Page 164 of Cold-Blooded Creatures

Up until my family’s death, I had not known what it meant to be a leader. How much the lives of others weighed on your shoulders. How you had to take calculated risks. Play the long-term game. Predict the outcome. Plan the casualties.

Choose between doing what Kali and Zion wanted and the needs of my people.

Either way, pain was guaranteed.

My legsapart in a wider stance, I emptied the magazine into a wooden target, drawing a horizontal line across the dummy’s neck. The severed head rolled across the gravel of our shooting range. A fifth dummy I had destroyed in the last ten minutes.

I loaded a new magazine into the handgun for the sixth time. The moment Ava had noticed me coming, she had kicked everyone out, stating they would continue training tomorrow, silently handed me a box full of bullets, and left.

My bullets flew right to the head of an arguably intact target until the handgun’s trigger ceased calling out the hits. The wood splintered vertically, and a portion of the dummy’s head struck the ground with a crunch, fracturing into tiny fragments illuminated by the orange and purple streaks of the sunset.

Ezra had returned a few hours ago with news that his contacts in Ilasall would ensure the delivery of my message to the Head of Ilasall. I had no other options besides warning the city we were coming.

I was coming.

Reloading the semi-automatic handgun again, I chose the next target, about sixty yards away, a bit out of range for this type of weapon. The swirls in the wood morphed into the image of the man who reigned over Ilasall and had identified Kali as an effective tactic to bring Zion and me to our knees.

With my eyes shut, I shot blindly, despite my instincts blaring at the danger of it. The vibrations of the firearm working permeated my muscles to the point my body bent to their oscillation, swaying back and forth.

“Wrath looks good on you.” A firm body pressed against my back and steel tickled the lower part of my throat. The chill from the blade raised the hair on my nape and my forefinger froze on the trigger. His chuckle slithered into my ear like an omen of his next move. “I wonder if it has its own distinct flavor.”

“Zion,” I said in warning, my voice gruff. Yet the hard lines of his form compelled me to not move away. Like gulping down a bottle of water after an intense training session, the sensation of him pinned to me was something I could not dismiss or reject. Not anymore.

Not when it felt so fucking good. Right.

“Your brooding tastes sour.” His tongue flicked my earlobe. Then traced the outline of the shell of my ear, and an involuntary shudder rocked through me. As he grasped my wrist, my bicep slackened, and he brought my hand over my shoulder. “Control”—Zion licked the handgun’s shaft in one long stroke—“spicy and sweet. As addictive as she is.”

No denial left my mouth. My vocal cords refused to let out anything else but a hoarse groan.

His lips wrapped around the barrel and his head bobbed slowly, the regrowing stubble along his jaw scratching my own. A fist formed at my side in a worthless attempt to draw my attention elsewhere.Enduring hunger for years, and then having your craving jump you…it could cloud anyone’s rationale.

He let the gun go with a pop, and the metal glistened from his saliva. “Now wrath…” His palm glided down my abdomen, pausing underneath my shirt, above the hem of my jeans. “Enticingly bitter.”

My muscles twitched under his warm touch as it skirted the sensitive sliver of skin. “You are mad,” I gritted out, clutching the post of the booth we were in. My own two feet were insufficient support when the gravel under my boots turned liquid and threatened to snatch away my balance.

“More than that.” He unbuckled my belt and slid inside my underwear. A choked grunt tore my throat apart as he gripped me, firmly and unyieldingly. “You see, I have a whole list of the depraved things I want to do to you.”

He brought out my already hard cock, and it stiffened further with him pumping up and down. Thumb brushing over my tip, he twisted his hand and squeezed.

A repressed hiss escaped my clenched teeth. The same exhale expelled any doubts or hesitation left in me.

Fuck showing restraint for his own safety.

Fuck keeping distance.

Fuck not taking what I wanted.

“I could write it down, hide the list between your notes, so when you’re in the middle of a meeting and accidentally pull it out of a pile, I’m what occupies your thoughts.” The blade scratched my neck as Zion stepped around me and dropped to his knees. “Is this how you imagined it? Me on my knees, begging you to fuck my mouth?”

“Yes.” I tangled my fingers in his golden-brown hair and yanked his head back. His lips parting made my sanity slip. “Bent over a table, crawling on the floor in my study, on all fours while you eat her out, licking me clean from her juices after I fucked her.” If he thought his list was comprehensive, he was sorely mistaken. He would not be able to walk once he reached the end of mine.

Holding my hips, he licked up my length, from the base to the tip. Pure sin colored his curving mouth. “Like this,kitten?”

“Shut up andsuck,” I snarled, and shoved his head down. “Hands behind your back.”

He obeyed without a hint of hesitation, widening his knees and crossing his wrists at his lower back, his knife clutched in his right hand, the steel resting against the rubber sole of his well-worn boot.

The eagerness he took me with blurred my vision, and I seized control, forcing him to take me quicker and rougher, tightening my hold of his hair. Guiding him and seeing, feeling how he instantly leaped to do whatever I wished, not a hint of refusal or uncertainty, like he had been waiting for this for too long… Holding back ceased being an option.