AllFreeNovel
Share Us
There was a part of me who didn’t like that. Didn’t like that I was attracted to the darker sides of him. The part that sometimes believed I really was sweet and naïve and innocent. And in some ways, I was. I might have thought the thoughts, but I’d never acted on a single one of them. I’d never been in any situation where I’d come close to doing them. I’d been kissed. Once. But then Valen had found out and there was zero chance of it ever happening again.
Then there was that other part of me. The more dominant part. The one that didn’t care anymore. The one that had been caged too long. Needed freedom. Needed release. Needed something to change. Anything.
I was done being a captive in my own life. Done waiting patiently for a future I didn’t want.
“How much does it kill you?” I asked him.
His hand smacked the tree trunk above my head. “Do not test me, princess.”
I planned to. “Wanting quite possibly the only person in the entire world you can never have.”
He leant his lips to my ear. “You think very highly of yourself for a woman who lets her man fuck around.”
I reached up ever so slightly to his ear. “On the contrary. I think very little of myself. Least of all that what I want matters to anyone else but me.”
Valen pressed against me, and I felt his whole body was tense. I couldn’t tell if he was holding himself back or holding himself in place. Perhaps they were one and the same.
“You are many things, princess, but self-deprecating and defeatist you are not.”
“How would you know what I am?”
“It’s my job to watch you.”
“You mean, it’s your job to make sure I stay pure and innocent while Apollo gets to wet his dick in any idiot who’ll spread her legs for him?” The venom in my tone surprised me.
“I don’t see you doing anything to stop him,” he growled, like he took it personally.
I shoved against him, and he swayed right back to press me into the tree again.
“Apollo wouldn’t care if I was spread, willing and naked, over his bed in offering,” I told him. I sounded bitter. I was more bitter about the fact that I wouldn’t have minded being spread naked and willing in Valen’s bed at that point.
Valen’s hand touched on my hip, softly at first then harder. Just as slowly, he ran it up my side and splayed his hand just under my breast.
“And still you want him,” he said, but it was accusing.
“Iamall but engaged to him,” I reminded him. I’d meant to sound sarcastic, but all that came out was my anger for Valen.
His body pressed into mine deeper. I felt my breath come faster. My heart hitched in my chest. My clit tingled.
It was dark. We were both drunk. No one knew where we were. And we felt on the cusp of tumbling into something dangerously amazing.
His nose dipped to my jaw, and he released the faintest groan, like desperation mixed with resignation. His breath on my skin sent goosebumps flaring. My nipples tightened.
My hand went to his chest. I didn’t push him away. My hand fisted his shirt like I was holding him in place. My body pressed back into his as well as it was able.
I was on the precipice of nervous anticipation, but my heart was steady. Thudding evenly in my chest like this was right. This was natural. Normal.
Valen ran his nose over my skin and his lips skimmed my throat with the briefest of kisses. My head tipped sideways to give him better access and his hand on me tightened. His other hand went to my other hip and his body shifted as he almost thrust against me. He was hard. Very hard.
My hand closed tighter over his shirt, and I leant my head against his.
We were breathing the same air. We existed in the same space.
And I didn’t want to be anywhere else.
Suddenly, a howl rent the night.
It was a very poor, drunk human imitation, but the bursting of the bubble had shivers running up my spine and I jumped. Valen’s hands tightened on me again, but it was almost supportive and steadying this time.
