My mouth finds hers. I kiss her like she’s air and I’ve been drowning in fire. She kisses me back like she’s trying to put the flames out.
And for one moment, oneterriblemoment, I remember who I was.
And Ihateit.
I pull away from her, the green fire roaring again.
“You shouldn’t have done that,” I whisper.
Her eyes shine. “I’ll do it again,” she says. “I’ll keep doing it. Until you remember.”
I let the shadows dissipate. “Leave.”
She doesn’t, her body still intertwined with mine. “I’m not finished.”
A smile curves up my face. I’m done with games, and it seems so is she. “I can’t promise to be gentle with you. But I can promise that you’ll come so hard, you’ll feel it for days.”
Her thighs tremble around me, and she stares me down as she mouths,I love you.
She dared to try and fix me. She kissed me like I was him, like I was still that boy with trembling hands and a voice that cracked when he said her name.
I hate her for that.
I love her for it.
It hurts worse than any blade, any torture I’ve ever endured.
“You think you can heal me?” I growl, slamming her back against the bed, my hand braced beside her head, thorns breaking through the mattress. “That your soft words and sad eyes will unmake what I’ve become?”
She stares at me, lips parted, chest rising with each breath. She doesn’t answer.
She doesn’t need to.
Because I already know, and it makes me furious.
“You want the man I was?” I snarl. “Then take what’s left of him.”
I kiss her, rough and hungry, like it’s a punishment, like I can shove all the confusion and grief back down with the taste of her. She gasps against my mouth, but she doesn’t push me away. Her grip tightens, claws into my skin, and I drag her harder against me.
We make love like it’s war.
Every movement is a battle between what I am and what I was. Between what I want and what I’ve become. My shadows crawl over her skin, thorns curling around us.
My hands knead her soft breasts, twisting her nipples as her nails claw down my back.
“Caspian!” She cries out my name, the old one, and I freeze, just for a moment.
Rose, I’m not.
I’m not him.
Unable to stop touching her, I bring her to the edge over and over until she’s shaking, breathless, tears glistening on her cheeks. She’s hurting. And I’m the reason. And still…her body answers mine.
She’s so wet, my cock easily slides in and out. My fingers are sloppy as I circle her clit.
She feels good. She feels like home. And I ruin her anyway.
When she shatters beneath me, I hold her too tightly. I press my mouth to her throat and breathe her in and pretend I can keep her as she is, soft and trembling and mine.
