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I can feel myself leaning, once again caught in her spell. And maybe itisa spell. Maybe this gorgeous creature I’ve been taught to fear has me bewitched.

None of that stops me from continuing to lean in, and it seems the same can be said for Key.

Crack.

I only have a second to register the beam from the floor above splitting away from the rest, only a single moment to predict where it will land before I roughly shove Key out of the way. She winds up with her back pressed to the wall just as the beam crashes against my back, and I grunt and tense as it rolls away, already assessing her.

“Are you okay?”

Her lips are parted in surprise, her chest heaving. “You saved me again.”

“Aye.” I realize my hands are braced on either side of her head, our bodies only a hair’s breadth apart. “Seems now you owe me again.”

I can make out her pulse fluttering at her throat, and her pink tongue swipes across her lower lip, and her eyes—those eyes are utterlybewitching—and I do the last thing I should, most likely.

I crash my mouth against hers.

17

Keyanna

The surprise that courses through me lasts all of three seconds. Three fucking seconds ofWhat the hell?before my body catches up to the situation and has a team meeting with my brain to decide that, yes, we are absolutely on board with Lachlan kissing us senseless.

I feel his hands lift from their place on the stone on either side of my head, his palms finding my cheeks to hold my face as his lips move against mine with an intensity that steals my breath. It’s like every second of the frustration I’ve felt since meeting him has suddenly morphed into this all-consumingwantthat has me grasping at his sweater to pull him closer, has me tilting up my face to seek more.

“Key,” he breathes roughly against my mouth. “Is this all right?”

“Don’t stop,” I manage, my voice sounding all wrong.

He groans, a sound that I feel down in my toes, and then his fingers are in my hair, tugging gently enough not to hurt but with just enough pressure that Ifeelit. I can’t remember the last time I’ve been kissed like this; the last year hasn’t really been a great time to date, after all, but honestly, I’m not sure that I’veeverbeen kissed like this.

Lachlan kisses like he’s trying to consume me; his teeth nip at my bottom lip just before his tongue teases the same spot, and then he’surging me to open for him, something I’m all too happy to do. His tongue touches mine, warm and wet and seeking—the act of it so desperate, it feels a bit like sex. Like his tongue is fucking my mouth, claiming it, eradicating every other kiss that came before it.

“S’not fair,” he rumbles against my lips just before his tongue dips back inside.

I suck in a breath, my lids heavy and my limbs feeling like Jell-O. “What’s not?”

One of his hands slips from my hair down to my throat, his palm so wide that it covers the entire expanse of my neck, his thumb sweeping back and forth across my pulse. I can feel the way it pounds under his touch, but I’m still dizzy with the way his tongue slides against mine, the way his knee creeps up between my legs to hold me steady, offering a delicious pressure that makes me want to rock back and forth.

“S’not fair that you’re so goddamned beautiful,” he rasps.

A sound escapes me that sounds suspiciously like a whimper, and Idofeel my hips tilting as if they have a mind of their own, the friction of my pussy against his thigh eliciting a shower of sparks between my legs even through my clothes.

I’ve never felt a need like this; I think if he asked me to lie down on the dirty stone right now, I absolutely would. Every moment he’s been insufferable, or annoying, or a downright asshole—now it feels like they were just tiny pieces of kindling. Stacked over one another again and again until one tiny spark set it all ablaze. And now I’m fucking burning.

“Lachlan,” I whine, shifting my hips again.

His lips tease the corner of my mouth, drifting down my jaw before he leaves a sucking kiss just below it. “Feels good?”

“Mhm.”

His hand finds my waist, the other still tangled in my hair, and then I feel him tug at my hips, forcing me to rock back and forth. “So lovely like this,” he murmurs. “All flushed and pink from my kisses.”

“Is this insane?”

“Mm.” I feel the wet heat of his tongue against my throbbing pulse. “I reckon you’ve done nothing but make me insane since the moment I met you.”

I gasp when I feel his teeth scrape along my skin. “Not exactly a glowing endorsement.”