With difficulty, I reach for the top rung and pull us up to the loft. Exerted, I curse under my breath. Why does she always have to be so stubborn? Why couldn’t she just accept the love I was trying to give her? It’s all I have to offer…it’s everything.
But that’s what drew me to her in first place, didn’t it? I remind myself of this as I lie her down on my bed, my muscles straining from the effort to be as gentle as possible.
Then I admire the sight before me. Kal’s black hair spread around her. Her head tilted back, revealing her enticing neck. Her legs parted just enough for me to slide my hand between her thighs…
She opens her eyes, and the green of her irises startles me. It blazes, jewel-like. The mercury beneath her skin illumes like the tail of a comet streaking the sea of her skin. Just under the thin gown, I can see the clear casing of the clamp. The streams of glowing silver flowing around it. She’s such a beautiful sight that it makes my hands clench into fists. My stomach knot. My head ache with the pressure of a million bees attacking my brain. My groin pulses with an irrepressible need.
I bite down on my lip again, taste blood, and turn away from her. I have one window in my loft; a glass wall that overlooks the cove. I go to it now and press my palm against the cool pane. The glass ripples as the dark tint blocks out the sun.
Such deeds are not done in the light.
“Caben?”
I pull myself away from the window and my morbid thoughts, and turn toward Kal’s soft voice. Toward the most inviting vision I’ve ever laid eyes on.
And an unadulterated feeling of disgust sweeps over me.
I clutch my chest and sink to my knees. My heart pounds loud in my ears as it beats against my rib cage with violent lashings. Stripping my cover of existence down to its barest bones.
I’m damned.
My body, mind, soul—I’m thoroughly damned.
Only one morsel of salvation blinks dimly in the sea of darkness.
With the last of my sanity, what clean shred remains, I turn away from her—my light—and leave.
? 26 ?
Kaliope
“WAIT—STOP.” THE WORDS rush out in one breath. Caben halts over the ladder entrance of his loft. The only acknowledgement he heard my soft plea.
I can’t seem to summon the energy to say more, or at least in a solid, audible tone. All energy is focused somewhere else—on the humming, vibrating core within my body. Coaxing me into a liquid puddle on his bed.
Inhaling deeply, I breathe in Caben’s scent. Oleander and pine. It’s so powerful here; where he lays his head, tangles in his covers. It pervades my senses and beckons me to him. But he’s still stalled at the ladder, his focus on something other than me.
That causes me pain.
Pushing myself up onto my elbows, I angle myself better to see him. My head is dizzy and light, and I can’t quite grasp an annoying thought that lingers just out of reach. Something’s…off. But that thought is soon submerged below my conscience when the building desire sparks anew in my belly.
I’m on my hands and knees, crawling toward Caben, before I latch on to it fully.
Rising up, I let my fingers bring the seam of my gown along with me. “You don’t want to taste what’s yours?” I rub one of my hands up and down my thigh, the other continues to lift the gown—and then Caben’s gripping both my wrists.
“You’re infected,” he says, his eyes intense. “Stop.”
Confusion and hurt and rejection spear through me all at once. My breathing quickens. And then the pain starts again. A piecing rhythm of unsatisfied yearning. “Please,” I beg, wriggling my arms from his grasp and linking them around his neck.
I press my body to his, writhing against him and trying to end the torment. “Don’t you feel it?” I ask, skimming my lips along his neck, my hands finding the buttons of his shirt. “It’s so close…” I can feel the moon heading toward its destination, just as I can feel Caben’s struggle to fight it.
Impatient, I yank his shirt the rest of the way open. My nails graze smooth skin and the hard seams of muscles as I arch my body, squeeze my thighs together to repress the persistent ache.
A groan rumbles from his throat, deep and long. I look up into his face. His eyes are shut against his pained expression. He’s in agony, too. “Let me help,” I say, and dip my hand lower.
I’m just undoing the button of his pants with difficulty—his erection pushing so hard against the seam—when he growls and his hands clamp onto the backs of my thighs. He lifts me off the bed, and I wrap my legs around his waist. Then my back hits the bedding. All his weight bears down on me, the feel of his rough pants and the hardness underneath puts just enough pressure on the ache to make me gasp.
His fingers dig into my flesh as he thrusts his hips, rubbing the throb until I’m moaning and clawing at his bare back. His strained muscles work under my hands, and his hot breath sears the skin of my breast where his mouth roams.