Page 28 of Possess Me at Midnight (Doomsday Brethren #4)

She no more than catches her breath before I pound that same spot again, still holding her gaze.

I know I should ease away, back off until she recovers.

But her soul is open to me; I see it in her eyes.

And what I see inside her is even more beautiful than her face.

I couldn’t dispute her kindness since she’s never treated me as anything but a warrior wizard.

Her intelligence amazes me. The clever girl manipulates Council politics as easily as she deals with the centuries-old magic of the Doomsday Diary.

Her sensuality… She keeps it tucked beneath her surface, but basking in it now, I nearly drown.

She’s…everything, and I’m determined to give her the kind of ecstasy that makes her cry out in pleasure for me again.

Closer. Somehow I have to get closer, deeper, take even more of her.

Now. I raise her legs over my hips, and they curl around my waist. That still isn’t enough.

I put more force behind each stroke, sink deeper still.

The bed shakes with every thrust. And still, it’s not enough.

I press my face closer to hers, losing myself even more in the blue heaven of her stare.

Still not enough—not even close. Will it ever be?

“I could do this to you all night,” I murmur. “I’m dying to.”

Her eyes flare again, and she doesn’t speak, but she moans, lower than the last time she neared orgasm. Longer. Joy races like fire through my veins as she tightens on me again. A little more, then…

“Ice!” Sabelle screams, her nails digging frantically into my shoulders. “ Ice! ”

The pain of those pinpricks on my back spurs me.

I piston into her like a madman. My pleasure spirals nearly beyond my control, but I hold onto it for the sheer thrill of watching the frantic need on her face transform into the most beautiful bliss.

And trust. She trusts me to care for her. Nothing is more beautiful.

As her second orgasm ends, gratification and need hit me at once, almost conflicting. Yes, I’ve hurtled her into pleasure more than once, and I can only pray that means I hold a deeper place in her heart than Lucan. But twice doesn’t satisfy me. Not even close.

Don’t push her anymore , I tell myself. Slow. Gentle. Pull back. She’s not ready for more .

I tell the voice in my head to fuck off.

Groaning, I roll over, lay on my back, then lift her off my erection, which aches for more of the soft suction of her body. Instead, I wrap my arms around her, biceps bulging beneath my tattoo, and drag her up my torso, settling her wet, swollen sex over my mouth.

Without hesitation, I begin to feast. My gut tightens. The taste of her very essence screams at me, my instincts flaring anew. My mate. Mine!

“Ice,” she pants so hard her chest heaves. “Wait. I-I can’t. Breathe. Oh, my…god!”

I close my eyes, trying to keep my self-control from unraveling. As I tremble and feel a haze of need shut down my brain, I realize that grasping for resistance is a waste of time…

“Need more. Now,” I growl, then devour her again, sucking the little swollen bud into my mouth and teasing it with my tongue.

She comes again, against my lips, with a shout that tapers off into a crackling, hoarse cry. And still I want more. Far more.

Maneuvering her down my body with one hand, I lift my cock with the other and raise up into the tight clench of her body. She closes around me in welcome.

“Yes. Ice. Oh, god… Yes!”

My favorite word from her.

Sabelle catches my mood and gyrates down on my aching shaft, her chest against my own. And her gaze locks with mine.

Time seems to stop for an endless moment before she cries out again in a raspy roar, her fingers digging into my arms. Her pussy grips me so tightly, she threatens to strangle my erection…but what a way to go.

The need to find my own pleasure is strong, but I grind my teeth and tamp it down. As long as Sabelle has any remaining desire, I want it. Just like I want her to want me for all time—the way I’ll want her.

Swallowing a curse, I lift her off me, kissing away her protest with a harsh press of my mouth over hers.

I swallow her cry and urge her back to the bed.

Without a bit of prompting on my part, she parts those sweet, golden thighs, and the invitation is nearly too strong.

But I want—need—to have her in the most submissive way, to see if she responds with equal passion and trust when I have her beneath me and open.

Even as I call myself twenty kinds of fool, I roll her to her stomach and lower myself over her, spreading her legs again with my feet. Then I grip her hips.

“Ice? What?—”

“Feel me,” I demand, then press deep, relishing this position where she can feel everything and control nothing.

I latch my mouth on the back of her neck, and she cries out. Satisfaction broils deep inside me when she arches up, giving me a better angle to sink deep inside her. I take ruthless advantage of her sweetness.

During one unrelenting stroke after another, I reach beneath her and find her distended clit, swiping my cream-coated fingers across it.

“Ice. Ice!” She can barely find her breath now. “I can’t?—”

“You can. I need it. Give it to me.” I nip at her neck again. “Now, princess!”

On command, she clamps down on me again, her explosion of pleasure mere moments away. And still something drives me.

“You feel me?” I growl. “Deep inside you.”

“Yes!” She loops one of her arms over mine, linking our fingers together.

Sabelle wants to be closer to me. That renews my frenzy. Squeezing her fingers, I block out my need for orgasm, reading the cues of her body instead. Just once more. Then surely, I’ll be satisfied that she’s held nothing back from me.

My fingers sweep across her wet flesh as I hammer her with rapid strokes, thrilling to the feel of her tensing beneath me, her gasps and moans.

“Who’s deep inside you?” I demand.

“Ice!”

She bucks and screams, and I sink even deeper inside her than ever.

Bloody hell, it isn’t enough. But my control is fraying, my blood screaming for release. The ache building in my cock is eroding everything but the need to mark her in the most basic way—with my seed.

Withdrawing again, this time to the sound of her weak protests, I roll her to her back once more and slide between her relaxed thighs.

Pushing inside her swollen sex requires patience I don’t have and nearly shoves me over the edge.

She isn’t done yet, not without me. One more climb to the pinnacle of pleasure…

Again, I link our gazes and hands. The connection is electric and shudders down my spine.

My steady strokes turn urgent, and Sabelle, my sweet princess, rises up to meet me thrust for thrust, no longer just receiving but claiming.

Her stare locks with mine, and I read her growing pleasure, the rising need, then the dawning of surprise.

I clench my jaw. Yes, the explosion is big. Huge. Monumental.

Sweat breaks out across my back, my forehead, as I push my way inside her ever-tightening body, and eager acceptance glides across her face, as welcome as a cool breeze on a broiling summer day.

Perfect. Then she’s chanting my name hoarsely and falling over the edge.

She clings to me with her hands, her lips, her gaze.

I fall down into her as the need crashes past the last of my resistance, and I soar into a pleasure so intense, so sublime, it shakes me to the core.

She undoes me.

I swore that tonight would change Sabelle and her feelings for me. Instead, being with her changed me forever. I was already convinced that I loved her. Now it’s clear my feelings are an abiding, enduring devotion. As I’d said when I spoke the Call, there is no other for me but her.

“Princess?”

Sabelle’s drowsy, half-open eyes and her tilted smile focus on me. “Hmm?”

She sounds drowsy, dreamy, and I can’t hold back an answering grin as joy whips inside me.

“You should do that more,” she whispers.

“Make love to you? Oh, I plan to.”

Biting her lip, she closes her eyes, suddenly shy. Have I ever seen a more beautiful woman? Aye, she’s gorgeous in pleasure…but positively stunning in satisfaction. The fact that I put that satisfied look on her face awes me.

“Smile, I meant,” she corrects.

I haven’t had much to smile about in two hundred years, since Gailene’s death. But now…I widen the expression. For her. Yes, happiness is fleeting, and Sabelle will likely never be my mate. But no one—least of all her brother—can take this moment from me.

And I plan to savor it for the rest of my life.

Sabelle

Before dawn the next morning, I stretch, eyes closed, feeling peaceful yet brimming with energy. I’m well rested for the first time in days. Despite the December wind howling in the darkness outside, a sense of warmth and protection settles and soothes me.

I roll over and encounter a hard body radiating furnace-like temperatures. My eyes fly open.

Ice.

Oh, heavens. Everything we did last night rushes back to me in stunningly clear memories.

I’ll never forget looking into his eyes as he penetrated deep inside me, sending me hurtling into pleasure.

The memory of the tenderness etched onto the hard lines of his face melts me.

And the pleasure he drove me to, over and over.

He was relentless, unyielding, demanding…

and competing with a wizard who wasn’t even in the room.

After last night, Ice more than proved that whatever I felt for Lucan whilst I cared for him during his mate mourning was a pale imitation of the vibrant, white-hot need Ice rouses. He treated me like a woman, not a fragile doll. And I’ve never experienced such ecstatic bliss.

Slowly, I open my eyes to the harsh lines of his cheekbones, the black wings of his brows over closed eyes, his strong jaw. My heart skips. Actually skips.

After last night, something changed between us. I’ve always been curious about Ice. But this…is more. He not only showed me a version of myself I didn’t know existed—wild, desperate, and so willing to surrender—he’s gaining a foothold in my heart.

You could have that forever, a voice whispers to me. Speak the Binding. Become his mate .

What would Bram say? The Council? The rest of the Privileged?

Could I endure the possibility of being shunned?

What about a mating of political necessity Bram advocated for?

What if I accept Ice and the balance of the Council falls in Mathias’s hands?

What good is preserving my heart if I destroy magickind?

I sigh. Bram mated where he wished. But wondering where the fairness is in that does me no good.

Life isn’t fair, and it never will be. Resenting my brother for following his urges and heart only makes me feel petty.

Logically, mating is simply different for wizards.

Their instinct tells them. Witches…not so much.

And as Merlin’s granddaughter, celebrated from the time I was born, expectations were always heaped on me.

That only intensified after my transition.

Once magickind realizes the peril they’re in, more eyes will be on me.

Rolling away, I sit up, glance over my shoulder at Ice again. He occupies three quarters of the bed. In sleep, I recall his arm twisted about me, his leg draped over me, hard breathing on my neck. I felt cherished and protected in a way I never have.

Gathering up the courage to Renounce him will hurt. But I have to do it. Today. Continuing to give Ice hope when I cannot be free of my station in life is horribly unfair to him.

Tears stab my eyes as I shove the gauzy drape aside.

Stumbling from the bed, I cover my face with my hands and hold in my sobs.

I want Ice—now. Again. God help me, I fear I’ll always want him and no one else will do.

A reckless part of me wants to crawl back into bed with him and Bind to him so no one can ever part us.

Duty. Desire. Family. My heart. All are important. I don’t know which way to turn.

I reach for my clothes and thrust them on, so utterly confused, my mind adrift…

Until the sudden shrill shriek of a magical alarm slices through my skull. The wards. Someone—no, many someones—are hammering against our defenses with methodical, terrifying precision.