Page 240 of The Devil's Thorn

“And yet…” He bent close, his lips grazing my ear, his breath hot enough to steal mine. “You’re still not running.”

I swallowed. “There’s nowhere to run.”

“Good girl.”

The words slithered through me like smoke—dangerous and addictive. And when I felt his fingers at the waistband of my pants, I didn’t flinch.

He tugged them down in one rough pull, dragging the fabric over my hips, baring me to the candlelight and the judgmental silence of saints. I felt the chill hit my skin, the sharp contrast of his warmth behind me.

I was bare. Offered. And completely, devastatingly his.

He didn’t say anything right away. Just stood there, letting me feel the weight of him behind me. His silence pressed into me almost as much as his body did—heavy with intent.

Then— He gripped my hip, the bite of his fingers leaving no room for doubt. And with the other hand, he pushed his pants low enough for skin to meet skin. I felt him—hard, hot, terrifying. And mine.

The first push of him was slow. Deliberate. Not gentle—but purposeful. A claiming.

I gasped, my body stretching to take him, tokeephim, my fingers curling into fists behind my back. The sash bit into my wrists, grounding me in the pain, in the pleasure, in the rawness of what this was.

He didn’t stop.

He pressed in deeper, until there was no space left between us, no air I could breathe that didn’t belong to him.

“Rafael—” It came out broken. A plea. A prayer.

He pulled back—only to slam back in with a force that stole sound from my throat.

“Say it again,” he growled, his hand wrapping around my throat from behind, pulling me up just slightly, just enough to make me arch into him. “Say my name like it’s the only one you’ve ever known.”

“Rafael.”

He thrust again, harder. “Louder.”

“Rafael.”

His name echoed off the cathedral walls like a blasphemy. His fingers tightened in my hair, yanking my head back so he could look down at me, see my mouth parted, my eyes half-lidded with something between surrender and need. I could feel him watching me—every reaction, every shiver.

“You like being taken like this?” His voice was velvet-wrapped steel.

I didn’t answer fast enough.

The sharp smack of his hand across my ass made me cry out, the sound swallowed by the stained-glass saints above.

“Answer me.”

“Yes,” I gasped. “God, yes.”

He chuckled, low and dark. “God isn’t here, Isabella.”

He drove into me again, and again, each thrust rougher than the last, dragging me closer to the edge of something I wasn’t sure I could survive. My legs shook. But I didn’t care. I didn’t want soft. I didn’t want mercy.

I wantedhim. Every brutal, sacred inch.

His grip tightened, and I knew—heknew—what he was doing to me. How he was breaking me open and rewriting me in his name. And I let him.

Because I wasn’t afraid of being ruined anymore. Not by him. Only of not being ruinedenough.

His rhythm was brutal. Every thrust slammed into me with unrelenting precision—like he knew the exact point between pain and pleasure and wanted to keep me teetering on it, breathless and shaking. My fingers curled uselessly behind my back, wrists bound with the holy sash, my cheek pressed to the cold stone as the cathedral walls bore silent witness.