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“Daphne…” Lukas trailed off.

I was already running through a list of every epithet in the book and slinging each one at myself. I tried to wrench out of his grip so I could run away, but he just pulled me flush to his body, forcing my head back even further so I had to meet his eyes.

“Tell me you meant that.”

There was no way I could lie to him. “I did.”

Lukas’s throat bobbed once. “Well. Better get started then.”

I expected him to lean down and kiss me. Or use the leverage he had on my face and body and bring me to him. But no. He just stood there. Expecting me to climb him like a tree.

Fine. I was past holding back anyway.

I trailed my hands down his chest and hit his belt buckle, tucking a finger under the thick leather and pulling him closer, eliminating the few inches between our skin.

My fingers drifted to the buckle, finding the loop. I only had one goal, cooling my fevered skin with his. I was basically attacking him, and that seemed to be his final straw.

Lukas’s mouth was on mine in a second. Hesitant at first, and far too light to soothe the hammering of my pulse.

His lips were as soft as I guessed and as sinful as I could have hoped.

Actually, that was a lie. No amount of guesswork or hope could have predicted this level of perfection.

Lukas kissed me in deep, long pulls for what felt like an eternity of torture. But when his open belt buckle clinked against itself, he lost it.

His tongue was in my mouth in seconds, brushing against my own and making me question why I had ever been scared of crossing this line with him when it felt this good.

Consequences be damned. Neither of us thought to pause and consider that this was a line we should never cross. No, we were both jumping into it with zero hesitation.

I kept my hands pressed into his lower stomach and basked in the kiss, moaning contentedly at a long stroke of Lukas’s tongue.

Lukas pulled back slightly at that, gripping my face in his hands like a vise. His eyebrows were pinched together in disbelief. And somehow, I just knew he was looking at me like that because he hadn’t ever heard me make that sound before.

When Lukas bent back down and took my mouth in another desperate kiss, my own skin started itching with the need to move. I needed to drive him as crazy as he made me.

I needed him toknowhow badly I wanted him and for him to match that ferocity tenfold.

I needed to do something with the fire building under my skin, making me shaky with the full force of what I felt for him.

And when he wrapped his hand around my hair and tugged, I got the confidence to do something I’d always wanted to do. Especially to him.

I dodged his mouth when he leaned in again, instead pressing a kiss to the exposed triangle of skin at the base of his throat.

And then I sank to my knees in front of him.

“Daph,” Lukas said, hoarse and scraping. He pulled at my arms, trying to get me to stand. “Not yet.”

“What, Luke?” I asked, looking up at him under my eyelashes. I knew what he was thinking.

“You don’t…Are you sure you want to…” He swallowed hard, like it was painful to say the words.

He knew I’d never done this before. Because I’d been the one to tell him. It was a drunken confession after a stupid game with our friends.

At the time, he’d grumbled something under his breath likeat least there’s thatbut I hadn’t known what it meant.

“I want to.” I sounded like I was begging. “Let me.”

When Lukas didn’t budge, keeping my face gripped in his hands, I tried again. “First time for everything,” I said, relishing in the feeling of the wood biting into my skin as I kneeled in front of him, hands resting on his muscular thighs.