and conveyed with his origin form. I’ve only ever pondered what his may be in idle curiosity, but now… I gasp in horror as he draws it.
Unlike Dusk, Abaddon doesn’t have a golden sword that channels light and warmth.
No, he hasa goddamn scythe.
Black smoke and shadows billow off of it, with a few tendrils solidifying and coiling up the wielding arm. The base metal of the weapon is pitch black, dark as the fabled pit of the Abyss itself. But it also has small red rivers, much like arteries, pulsing through the handle before narrowing and splintering throughout the curved blade.
Sheer power radiates from the pair, folding over and exponentially amplifying by the second. My instincts scream at me to run, run,run.
Gone is the soft, vulnerable angel that was here only moments ago. In his place stands Abaddon the Destroyer, ready to spill blood in his namesake.
He looks back at me, eyes glowing bright silver, and pauses. Some of the stoic wrath on his face fades. Though his voice still sounds darker than normal, when he speaks to me, it’s quiet and calm. “You’re afraid... It’s okay. The alarm has been triggered, but nobody’s going to hurt you. I’ll make sure of it. I just need you to stay in the castle, where you’ll be safest. Can you do that for me?”
