Page 26 of Gilded

LUKA

Y ou deserve better than what you’d get at my house.

Malia deserves better, too. But here I am, tasked with giving her more misery. And it’s my own stupid fucking fault.

She’s quiet on the way to the helipad and wipes away a tear now and then. I’m impressed by the way she did right by the kitten instead of taking it home because it would have made her feel better. At least short-term.

I reach across the seat and take her hand. She looks over, her eyes wet. I tilt my head, inviting her to scoot over, and she’s beside me in a second, head on my shoulder.

I slide the glass partition up, and I’m about to apologize for taking her to the café, but she looks up at me and says, “Thank you for that. It was incredibly thoughtful and brought me more happiness than I’ve probably ever had.”

I lower my head and kiss her. A simple kiss that turns into something far more heated in seconds. I love the feel of her hand in my hair. Of her mouth opening beneath mine like she’s been waiting for me.

The little purr in the back of her throat sets me on fire, and I’m wishing I’d bought her a short dress so I could pull her onto my lap right now, but we’re at the helipad in no time.

The flight to the island is short, and before I know it, we’re at the house, and she takes my hand to get out of the car.

Walking toward the house, my mind is on logistics—her room or my guest house?

Hard and fast or slow and considerate? Originally, I planned on having no mercy, just fucking her like Zeiger will, but I don’t have it in me now.

She may not be innocent, but she certainly doesn’t have the ability to choose the way I assumed she did.

It will be much harder to separate after sex if she’s in my cottage. Besides, I’ve never spent an entire night with a woman, and I don’t intend to start now. I’m already in too deep here.

“Your room?” I ask as we enter the house.

Nerves dance in her eyes, but she nods.

Only, with every step closer to her door, my resistance mounts and my conscience grows louder.

In her room, she immediately goes to the kitchen and pulls down a bottle of red, filling two glasses without speaking.

I slide off my suit jacket and toss it over a chair. I’m already hard. Just the thought of touching her makes my mind go fuzzy around the edges, and the weeks since I fucked her mouth have given me too much time for all the fantasies to kick up.

I sit on the sofa, elbows on knees, my mind drenched in lusty thoughts—touching her, tasting her, fucking her. But there’s something new in the mix. Different from what I feel with other women. I can’t describe it, but there’s no denying it either.

She comes toward me and offers me a glass. I take both from her hands and set them on the table. “Turn around.”

She obeys, and I slide the zipper down her back.

The dress easily falls off her shoulders, exposing the gorgeous shape of her body.

I skim my knuckles down the indention of her spine all the way to the end and nudge the dress over her hips.

It drops to the floor, leaving her gorgeous ass bare in nothing but the lacy red thong I added to the gift at the last minute.

I want her so badly, my teeth ache. Only not just physically. I want her mentally. Emotionally. And any other way I can possess her.

Which is a big fucking problem.

She turns toward me, and my throat thickens. I want all of her all at once. I want to throw her down and fuck her until she screams in pleasure, until we’re both sweaty, until we’re both spent.

“Panties,” is all I have to say before she shimmies the strip of lace over her hips and lets them drop. I grip her waist and pull her close, kissing her belly. Then I run the back of one finger over her pubic hair. “This will have to go. He won’t want it.”

“Okay.”

She straddles my lap like she’s been doing it forever. Then she wraps her arms around my neck and presses her perfect little body up against mine. An untouched, pristine body. One I’m going to tarnish. One Zeiger will destroy.

She slides her hand into my hair and scores her nails over my scalp. I close my eyes and moan at the delicious shivers coursing down my neck. But they twine with ugliness in my chest. The ugliness of the man who will take her from me.

I clench my teeth as my mind strays to getting her away from Zeiger. From Tarik. From this prison. But Jairo’s warnings ring in my head. If I don’t do this, I’ll lose Zeiger’s trust. If I lose Zeiger’s trust, everything falls apart. If everything falls apart, we die.

And if I don’t teach her, he’ll find someone who will. In his circle, that person won’t give a fuck about the kind of stain this could leave on Malia’s soul. And, yeah, the thought of someone else touching her makes me utterly insane.

She lowers her hands to my face and searches my eyes with a frown. “You don’t want to do this at all, do you?”

Damn, that reading-me thing she does is unnerving. “It’s more complicated than that.”

“Did I do something wrong last time? Was I not good at it? I’ll try again. I’m sure?—”

I kiss her quiet. “You are amazing in every way.”

“Let’s just not do it and say we did. Then you’re off the hook.”

At this point, I couldn’t get this hook out without ripping myself apart. “Soren will know. And men like Soren and your father can’t live among liars.”

“How would he possibly know? If we have the same story?—”

“Trust me, if you go to his bed not knowing what I should be teaching you, you’ll be the one to pay for it. That’s not happening on my watch.”

She exhales, and her eyes glisten. “Let’s just do it fast and be done, then.”

“It doesn’t work like that.”

She rolls her eyes, and the tears escape. “Why can’t anything be easy?”

I cradle her face, wiping at her tears with my thumbs. “Sex for the first time can be uncomfortable and awkward. And it takes time to learn how to do the things Soren likes.”

As I kiss the trail of tears on her cheeks, she leans into me, curls her fingers into my shirt, and tips her head so her mouth meets mine. I hum in pleasure and open to her, loving the feel of her tongue against mine.

She leans into the kiss, taking it deeper, and her assertiveness is a wicked turn-on. She pulls back with a breathless “What happens next?”

Fuck me. This is happening. There’s no way around it.

“Don’t worry about that,” I tell her. “Tonight is about you. About learning your own body and making you comfortable with sex. I’ll take care of everything. You just come along for the ride, okay?”

“What about those things Soren likes?”

“We’ll get to that. I won’t send you to him not knowing what to expect. But there are steps.”

Nerves jump in her eyes. “Okay.”

“For this next step, you need to trust me, Malia.”

She slides her hands up my chest. “I don’t have much trust in anything anymore.”

“Can you give me a shot at earning it?”

Thoughts pass through her eyes. “I can try.”

I don’t deserve her trust any more than I deserve her loyalty, and it makes me feel like shit asking for it. Expecting it. Needing it to get to the next phase.

I spend long moments kissing her as I stroke all her perfect, warm skin, following her curves. She rubs her hips against my erection, and I lose air.

“Mmm,” she murmurs into my mouth. The sound spears my groin with heat, and for a split second, I wonder who will be changed the most tonight, me or Malia.

She pulls out of the kiss and rests her forehead against mine, catching her breath.

“Do you have questions you want me to answer?” I ask.

“Should I?”

“Not necessarily.”

She thinks about it for a second. “Should I be scared?”

I smile and brush her hair back. “Not with me.”

“That’s all I need to know.”

I slide my hand around the back of her neck, bring her mouth to mine, and add force to the kiss. She welcomes the assault and slides her hands into my hair. The move sings through my body in a way that tells me I’m well over the line. A line I didn’t even realize I had to draw.

I pull my mouth from hers, moving on to her jaw, her neck, her throat. By the time I reach her tits, her hips are rocking against mine.

I stroke her nipples, cup one tit, and hold it while I explore the other with my mouth. The sounds she makes skitter across my skin. Her fingers close in my shirt, and her body grows tighter and tighter.

“Feels so good.” She murmurs the words with the kind of awe that would only come from a virgin.

I hold her face in one hand and keep her gaze on mine while I let the other slide down her body and ease between her legs.

She sips a breath and holds it, but I lose track of her reactions because she’s wet, and my cock—with that very little, one-track mind—hasn’t been able to stop thinking about this from the moment I saw her at the pool that first day.

“Push up on your knees a little.”

The order brings her back to the here and now, and her gaze focuses on mine again.

With space between our bodies, I push into her with one finger. She tenses, but purrs in the back of her throat, a sound that has the potential to make me completely lose control.

I pull out and add a finger, then move inside her, trying to stretch her walls, but she’s rocking her hips, taking my fingers deeper. She’s so fucking hot, she makes me dizzy.

With my free hand, I brush her hair back. “Feels like you want more.”

“Yeah,” she says, breathless.

I push deeper, moving with her hips and pressing my thumb over her clit. Her eyes close as she moans.

“Perfect.” I grip her ass cheek in my free hand and pull her deeper.

She gasps and sucks air through her teeth, brow tight.

Even though a few weeks ago I was ready and willing to kill her, now I hate causing her any kind of pain.

“You’re perfect. Just keep your eyes on me and let go of everything else. ”

She rides my hand with the instincts of a sensual creature, striving for what must seem to her like an elusive goal.

“Take your time, love. There’s no rush.”

She stills, her cheek to my head, panting. “It feels so good.”