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The nearer she got, the more obvious the heat radiating off him became. The man was a damn furnace. After an eternity of slow-motion shifting, Kaia was propped up on her side beside him. She held her breath lest he should feel it and studied his features in the darkness.
Kaia had to admit the man was beautiful. She didn’t think she’d ever seen him entirely relaxed before. When he was awake, there was a permanent undercurrent of cold discontentment in the sculpted features of his face. When they sparred, or fought, or kissed… There was a flash of something demented and alive in there.
But now, there was only peace. Thick lashes swept over broad, chiseled cheeks. Strands of dark hair splayed over a relaxed brow. Mouth devoid of tension, his lips turned up a little at the corners. Naturally set into a small, content smirk. She was so focused on his mouth that she didn’t realize he’d opened his eyes until his hand was in her hair. She balked for a moment as he pulled her to him.
Their lips joined in fire, and so did the rest of them. Even with the oversized shirt she’d been wearing, Kaia felt him burn through the fabric. Neither of them made a sound. All there was were their breaths, their mouths, and the pounding in her ears as he worked his fingers through her hair, against her scalp. It was still sore there, from the way he had yanked her back on theZenith. But the caress this time was nothing like that, the pain only a phantom left by those same hands in a different mood.
It was a strange sensation to feel the spikes on his tongue take shape as he deepened the kiss. She broke away, pausing for breath.
“Can I see?” she whispered.
Keeping his eyes locked on hers, Orion tilted his head back a little and opened his mouth to show her.
It was visceral and wrong and so, so weird, the way the spikes pulsed into hard protrusions on the surface of his tongue. Her gut clenched at the sight.
Kaia was about to ask for permission for what she did next, but realizedfuck that—he didn’t ask her permission the other night.
She slid the tip of her finger past his lips, pressing the pad against one of the spikes.
Gross. Isn’t it?
It was slick with saliva and not sharp enough to hurt, but sohard. A droplet of silver leaked out from under her fingertip. Glancing back at his eyes, her breath hitched at what she saw there: a helpless blackness, a hungry void staring back at her.
She did that.
She slid her finger down his tongue, just like he’d done to her. It came away with a streak of silver glinting on the pad. She looked into those black eyes as she brought it to her mouth and sucked off the substance.
It was only a test, of course. It didn’t taste bad, but she wasn’tintoit. She was just doing her best to suppress the disgust of it all.
But for it to be a proper test, she needed more.
When Kaia dipped back toward him, he squeezed both hands against her cheeks, shoving his tongue into her mouth with a rabid growl. It was an invasion of heat, iron, and bitter caffeine enveloping her senses. Kaia fisted a hand in his hair hard, maintaining the pressure she’d need if he started getting too rough.
And when he tried to flip them over and roll her underneath him, she planted her knees into the bed on either side of him, staying firmly straddled atop him.
“Fuck.” It was more of a whine against her lips as he pushed his hips, jolting her up with the movement.
So much exorin was seeping into her mouth that she had to swallow quickly as they devoured one another. Still, it spilled over to her chin, dripping onto jawline, sliding along the taut cords in his neck. Oh, God, why was she licking it from his throat as he drove his head back into the bed underneath her? Why did the way his hands burned her face make her grind back against him?
Kaia had to end this. She got what she needed. She was certain it was enough for her test.
She began to pull away, but he tightened his hold on her face, painful fingers digging into her skin.
Kaia worried if she didn’t get him off now, she wouldn’t find the strength to do it later. Her own arousal was sleek between her legs. Her body thrummed from her core to her chest with each roll of his hardness against her. Was this the intoxicating effect of the exorin?
Just for a moment, she almost wished it were. That would at least be an excuse.
Kaia twisted her torso away, jutting an elbow into his ribcage just the way he’d shown her at the gym. But she was too gentle about it, scared to get him even angrier. He grunted, but wasn’t deterred. He clawed up the back of her thigh, lifting the hem of the shirt over her ass as he grabbed for flesh. Kaia hissed through her teeth, shuttering her eyes as she tried to resist rolling back against him with the pleasure shooting through the nerves under his grip.
The knife she’d found under Orion’s coolbox earlier was what did it. When she slid it from beneath her pillow and put it against the side of his throat, Orion froze. They both did.
His black eyes narrowed, and she thought he might fight. Fuck, shewantedhim to fight. Give her an excuse to plunge that blade into his neck. He winced as she pressed the weapon harder to his skin.
“All right,” he said in a gravelly voice. He took his hands off her and held them to either side of him in a gesture of surrender. “All right.”
“It’s not all right,” Kaia snarled.
The arousal that thrummed through her body was morphing into something else. She had her chance now to get some semblance of payback for what he did to her. That wasn’t part of her plan. She’d only intended to test her immunity to the exorin. Yet here she was, watching his throat bob in a swallow as the blade dented his skin. Was he scared? “It isnot fucking all right.”
