Page 205

Footsteps, again.

I made a run for it.

Through a skewed open arch, around the nearest corner … Before me, a wide space unfolded. A great hall in better times, no doubt, although now the ceiling was gone and only the slender buttresses along the walls hinted at the place it had once been. Moonlight bathed the weathered marble floor in an ethereal glow, and for a moment, my steps slowed as I drank in the strange, shattered beauty of it all …

Only then did I realise the world had gone suspiciously quiet behind me.

I stiffened, then slowly began turning, goosebumps prickling every inch of my skin. But the doorway through which I’d come was empty, no trace of the tall silhouette I’d expected to find waiting …

Something moved above me.

Aboveme.

I knew before I started running that I was too late.

He didn't even land. The solid weight of his body hit me from behind, and then his arms were around me, catching me as I tumbled forward … Velvet wings swept out on either side of us. I tried to land on my feet as we half fell, half floated to the floor, but he wouldn’t let me; cold marble bit into my knees, myhands, my shins as he lowered me, pinning me to the ground as I struggled against his hold.

‘That’scheating,’ I gasped, trying to elbow his wing.

His laughter brushed over the back of my neck, hot and feathery. ‘All you told me was to make you speak the truth, cactus. I didn’t hear anything about rules.’

I tried to wriggle from his grasp. He didn’t budge, his weight locking me between him and the floor, his hands constraining mine with effortless strength. The cold of the marble was seeping through my dress, numbing my stomach; in contrast, the heat of his muscular body pressing into my back was almost unbearable.

‘Want to tell me what’s on your mind now?’ he muttered sweetly into my ear.

‘You bastard,’ I panted, which would have sounded more convincing if not for the hysterical laughter spilling out with it. Gods save me, his hard body on mine, raw strength leaving me entirely at his mercy … how was I supposed to keep thinking at all? ‘You’re holding me down and tormenting me! Do I look like I have time for deep ruminations onanything?’

He wedged his thigh in between mine, forcing my legs apart. ‘If you’re looking for something deep …’

‘Like ocean trenches?’ I managed through gritted teeth.

‘Oh, we both know you’re not thinking about the ocean,’ he informed me, easily transferring both my wrists to his left hand. His right slid below my skirt again, and this time there was no fleeing as he relentlessly, unyieldingly made his way up my thigh, closer and closer to my soaked underwear. ‘Unless it’s a metaphor for wetness, of course, in which case—’

My hips jerked up against him – I couldn’t help it. ‘Creon.’

‘No?’ he murmured. ‘Not thinking about metaphors either? One wonders whatisoccupying your thoughts, in that case.’

Agony. Pure and simple agony, my skin burning under his touch, my body craving that sweet, sweet invasion … His hand was so close now.Soclose to the place where I needed him most, and yet he was stalling, waiting for me to respond – a single bit of truth away from ecstasy.

My lips – my stupid, stubborn lips – moved without my permission. ‘Gardening. I … I’m thinking of gardening.’

His rough laugh told me he was enjoying the struggle far too much. ‘Are you?’

‘How about a maze of boxwood hedges?’ I was babbling now, barely hearing myself. He nudged my thighs further apart with his knee between my legs, baring me and the damning wetness at my core to the night air, and my thoughts spiralled into nothing butneed– nothing but the bulge of his cock pressed against my lower back, taunting me with its nearness. My tongue kept going all the same. ‘And a rose garden and an exotic fish pond and … and—’

His fingers ghosted over my underwear just once.

Every muscle in my body clenched simultaneously as sparks exploded beneath that tender skin – clenched around the emptiness far too deep inside me, craving the fulfilment I knew was just a whisper away. Hehadto know, damn him. He could feel my fingers clawing at the cold marble, could feel my body begging for him to take it … But he retracted as swiftly as he’d come, fingers brushing gossamer touches back down my thighs. Refusing to set me free. Refusing to save me from myself.

‘And?’ he said sweetly, his long hair tickling my cheek as he bent over me.

‘Please,’ I whispered.

‘Hmm?’ He ground against me, a slow, torturous stroke, his straining hardness all I could feel even through trousers and coat and dress. Ready to shatter me. Ready to drive me over the edge in all the ways only he could. ‘Is there anything you need, love?All you need to do is tell me – your wish is my command, of course.’

That melodious voice, teasing and taunting, curling around me like smoke in the darkness … I gasped in a breath, then another one. His fingers were drawing idle circles on the inside of my thigh, barely-there touches that left trails of fire in their wake; no mercy, those touches told me, no matter how much I might beg. Fae wars didn’t end in surrender.

Only defeat would do.