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“That was rather candid.”

I looked back at his face in the darkness, able to make out the tip of his mouth as he smirked. “That is a further irony of our relationship, is it not? I have no secrets from you, Azriel. You are the one person I can bare my soul to.”

“Almost as though you can trust me?” The playful questioning in his voice did untold things to my stomach.

“I do not think I could ever truly trust a man who holds a signed death warrant with my name on it.” I dared a small laugh. “But yes, I suppose something akin to trust is there. Something close enough.”

“You know, Evie, out of the two of us, I am not the closed book.” He moved towards me, leaning on one hand and bringing the other up to my face, brushing my cheek gently with the backs of his fingers. “You… You are a mystery. A deep well of secrets. Everyone knows who I am, what I am, but you… You are an enigma. So when you say that you can bare your soul to me, I do not take that lightly, for I do not think you have ever been able to even consider baring even a fraction of your soul to anyone else before.”

His words tore away at my heart, leaving behind a hole, bleeding and coarse, and almost painful. How could this man, this brute of a man, see into the very heart of me, and know me? I did not care for it, and yet I was the one who had sought him out.

When I did not respond, simply sat before him with my hands clutched in my lap so he did not see them shaking, he leaned closer still, and planted a kiss against the corner of my mouth.

“Take off your clothes.” There was no command in his tone, not this time, though his voice was no less devoid of desire.

“And what if I do not want to?” My tone was coquettish. Was I really teasing him? I heard Rebecca’s advice, a distant voice, telling me to take charge, because he’d like that. Yes, perhaps a silly little game was exactly what I needed to stave off the dread of what the coming day would bring.

“Shall I cut them off you again, wife?” Azriel growled, reaching out for me.

I seized his hands in mine. “Certainly not. I do not need you destroying even more of my clothes.”

“I intend to destroy all your clothes in time, and buy you an entire new wardrobe.” He jerked his hands towards him, taking me with them, pulling me against his chest. “Would you like to dress like the Spanish ladies do? Or perhaps the Italian fashions are more your style?”

“I-I do not know.” I gasped as I felt his hard length pressing into my stomach. “Though… I do wonder.”

“What do you wonder?” He exhaled a hot breath against my lips.

“What do you like? You asked me what I liked, and now I want to know what you like.” I moved to kiss him, pulling back from his opening mouth with a sharp intake of breath so I hovered just out of reach. “Do you like to be ridden?”

Desire practically leapt off his skin, sparks in the darkness. He growled again, deeper this time, from a place of need.

“Do you intend to ride me?”

I shrugged, enjoying playing the innocent far too much. “I have never done it before. I doubt I would be much good at it.”

“Then let me teach you. But first, take off your clothes.”

I sat up, straddling his thighs, shuffling the robe down my arms and casting it to the end of the bed. I peeled up my nightgown, and when my arms were caught above me, my vision obscured, Azriel sat up and seized my nipple in hismouth. I whimpered as his hand caught fast on the nightgown, trapping me so I was squirming and moaning as he licked and sucked hard.

“Oh… oh god.”

“Is that good?” He asked against my skin, and I nodded in the cloud of my nightgown.

“Yes.”

He moved to the other nipple, giving it equal attention, nipping gently with his teeth so I yelped and wriggled on his thighs. With a laugh, he lifted the nightgown just enough to free my mouth, and kissed me, biting down on my lower lip hard enough to have me moaning.

“I like you like this.”

I laughed breathlessly against his mouth. “I know it.”

He peeled the nightgown the rest of the way off my arms and cast it aside, lying back against the pillows and pushing the linens below his hips so his cock sprang forth. With a firm grasp, he guided me onto his hips, so he was nestled within my folds.

“It will be deeper like this, and you might need to take it very slowly, beloved. Are you wet?”

I shifted a little, and shook my head. “Not enough, I think.”

Azriel, still holding on to my hips, rocked me back and forth along his length. I was so surprised by the surge of heat in my core that my hands flew to my mouth, suppressing a squeak. But the feeling was so pleasurable I could not help but repeat it, over and over again, until we were both panting.