Page 177 of The Bonds of Indigo

“Lucifer!”

“No!” I shout so quickly it takes a heartbeat to register the implication of that word. “I can’t, and you fucking know I can’t! Because I don’t want that. But it’s what needs to happen. I can’t be with you.”

I swear I’m not even halfway through a blink before he’s in front of me, the cool press of wood hitting my back. His hand wraps around my throat, and I gasp, shaking my head even though I don’t want him to stop.

“Your time to convince me has ended, little deviant. When has a Demon of want and need ever given a fuck about can’t?”

Lightning rips down my spine as every buried need I’ve ever had for this man surges up at once, igniting my skin and threatening to make me do something I’ll never recover from.

“Kayn… please, don’t…” Stop. Don’t stop. Please, bloody Beyond, don’t stop.

He leans in, his body pinning mine to the wall. His breath ghosts over my cheek as he whispers, “Our little Amarah warned me that anything you told me about why you left is bullshit.”

My breath snags.

“What?” I hadn’t heard a damn thing—and I would have. My hearing is just as good as his, if not better. “How?”

“That isn’t important right now. Do you know what is?”

My hands fist into his shirt, and I’m torn between pulling him closer or pushing him away for his own damn safety. Meanwhile, my cursed Vigoro is already reaching for him like he’s the only thing I can survive on. Like I’ll die without him.

His knee nudges between my legs and I groan, friction dragging across both my cocks.

I swallow hard, then grit through my teeth, “Kayn…”

“What’s important,” he murmurs against the space between my neck and shoulder, “is hearing you beg me to stay, beg for my forgiveness. Then beg me to take you with us because that’s what you want. That, little deviant, is all I need to hear come from that lying mouth of yours.”

The sensation of his fangs brushing against my skin has me freezing. Fear detonating through my veins. “Don’t… don’t bite me.”

“Why’s that?”

I’m in way over my head. I could summon my shadows to subdue him, wipe this moment from his memory along with Amarah’s, and throw them both out. I could try to convince my father that the Witch was more trouble than she was worth and that I’d investigate what happened to his Grimhorn. Then go back to everything I’d done before leaving him the first time.

But I’m a fucking fool for this man—and for that girl.

So, I don’t lie.

“My father will smell you on me, Kayn, and he will kill you.”

A heartbeat passes in silence and stillness. All that’s between us is a thousand questions and my breathing, which I can’t seem to control.

It’s in this quiet that he… chuckles. “Well, fuck. How did I not even consider that to be the reason?” He inclines back, but only enough to hover inches from my face. “He threatened my life…”

I grind my molars together, taking in a deep breath of him.

“Yes…”

“Yes,” he mimes. “You didn’t want to leave me.”

I shake my head. “No. No… I didn’t, Kayn.”

He leans toward me again. “Well, Lucifer.” Bloody Beyond, the heat from his words against my lips has my heart beating like a drum against my chest. “You’d better roll around with Amarah to get me off you, because you won’t be telling me what not to do with what’s mine.”

Our mouths crash together, and it isn’t just him putting force behind it. Every part of me needs this. Needs him. Fuck, I was a fool and maybe I still am because I don’t want to stop this, even though I know I should.

His tongue breaks into my mouth just as mine eagerly wraps around his. He groans, and I’m thrown back into the memory of the day I realized how perfect he was for me.

How perfect he still is for me. Everything from his taste—whisky and blood orange, enough to make me heady—to the sounds he makes that could summon a storm. I’m a damn mess for him.