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Chapter Eight
Ven
“I’m warning you, Ryder…” I say.
“I’ll be a perfect gentleman.”
His voice has dropped several octaves and sounds like moonlight on waves with a deep, dark undertow. Pulling me under, alluring and magical. He sounds like anything but a gentleman. I shiver, and my sex tightens involuntarily.
Those teal eyes settle on me as he begins to unbuckle his jeans. I can’t take my eyes off his fingers. He’s not moving nearly fast enough. When his pants drop to the floor, I realize I’m still staring and spin around.
Ryder’s hands slide over my hips from behind, and he steps up close to me. Something very long and very hard presses into my ass. I can feel it even through my towel. My heart flutters, and I can’t tell if it’s panic or desire. Or a bit of both. “You’re blocking the shower,” he whispers in my ear.
Then he lifts me, as if I weigh nothing, and sets me down a foot to the right.
Despite the cool shower I just took, it’s an inferno inside this bathroom. The glass is foggy, but I can see the outline of Ryder’s body as he stands under the water. He presses one hand against the wall and leans into the stream of droplets, turning his head back and forth to get his hair wet. Slowly, I force myself to turn around.
Would it be so bad if I…
No. I can’t forget that he’s a demon. A lust demon. This is what he does. He’s done it to a thousand women before me, and he’ll do it to a thousand more after. Even if he doesn’t have horns and a tail, demons are dangerous. End. Of. Story. And I do not need any more drama in my life.
Despite what I keep telling myself, I can’t get the image of Ryder’s naked body out of my head. Can’t stop feeling his fingers as they brushed across my hips. How I’d wanted them to go lower, and lower… Every sound coming from inside the shower makes my breath catch. I need to remember how much I’d despised him just hours ago. I need to. But I can’t.
Finally, what has to be ten excruciating minutes later, the water turns off. I suck in a breath and close my eyes as I hear Ryder step out of the shower. He doesn’t move for a moment. My heart is racing so hard I can feel it against my arms, which are crossed tightly over my chest.
Light as a feather, Ryder traces one fingertip down my back. Then he tugs my towel off with a snap.
“What the hell?” I growl, spinning around. Even though I’m now completely in the nude.
“I don’t see another towel anywhere,” he says, a look of mock innocence on his face. “Surely you don’t want your guest standing here cold and shivering?”
“You are not my guest,” I grind out between clenched teeth. “You staying here is purely out of necessity.”
“Necessity,” he says, and his eyes rove over me, his voice rough and dark again.
“Stop staring,” I say, glaring at him. I curse inwardly at how unsteady my voice sounds.
“That’s like telling a child to stop gazing at the sun.” He smirks.
“You’re behaving like one, that’s for sure.”
He finishes toweling himself off, not breaking eye contact for a moment, then he hands me back the towel. I wrap it around myself and stomp into my bedroom, satisfied at the zap the magical orb makes when he lags behind. After rifling through my dresser, I put on a pair of cotton pajama shorts and a tank top. Ryder watches me intently.
“What happened to your legs?” he asks after a moment.
I look at the faint scars running down the outsides of my legs, from ankle to knee. I’d been able to have magical healers fix most of the damage, but not all. I clear my throat to make sure my voice is steady. “Burn marks. From when I was abducted.”
Ryder’s eyes widen in surprise, but I don’t want to talk about it, so I change the subject. “Aren’t you going to glamour yourself some clean clothes?” I ask.
He shrugs. “I usually sleep in the nude.”
I snort. “Of course you do. Well, not at my house.”
With a sigh, he waves a hand and his very well-endowed lower half is covered by a pair of black boxer-briefs. They leave little to the imagination. Not that I need my imagination since I’ve seen the real thing. And his abs… I’m going to need to get back in a cold shower.
How am I going to make it through the night?
I walk over to the bed, cringing at how small it is. I pull back the covers and slip underneath. The orb is too small to allow him to go around to the other side, so he has to crawl over my side. For a moment he’s hovering directly over the top of me. A necklace that I hadn’t noticed before, made from small round beads of wood and lava rock, dangles in front of my eyes. I could reach up right now and hook my leg around him…
