The air around us became unfathomably hot. Suddenly clothing was too constrictive, too much to bear. Everywhere his hands went, from my arms, down my back, over my ribs, up to my breasts, he burned a fingertip trail into my skin.
I pulled back, breathless.
I’d never had a hug this dangerous before.
When he met my gaze, he hesitated a fraction of a second. He asked something in that look, and the answer was written all over my face. Yes, yes, yes.
His lips met mine, and it was like lightning crackling inside me. My whole body sparked to life. First he kissed me gently, imploringly, his lips learning the curves and outlines of my own. He was letting me taste him, letting me know him, and most of all he was giving us both enough time to come to our senses.
Problem was, I didn’t want to come to my senses.
I wanted to dive senselessly into this man and emerge on the other side forever changed.
I opened my mouth and licked his lower lip, inviting him in. The kiss stopped being sweet. His tongue met mine, and it was electric. My body shuddered convulsively from the unexpected delight of that one teasing taste. I clung to him, my fingernails digging into the buttery-soft material of his incredibly expensive shirt.
I traced the outline of his chest muscles as I steered him back into the bedroom, guiding him until his legs hit the end of the bed and he dropped down onto it.
With us temporarily broken apart, I could see just how hungry he was. His eyes, so angry only minutes before, were shining. There was a desperation on his face that made me feel powerful and desired. I had the control to make this man lose his mind with need. I’d gloat, but he had the same power over me.
All I wanted was to give him what he needed. What we both needed.
I could practically feel his gaze touching me as he looked me up and down.
I had never felt so beautiful. Not in that gown I’d worn for the lightning show. Not ever before. He looked at me as if there was no one else in the world he wanted to see. Like he would be perfectly content if I was the last thing he ever saw.
I touched his face, tracing my thumbs over his cheeks, running a finger over his once-broken nose. I leaned in and kissed it. I kissed the apple of each cheek, kissed the deep furrow in his brow. I kissed his chin, all the while deftly avoiding his mouth.
His hands went to my waist, and as I mapped his face with my lips, he pulled me onto his lap. I didn’t resist. Once I settled there, I felt the heaviness of his erection pinned between us. He and I groaned at the same time.
I kissed him then, and not gently. My kiss was all an
xious need and devouring heat. I wanted to melt myself into chocolate and fill his mouth. I wanted to kiss every secret inch of him.
He pushed his fingers under my shirt, and in an instant it was gone, which I only noticed because I had to break away from the kiss, gasping for air, as he pulled it off me. My fingers worked each pearlescent button on his shirt, undoing him like a knot. Finally he was bare, and I stopped kissing him to get a better look.
The tattoos that covered both his arms were exposed for the first time since I’d been here. Each one was a memorial, a reminder of someone he’d hurt in the process of doing his job. Cade wasn’t big on forgiving himself for things. I wondered what would have happened if I’d died today. Would he have shouldered that blame? Would he have added a little storm cloud to the array?
I must have looked distracted, tracing the outline of each secret symbol with my fingernails, because he growled at me, twisting my head back towards him until his mouth met mine and I was lost to his kisses once again.
So this was what it felt like to be alive. I didn’t think I’d ever been so centered in a moment before. Each touch, each sound, each movement was uniting us in ways I’d never thought possible, and we weren’t even naked yet. This felt so right I couldn’t imagine why it was forbidden.
I didn’t care, either.
Soon we were both naked, though I couldn’t have said how our pants came off, it just happened too fast. Cade laid me back on the bed, his fingers tracing my face. I bit the pad of his thumb.
“I’ve imagined you like this for such a long time,” he said quietly, almost like the words were coming to him out of a dream. He looked over me, touching my breasts, my ribs, his fingers moving lower, lower, lower until oh.
I let out a gasp, and he smiled mercilessly while stroking me slowly. Oh, gods, the perfection of this was staggering.
“I thought you hated me,” I confessed.
“Because I was unkind to you?” He smirked a little, and his fingers continued to work. The world around us had gone hazy. “That was self-preservation.”
“If that was self-preservation, what is this?” I decided it was time to go stroke for stroke with him and took hold of his hardness, matching each cruel curl of his fingers until we were both panting.
“This is drowning.”
His fingers withdrew, and he knocked mine away, and then he was inside me in one glorious rock of the hips. My body stretched for him, yielded to him. I let him shape me, so that I would only fit him and no one else.