AllFreeNovel
Share Us
She didn’t like to remember any of this. It had been three years and it was as if it had only just happened. She could feel everything as if it was happening now, high above Manhattan with her hands pressed to the glass that was all that separated her from stepping out into air.
A fall that seemed tame in comparison to Balthazar Skalas in a darkened gazebo on a summer night.
She had opened her mouth again, that time to stop the madness—or so she liked to tell herself now—but nothing came out. His mouth continued to toy with her skin, chasing fire along her clavicle and sucking gently on the pulse at the base of her neck.
And meanwhile, his hand, huge and utterly without hesitation, skimmed its way up the inside of one thigh to the edge of her panties. Then, before she could even find the words to protest—or encourage him, more like—he stroked his way beneath.
Her whole life, Kendra had considered herself remarkably self-possessed. It came from being raised like an only child, so much younger was she than her brother. Always in the company of adults. Always expected to act far older than she was. Her friends in boarding school and college had always allowed impetuousness to lead them down questionable roads, but never Kendra. Never.
But that night, none of that mattered.
Because Balthazar stroked his way into her melting heat, and Kendra...disappeared.
There was only that strong arm at her back, his mouth on her neck, his fingers between her legs as he played with her. He murmured something she didn’t understand, rough and low against the tender skin in the crook of her neck, that only later it would occur to her was likely Greek.
But she didn’t have to understand the words to know that whatever he said, it was filthy.
It had shot through her like a lightning bolt.
She’d made a noise then, a sob, and he’d growled something in reply. And then he’d pinched her. Not hard, but not gently, either. That proud little peak that already throbbed—
Kendra had bucked against him, lost and wild and heaving out another kind of sob, high-pitched and keening.
How had the whole of the East Coast not heard her?
When she finally stopped shaking, she’d found him staring down at her, a kind of thunder on that face of his, so harsh that it was almost sensual. Brutally masculine and connected, somehow, to all the places where she’d still quivered. To where his hand still cupped her, so that all her molten heat was flooding his hand.
A notion that made another shudder rip through her.
“You are surprising,” he’d said, rough and low. “I am not usually surprised. Come.”
He’d pulled his hand from her panties, and she’d thought that harsh line of his mouth almost curved when she’d swayed, unable to stand on her own once he released her.
“Come?” she repeated.
“You’re more of a meal than a snack,” he had told her then, too much heat in his dark gaze. “And I prefer to savor my meals. I have a house not far from here.”
Reality had reasserted itself with a sickening thud. What on earth did she think she was doing?
A question she still couldn’t answer, three years later.
The back of her neck prickled then. She sucked in a breath as she turned, then froze.
It was as if she’d summoned him. He stood in a door she hadn’t known was there, that must have opened soundlessly, because she had no idea how long he had been watching her.
He was just as she remembered. Balthazar Skalas, the devil himself, his deep dark eyes alive with mockery and that cruel twist to his mouth.
And she could tell, instantly, that he remembered her perfectly.
“Kendra Connolly,” he said, as if he was tasting her name. His dark eyes glittered and she felt it. Everywhere. “Your brazenness is astonishing, truly. Have you finally come to finish what you started?”
CHAPTER TWO
BALTHAZARSKALASDETESTEDthe Connolly family.
He had long despised Thomas Connolly, who considered himself far more charismatic than he was and acted as if that supposed charisma made him a force to be reckoned with. When the only thing it had truly made him was appealing to the vulnerable and therefore a sworn enemy to Balthazar and his brother. His son had always been useless at best and otherwise wholly laughable.
Balthazar had been waiting for the time to deal with the elder Connolly for years. He might have forgiven the younger’s nonsense—or at least ignored it, the way he did all things beneath his notice—had foolish Tommy Connolly not believed he could steal from Balthazar with impunity.
