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And then his voice—low, brutal, delicious—split the silence.
“You’d be safer with the snake,” he said, his voice dark silk stretched over steel.
I licked a droplet from my bottom lip, heart hammering in my chest. “So let her in. Let her slither between the sheets and see which of you bites harder.”
He moved fast.
Water surged as he reached me, both hands gripping the edge of the pool on either side of my body. Caging me in. The heat coming off him, even submerged, made my breath hitch.
“Careful what you ask for,” he growled. “I’m not the one who waits in the shadows. I’m the one who sinks his teeth in and doesn’t let go.”
My thighs clenched under the water. He was too close and still not close enough. Every nerve ending in my body screamed for friction. For impact. For him.
“I don’t want you to wait,” I whispered. “I want you to fuck me.”
His hand slid beneath the water, fingers curling around my thigh, dragging me against him. I gasped at the contact—bare skin, heat meeting heat. My breath stuttered. My fingers gripped the edge of the tile.
A door creaked in the distance.
Laughter drifted out into the night.
Two more men—presumably, his brothers—stepped into the courtyard, one shirtless, one in tactical pants and boots, carrying what looked like a training dummy over his shoulder.
They both saw us.
Saw me.
Bare-assed in the pool. Black thong. Wet hair. Eyes glazed with want.
They didn’t leer. Didn’t catcall. Just nodded once—almost in respect—and kept walking.
Me? I didn’t flinch. I didn’t cover up.
I leaned closer to Elias and murmured, “Think they’d let us borrow the snake … just for a night?”
He looked like he was going to combust.
“Vivi,” he warned, voice a growl so thick with restraint it bordered on dangerous.
I smiled sweetly, tilting my head. “What? I like things with bite.”
His jaw ticked. His arms locked around me under the water, and in one sharp, brutal movement, he lifted me from the pool.
“Elias—”
I shrieked as he tossed me over his shoulder, my soaked body pressed to the hard muscle of his back, water dripping from my legs, his hand gripping my bare thigh with unmistakable ownership.
“Put me down!”
“No.”
“You’re kidnapping me again.”
He walked across the stone, up the steps, into the house like he didn’t care who saw.
I wriggled, half-laughing, half-burning. “You’re not even going to let me towel off?”
“I’ll dry you myself.”