Page 7

Chapter Seven

NIALL O’LEARY

“What we want becomes a whisper against the roar of what we must do, and sacrifice becomes our second nature. You have to take her.”

Queen Talora Blackthorn Shadowhart Forrest

M y shirt is gone. A grave fucking injustice, considering she’s still wearing that lacy contraption over her tits—the kind a man dreams of tearing apart with his teeth. If she doesn’t take it off soon, I just might.

“Your turn,” I rasp, voice rough with hunger as I turn her and run my fingertip down her throat to the edge of the lace.

Her lavender eyes glint with mischief. Dangerous. Tempting. “Where should I start?”

Gods fucking help me.

“A shirt for a shirt seems fair,” I manage, even as my gaze locks onto the lace covering her like a taunt. “But that…” I gesture to it with a flick of my fingers, my jaw tight, my restraint thinner than a thread. “…needs to go too.”

She tilts her head, amusement curling her lips. Teasing. Testing. Then, with the kind of confidence that could bring kingdoms to their knees, she reaches behind her back. With a flick of her fingers, the lace falls away.

My breath fucking stalls. The delicate scrap of lace flutters to the ground at my feet, but I don’t look down. I can’t. Not when she moves, shedding the delicate barrier between us like they mean nothing. Like she knows exactly what she’s doing to me.

She’s bare. Bared to me. Like an offering. Like a fucking dare. Every inch of her exposed skin is a fucking masterpiece—soft curves, taut muscle, smooth, fucking mine.

And then—she steps back.

It’s slight, barely a shift, but the hesitation slams into me like a fist to the ribs. My entire body is taut, every muscle coiled, straining toward her, but she stays just out of reach.

The space between us? Unbearable. I won’t let it stay that way.

“Running from me?” My voice is a growl. A warning.

She barely gets out a shaky laugh before I grab her waist and haul her against me. Soft curves crash into hard muscle, her gasp swallowed by the heat sparking between us.

Fuck , she fits against me too perfectly. Like she was made for this. Made for me.

Her breath ghosts over my lips. “Only from my common sense.”

Common sense. A joke. A lie. Because she wants this. I can feel it in the way her body presses into mine, the tremor that runs through her as I drag my knuckles down her side—slow, deliberate. I watch her reaction like a predator watches prey. The sharp inhale. The way her fingers twitch, like she doesn’t know whether to push me away or drag me deeper.

“Common sense is wildly overrated,” I murmur.

She exhales. Tension bleeds from her frame as my hands slide lower. Fingers grip the curve of her hips. Hold her there.

I press my forehead to hers, swallowing back the feral sound rising in my throat. My pulse is a punishing thrum in my veins, my control a fragile, fraying leash.

“Felicity…” Her name is a demand. A prayer.

She tilts her face up, lips parting, chest rising in shallow, ragged breaths.

I brush a lock of hair from her temple. Deceptively soft. A breath. A moment. The last sliver of restraint between us.

Her fingers drag over my chest, nails scraping just enough to make me suck in a breath.

Fuck. She knows what she’s doing.

“Don’t hold back,” she whispers.

My fingers tighten on her hips, heat licking up my spine. A slow, wicked smile curves my lips. “I will never hold back.”

“So what are you waiting for?” she taunts, her voice raw, hungry.

My teeth graze her jaw, scraping enough to make her shudder. Her breath catches.

“I need you,” I murmur against her skin. “Like a sickness. Like a curse. Like fate threw you at my feet to see how long I’d fight before I snapped.”

And then I do.

I’m on her, hands gripping, claiming, dragging her flush against me. She doesn’t shrink from it. She meets me head-on, a fire I’ll gladly burn for.

My mouth crashes against hers. Teeth, tongue, heat. The kind of kiss that burns. That brands. That fucking destroys.

Her nails bite into my skin, dragging down my back and over my shoulders. Marking me. Claiming me right back.

I groan into her mouth, my hands everywhere—gripping, mapping, taking.

She presses closer, heat and softness melting against my body, and it’s not enough.

I need more. I nip her bottom lip, drawing a sharp inhale from her throat. “I love how you taste.”

She laughs, breathless, dazed. “You’re too good at this.”

I brush my lips against her throat. “Too good at what?”

She presses a palm to my chest, right over my hammering heart. “Telling a woman exactly what she wants to hear.”

I catch her wrist, dragging her hand lower.

Over my cock—where her hand fucking belongs, and fuck, I need her to feel that.

Her lips part. Her pupils blow wide.

“I don’t need words to tell you what I want, love.”

She shivers. A full-body tremor. Then she stands on her toes, brushing her lips along the shell of my ear. Her teeth catch for a heartbeat before she whispers, “Good. Because I don’t need words either.”

Fuck.

I press her against the nearest wall, caging her in with my body. My lips graze her throat, hot breath, sharp teeth, slow, teasing.

“You want to be craved,” I murmur, drinking in the way she trembles. “To be the reason a man loses control.”

She exhales a soft, shuddering breath.

I smile against her pulse.

She grabs my jaw, dragging my mouth back to hers. “Then shut up and show me.”

Fuck, I love a woman who gives orders. It’s a good thing I love breaking them even more. I lift her, pin her, claim her.

She gasps, grips my hair, and tightens her legs around me like spurs.

I toss her onto the bed. She bounces once, hair fanning out like a dark halo, a fucking goddess laid out for me.

I pause. Hover over her, my hands braced on either side of her head.

Her lips part. Her eyes hold mine. Then she smiles. Wicked. Wanting.

I reach for the drawer beside the bed, fumbling for the foil packet Tomas insisted I use. “Do it right,” he’d said. “Humans have rituals, too.”

Before I can grab it, her hand closes over mine.

“You don’t have to,” she murmurs.

I freeze. My body is on fire, strung tight, but my brain kicks back into gear at her words.

Her gaze is steady. “I can’t have kids. You’re clean, right?”

Everything in me stills. Tomas drilled safe sex into my head like a battle strategy, but nothing prepared me for this.

“How do you know?”

Her brow furrows. “Fibroids. My doctor said it’s unlikely.”

Unlikely. A fragile human word. A false certainty wrapped in medicine and absolutes.

My jaw clenches. “Unlikely isn’t impossible.”

Her lips press into a thin line. “University. Years. And nothing ever happened.”

Her voice is steady, but the weight behind it sits heavy between us. No children. No risk.

It should feel like an escape, a free pass from the noose fate tied around my neck. Instead, it coils tighter. I don’t know what I was expecting. A slap of reality, maybe. Some kind of warning to slow down.

Instead, she reaches for me—fingers trailing over my jaw, down my chest, right over the frantic thrum of my heart. Her nails curl against my skin, the faint drag of them like fire licking up my spine.

“This is madness,” I murmur.

She tilts her head, lips curving in a smile so sinful that it could make the devil jealous.

“Madness,” she breathes, voice a dangerous caress, “feels an awful lot like this.”

She seizes my hand, dragging it up her body like she’s daring me to stop her.

My palm curves over the soft swell of her breast, and fuck, I don’t just hold—I take. I roll her nipple between my fingers, a slow, punishing tease, and her breath stutters. Her nails dig into my thigh. I pinch. Harder than I should. She hisses through her teeth, her back arching like she fucking loves it.

I growl, my other hand snapping to her jaw, tilting her face up. Her lips part, a gasp escaping right before I take her mouth. The kiss isn’t soft. It isn’t sweet. It’s a fucking war.

I devour her, sweep my tongue into her mouth, letting her feel exactly what she does to me. How fucking crazy she makes me.

She moans into me, meeting me, matching me, her own desperation spilling over. Her hand strokes up my thigh, making me groan into her mouth as she drags her fingers over my cock.

I bite down on her lip hard enough to sting, and she fucking breaks.

Her teeth clash against mine, our kiss turning messy, brutal, a battle for dominance that she is going to lose.

I tear my mouth away, panting against her skin, lips trailing down her throat. I find her pulse. I bite.

She doesn’t hesitate. She doesn’t second-guess. She just fucking moves.

And I lose my fucking mind.