Nika stumbles toward me. “Don’t touch that! You don’t get to destroy that! That was—” Her voice hitches.
I barely register the pleas, too consumed by the safe I completely missed. “If you don’t give me the combination, I’ll destroy every single thing in this place.” I let her glimpse the certainty in my expression. “Then I’ll burn down your greenhouse.”
Nika launches herself at me with pure, feral rage.
She hits me like a missile, all teeth, kicks, and gouging fingers. She aims for my throat but gets tangled in my unzipped pants. This woman’s a rabid beast that’s lost all control.
“What the hell?” I catch her wrists but can barely contain them.
“That’s my mother!” She fights, clawing at my hands and face, trying to get free. “You’re soulless! A destroyer. A ruiner. You’re empty! There’s nothing inside you but cold and death and misery.”
I spin, slamming her back into the wall and nearly knocking the breath from her lungs. She wraps her legs around my waist, dragging me closer.
If that’s what you want.
Without thinking, I crash my mouth against hers.
I’d only meant to make her stop talking, to keep her from saying things that cut too close to the bone and exposed things I’ve spent years burying.
The tactic works, but the violent, all-consuming lust her accusations had chased away comes flooding back.
Not just for me either.
Nika is all teeth and fury, but now she’s trying to crawl under my skin instead of shredding it.
I taste rust when she bites my lip and crush my body against hers. Forcing her jaw open, I lay claim to that too-talented tongue and mouth. I can’t stop myself from pressing closer,kissing more fervently, digging my fingers into her arms. I need to feel her, and I need her to feel me.
Her hands slice through my hair, painfully tugging me closer.
Good. I want this to hurt.
Pain’s a sensation I can process. Unlike the truth in her eyes or the anguish in her voice.
With one hand under her ass, I hitch Nika higher. The other yanks at my jeans in an effort to get them low enough to finish this once and for all.
She’s so unbelievably wet. Despite the talking and fighting and the grief she dug up and spread around like fertilizer, she wants this as badly as I do. The scent of her envelops me. Roses and blood, sweat and cotton. She drives me fucking crazy.
Once I get my cock free, I line myself up and finally slam in.
The tight, almost painful resistance is both immediate and unexpected.
Nika yelps, bites her lip, and flinches.
I freeze.
That’s not the blissful moan from earlier. She’s too tense. The warning skitters across my mind, realization surfacing through the haze of lust and rage.
I grip her chin between my fingers and force her to look at me. She glares, tears that aren’t at all related to her previous freak-out clinging to her lashes.
Fuck my life.
I hold her gaze, my heart pounding against my ribs. “Nika. Are you a virgin?”
The truth scorches through me as Nika pants against the wall. Naked. Ruined. Exposed in a way that constricts my chest.
The beautiful assassin is a virgin.
What the hell have I done?
