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“Love,” he murmured, his voice a soft caress as he leaned forward.

His forearm rested on the wall above my head as he raised his free hand to cup my cheek with mock tenderness. It shifted to my throat once again, pushing back until my head smacked against the wall lightly. He kept his grip there, pinning me as I squirmed beneath the hold. Raising my hands, I clawed at the bare skin of his forearm.

“What did I tell you about lying to me?”

He restricted my breathing just enough that I wheezed when I tried to speak, reminding me that if we came to blows, I would lose. It wouldn’t just be the opportunity to seduce him that would be lost, but I also didn’t stand a chance of fighting him one-on-one without any plants around me. Whoever had decided putting witches in a building was the best way was a fucking moron, because I belonged to the woods—to the gardens andanywherebut here.

My only hope was the stone. I glanced at the tile floor out of the corner of my eye, dropping a single arm to guide it up.

My focus was gone in the next moment, when Gray seemed to realize what I intended. He moved quickly, my eyes snapping to his face as it crashed down on mine. His lips were on me immediately, bruising in intensity as he devoured my mouth.

His fangs brushed against my lips, tearing open the flesh as he pried me open for him. I obeyed, parting for him and letting his tongue surge inside. My hands abandoned his forearms, pressing against his chest. I only pushed for a moment, protesting the touch we both knew I wanted.

That I shouldn’t want but would be lying to deny.

Then they curled into his shirt, grasping it and wrinkling the fabric to pull him closer. His groan came from low in his throat, filling my ear, and his body pressed tighter until I felt his cock against my stomach.

“Fuck, you’re impossible,” he said, pulling back just enough to mumble the words against my mouth.

I growled at him, reaching up to bury a hand in his hair. The dark, inky strands were soft in my fingers, sliding through as I gripped them harshly and dragged his mouth back to mine. Each sweep of his tongue against mine was a brand, a claim of ownership I should have fought against.

Instead, I sank deeper into his touch, pulling him where I wanted him as his body shifted. He pulled back just enough, sliding the hand at my throat down until he brushed the skin of my breast. He swallowed my startled gasp, smiling into me as he kneaded the flesh. Pressing harshly, squeezing and testing the weight of it, he chuckled as he found my nipple and ran his fingers over it.

I jolted in his grip, a strangled moan escaping me.

“Do you think any others will make you feel like this?” he asked, brushing my hardened nipple again. “Your hips are grinding on me, just begging for me to fuck you into the wall.”

I resisted the urge to protest, to push him off. Especially when his hand abandoned my breast, drifting down over my stomach. I felt him against the thin fabric of my sleep shorts, pressing the jersey into me as he kicked my legs apart.

My eyes rolled back in my head as he found my pussy with expert precision, barely a whisper of a touch over my heated skin.

“Tell me to stop,” he said, sinking his teeth into my bottom lip. His eyes remained open, holding mine as my breath came in a shuddering pant. “Tell me you don’t want this.”

My mouth parted with the need to say it, but the words wouldn’t come. They couldn’t, not when he pressed his hand tighter to my flesh. The cloth of my shorts rubbed against me, his fingers circling my clit slowly.

“I hate you,” I muttered, pulling his hair harder.

He chuckled, pressing his mouth to mine gently as I tossed my head back. “I don’t give a fuck about that. All that matters to me is how pretty you’ll look writhing on my cock.”

I gasped as he slipped his fingers under the edge of my shorts, the coolness of his skin touching me. There was nothing between us, nothing to separate us from the way he felt against me. He resumed his work on my clit, circling it as I lost the ability to breathe.

This was how I died.

I was going to come, and I didn’t even care what that said about me.

“Fuck,” I whimpered, blinding light filling the edges of my vision when he moved; his teeth grazing the side of my neck.

He stopped, his fingers stilling on my pussy.

“What are you doing?” I asked, wincing at the tiny pinch of his fangs as he bit down into my skin. He groaned at the snack, drawing my blood into his mouth as my hips moved against him.

Seeking the pressure he’d offered, searching for my pleasure.

He withdrew his teeth, his mouth redder than it had been before, and stared at me. Removing his hand from my shorts, he raised his fingers to his mouth. Those steely eyes drifted closed as he moaned, pulling them free and staring down at me.

“You can come when you tell me what I want to know.”

My mouth dropped open in shock. Surely, he couldn’t mean—