Page 46 of Depths of Destruction

"You're a lot different than I would have assumed," I tell her.

"What do you mean?"

I hold up her perfectly manicured hand. It now has dirt caked around the nail bed. "If I saw you on the street, I would think you were high-maintenance. This situation we're in, it's not easy. You haven't complained once."

The silence practically buzzes as her face hardens, she blinks, and focuses on the wooden floor.

"Sorry. I didn't mean to insult you."

She slowly glances up. "You didn't. But it's ironic you would perceive me that way. I didn't grow up with much. My mother did her best to raise Emilia and me, but we were poor."

"You've fought harder than most to get what you have, then."

"I guess."

I fix her another sardine cracker.

She reluctantly eats it while wrinkling her nose.

I pick up a peach out of its can and lean closer to her, holding it to her mouth. "I think you're beautiful and smart and incredible."

Her blue eyes shine brighter. Desire floods me in a torrential storm.

There's something about Naomi I can't get enough of. And I don't want to.

My marriage was a mistake so many years ago when I was young and dumb. It seems light-years away. Every woman I've been with since hasn't been anyone to keep my attention.

Naomi is different. A unique treasure that doesn't come around twice in one life.

She puts her lips around the peach, eats it, then picks up my hand and sucks the juice off my finger.

Instinct takes over. The animal inside me escapes. She's awakened something in me I've never felt before, and I need her.

I scoot the chair back and fall to my knees then yank her chair toward me and shove my hands into the blanket, opening it up so her body is exposed to me.

For a moment, I contemplate where to feast first, but then I lean in and suck on her breasts, palm her back, and tug her body closer to mine.

She gasps and digs her fingers into my head.

I pick my head up and ravage her mouth with my tongue then move my lips to her ear. Licking her earlobe, I murmur, "You make me unhinged."

Her warm breath seeps into the curve of my neck. A delicious teasing of her tongue slides across my skin, and testosterone beats in my veins.

I dip down to her legs and wrap them around my shoulders, the carnal beast inside me unleashed and needing to be fed.

The tips of her fingers grip my shoulders, and the hum of her soft moan fills my ears.

My lips travel to the inside of her thighs, kissing the soft skin of her flesh. Blazing heat rolls out of the epicenter of her pleasure, and the smell of her sex creates a chaotic zing of adrenaline in my veins.

The first taste of her on my tongue does nothing to satiate me. It's a teaser. I eagerly lap up her juices, holding her so close to my face, I can hardly breathe.

A quivering begins as her body vibrates in my mouth and arms. The sharpness of her nails digs into my back, and her cries become louder and more frequent.

It all stirs my blood, which boils, pumps, and flows with such an intensity, I groan into her pussy.

She screams out my name, arching her back, then collapsing over my head.

I wipe my arm across my mouth and rise, quickly lifting her off the chair and taking two steps to the bed. I lay her on her back and pull her ass to the end of the mattress, holding her ankles to my chest and entering her in one desperate, eager thrust.