Page 44 of To Cage a Wild Bird (Divided Fates #1)

My mind flashed back to his mouth on mine, and my cheeks grew hot.

“Vale...” I bit my lip, and his pupils dilated.

“Say you want me to kiss you again,” he whispered, and my breath hitched.

I licked my lips and noted the way his eyes tracked the movement. “It doesn’t matter what I want. What matters is getting

out of Endlock. Thinking about anything else right now is too dangerous.”

And it was dangerous. I couldn’t get him out of my head, and it was consuming me. Consuming my every waking thought and my ability to

focus on escape.

Vale brushed a strand of hair away from my eyes and trailed his thumb slowly down my cheek, carefully avoiding my fresh cut.

The hair on the back of my neck stood on end, and goose bumps rose on my arms. I tried not to stare at his lips. And failed.

“Too dangerous?” he asked, looking into my eyes. I felt like I’d been put under a spell, making it impossible to look away

from him.

He leaned closer, never moving his gaze from my eyes, giving me enough time to pull away if I decided to.

But I didn’t want to pull away.

Vale brushed his mouth against mine, slow and sensuous, coaxing my lips apart with a languid caress of his tongue until I

opened for him.

He pulled away from me slightly, looking into my eyes as he trailed his hand down my arm to interlace our fingers.

He kissed me again, harder this time, and caught my bottom lip between his teeth, nibbling lightly. A shiver snaked its way up my spine.

My fingers wound their way into his hair, and then I was pulling it as his hands ran down my body to the backs of my thighs.

He picked me up and helped me wrap my legs around him, pressing my back harder into the door.

I ran my tongue lightly over his bottom lip, and he pulled me more fully against him, his hands tightening over my hips. My

fingers trailed down his back, playing with the hem of his shirt before I worked up the nerve to slip my hands under the fabric

and place them against his bare skin.

Already, the hard length of him pressed against my core through our clothes, and an ache pulsed through me. I nipped his lower

lip, eliciting a growl from him. And then his hands were under my shirt, cool against skin that had caught fire.

I grabbed his hand and urged it higher, and he bit my neck.

“Fuck, Raven,” he murmured against my lips, his voice roughened with desire, breaths fast and shallow and warm against my

skin.

His words sent a bolt of heat straight through me, and I rolled against him, moaning at the friction of him against my core.

I nudged him, trying to move his lips back to mine, but he moved his hands to my shoulders and held me there, slightly away

from him. I raised an eyebrow, my eyes meeting his.

A question swam in those depthless pools of liquid gold.

“I don’t want to stop,” Vale said earnestly. “Trust me, that is the last thing I want. But even now that you know I’m on your

side, I’m still a guard. And you’re an inmate. And I don’t want you to think you have to do anything you don’t want to do.

I still want to help you no matter what.”

Perhaps the softest words I’d heard him speak in the short time I’d known him.

And it had been so long since I’d felt I had control over what was happening around me. I couldn’t protect Jed. I couldn’t guarantee a future for our friends. I couldn’t even take a shower without another inmate waging an assault on me.

But this.

This I could control.

And I wanted him.

“I want you to touch me,” I breathed.

Once the words left my lips, there was chaos.

Vale’s eyes darkened impossibly, teeth biting into his plush bottom lip as he pulled me to him. He kissed his way down my

neck. When he reached my chest, he flicked his tongue over the peak of one of my hardened nipples through the material of

my camisole, and I let out a muffled cry, arching my back and pushing against his mouth.

He chuckled, low and rumbling against me.

My breath caught as he pressed me harder against the door, the surface cooling my skin but doing nothing to douse the fire

burning within me. The tension between us all these weeks had finally boiled over, threatening to incinerate me.

He moved to untie the string of my pants, claiming my lips with his once more. I knew my mouth would bruise from the urgency

of his kiss.

I curled my fingers into his hair, yanking until he let out a low groan.

“I know you’ve dreamed of hurting me for ages now,” Vale mused, scraping his teeth over my earlobe. “But is now really the

time for that?”

A shiver racked my body, rendering me incapable of speech.

His fingers slipped beneath my waistband, and my breath quickened, my grip on him tightening, keeping him close, as I rolled

against him, seeking out his touch. I felt like I might die without it.

Vale made a sound low in his throat and dipped his face down, his tongue darting out and licking a line up the column of my

neck.

“Please,” I breathed, not caring how desperate I must have sounded to him.

Footsteps.

Right outside the closet door.

Vale’s hand covered my mouth, and his free arm wound around my waist to hold me tight against him.

There were muffled voices from what sounded like two guards, and they stopped walking just outside the closet, continuing

a conversation I couldn’t quite make out.

My heart kicked up an erratic beat in my chest as I caught Vale’s eye, not daring to move a muscle.

But instead of nerves, something dangerous was reflected in Vale’s gaze. He gave me a wicked smile and then, keeping one hand

over my mouth, his other hand ventured down, inching toward my throbbing core.

My breath hitched in my throat. What was he doing ?

A guard laughed on the other side of the door just as Vale caressed the most sensitive part of me through the fabric of my

underwear.

My eyes went wide with shock, even as I released a desperate breath behind his hand. Instead of dousing my arousal, the fear

of being caught seemed to heighten it.

Vale’s hand clamped tighter over my mouth as he whispered, “You have to stay quiet for me. You wouldn’t want someone to catch

us, would you?”

I shook my head back and forth, grinding into his excruciatingly light touch, needing more. So much more.

His forehead pressed against mine as he slowly tortured me with the barely there touches of his fingers against my sensitive

flesh, watching my face as I squirmed and panted into his palm. “Do you want me to keep going?”

I blinked.

I shouldn’t want him to keep going.

But my traitorous body arched toward him, and I nodded against his hand.

His golden eyes darkened, shining with triumph even as he rewarded me, rubbing harder against me and wringing another muffled

moan from my body. I ground down onto him, relief mixing with increasingly desperate need as the guards’ voices finally faded

down the corridor.

But then Vale’s radio crackled to life.

“There’s been an incident in the Upper showers.” A tinny voice came through the device. “Vale, are you available?”

Fuck. Perri must have been in worse shape than I’d thought.

Vale growled, pausing in his movements and removing his hand from my mouth.

“Vale?” the voice called again. “If you’re not available, we’ll need to call the warden.”

That brought me back to reality. “Go,” I urged Vale, though I had to bite back a whimper as he moved his hand away from me.

The last thing I needed was Larch knowing I’d been involved in another incident.

Vale picked up his radio, pressing the button on the side, even as he watched me with heavy-lidded eyes. His voice was rough

when he finally spoke, like gravel scraping along my skin.

“Don’t call the warden. I’ll be right there.”