He snorts. “Nah, I’m sure you don’t. I don’t even understand this fucking mess right now, so I don’t see how you could.”
He rises from the bed, but then he hesitates, his gaze flicking up to my wrists where they’re bound to the headboard. Hale tied the ropes tight, and I can feel the binds squeezing against my flesh. I’m sure my wrists are raw and chafed.
“Does that hurt?” Zaid asks suddenly.
I nod, my heart leaping in my chest.
“Fuck,” he mutters. Then he shakes his head, like he’s answering a question he asked himself. “Well, I can at least make sure it’s not cutting off your damn circulation.”
He kneels on the mattress like Hale did earlier, reaching over me to check the ropes binding my wrists. He tugs on them a little, not loosening the knots but adjusting the way they lie so that they don’t pinch as badly. I hold perfectly still, hardly even daring to breathe as he works.
This could be my chance. If he just shifts the ropes a little more, maybe I can squeeze my hands out of the bindings.
I try to focus, to be ready to run or fight if I have to. But I’m distracted, consumed by the sheer presence of him. His fingertips brush over the skin of my wrist, an accidental touch that sends shivers into my palm and down my arm.
Maybe he can see me shudder. Or maybe he can feel it. Because he stops moving suddenly as his eyes drag back to mine.
His gaze lingers, hands above us at the ties. For a moment, everything seems to stop, as if the entire world is holding its breath.
“You smell like I remember,” I whisper.
And it’s true. He does. The same alluring scent of vanilla and musk.
His nostrils flare, his pupils expanding until they nearly overtake his irises. I wonder for a brief moment if I smell like he remembers. If his memory plays tricks on him every time he breathes me in, just like mine does.
But I never get a chance to ask.
Because a half-second later, Zaid drops his head, crushing his lips against mine.
My entire body jerks in reaction, shock shooting through me like a lightning bolt. His lips are firm and warm, hungry and demanding. A groan rumbles through his chest and into my mouth as he deepens the kiss, and he shifts his body on the bed until he’s half on top of me.
A jab of pain flares in the wound in my side, but it’s not strong enough to steal my attention.
All I’m aware of is Zaid.
All I can feel is Zaid.
I’m drunk on the taste, touch, and feel of Zaid on top of me, body pressing into me, lips devouring my mouth and jawline and neck and ears. I’ve kissed him before, but although there’s an echo of that previous kiss in this one, it’s foreign and unfamiliar too. He’s all man now. There’s no trace of the boy he used to be left in his touch.
He’s dominance and possession, hunger and wrath.
As he shifts his hips against mine, I feel the length of him, already hard against my lower belly. It makes a pulse of arousal throb deep between my legs, rising up above my pain and shock and confusion. A moan spills from me against my will, and he shifts again, grinding against me.
“You like that, kitten?” His voice is a ragged rasp, like he’s been drugged by whatever poison has infected me. Like he’s as out of control as I am.
I want to wrap my arms around him and pull him closer, but I’m caught against the binds above my head, held fast in his control. I wonder if he’s going to use it as some power play, but instead, he reaches above us, his lips still consuming every inch of me they can reach, his breath hot against my skin. He gropes blindly for the ropes, and I can feel his frustration building as he struggles to undo them faster. His hips grind
harder against mine as he finally unties first one wrist and then the other.
My arms fall free, and he groans, burying his face in my neck and sucking on the tender skin there.
Sparks dance before my eyes, and I feel like I might pass out again—like I might succumb to darkness just like I did in the van when I was bleeding out on the seat.
It’s too much.
Too fucking overwhelming.
Rationally, I know this is my moment to escape, but my body has other plans—my arms wrap around his shoulders, broadened by the years, pulling his body flush up against mine. Another stab of pain radiates through my side, but it only makes the feelings churning inside me spiral higher, making every nerve ending in my body sing.