“I don’t feel very strong right now.” And I hated myself a little bit for feeling that way. “You’ve provided me with all this knowledge and training, and I just… I flounder here.”
“Mind over matter,” he replied softly. “That’ll take time, but I have faith in you, Zay. You’ll figure it out.”
I melted into his touch, my heart panging for an embrace I wasn’t allowed to crave. Yet I did. Especially here while alone with him. His eyes told me he knew it, too.
“These fantasies are so wrong,” he whispered, his gaze searching mine. “My blood exists inside you and makes you want things you shouldn’t.”
“Like you.”
“Like me.” His palm caressed my cheek once more before sliding back to grasp my nape. “Yet I find myself unable to walk away. You might fall into another nightmare, forcing me to come back all over again.”
“You help me forget, Grigory.” I meant it. Every embrace in his bed, in his arms, allowed me renewed peace. “You make me feel alive.” At least in my dreams.
“Fuck, Zay.” His pupils flared, the need inside his gaze calling to mine.
“Yes,” I whispered. “It’s not real anyway, right?”
“Right,” he agreed, his opposite hand falling to my hip while the other remained around the back of my neck. “And we’re already in hell, too.”
Our surroundings changed, some trigger in my mind returning us to Grigory’s rooms. Or perhaps he did that. I couldn’t quite tell, the lines between reality and fantasy blurring whenever I found myself in his arms.
It was all fantasy.
All in my head.
And yet, I felt his presence there. He had to know this was happening between us. However, there seemed to be an unspoken agreement never to utter the truth out loud. I accepted that fate. Our blood wove a life between us that could never be, and if all I ever experienced were these stolen moments in my head, then I’d make the best of them.
The blue silks of Grigory’s bed cradled my naked skin, my clothes having disappeared in a blink of a thought, leaving me nude beneath Grigory’s gaze. I used to shy away in these moments, but not anymore. He’d seen me without clothes in my worst moments, during the night he saved my life.
I was no longer that woman.
I’d been reborn into someone new, a female with spirit driven by revenge.
And that was who he saw now.
“You’re more than that, Zay,” he said, pulling his shirt over his head to reveal a rippled abdomen that I longed to pet and memorize. Maybe tonight he’d finally let me. “You’re strong, refined, gorgeous, and far too stubborn,” he mused, tossing the cotton to the floor before crawling over me. He never caged me in, always allowed me an escape—a feat, considering his solid strength and size.
His lips gently grazed mine, leaving me yearning for more as he always did. “Please, Grigory.”
“When I take you, it won’t be in a fantasy, Zay,” he said, his tone holding a touch of command to it that confirmed he wouldn’t budge on his decision.
It was always this—an introduction without the true climax.
“You enjoy it,” he replied, firmly in my thoughts.
I did. “Let me do more this time.”
He just shook his head as usual. “I’m already pushing enough boundaries by doing this, beautiful.” His mouth brushed mine once again in that teasing caress, then he moved downward between my thighs to place a tender kiss against my mound. “I’ll give you what you need,” he promised. “And with every swipe of my tongue, I’ll erase another bad memory.”
“Yes,” I breathed. “Yes, Grigory.”
“Fuck, I love hearing you say that, even if it’s just in your head.”
His palms found my thighs, sliding upward to the place I desired him most. Heat blossomed across my skin, as it invariably did beneath his touch, and I began to squirm beneath the intensity of his gaze. Grigory always watched me carefully, measuring his movements and retreating at the first sign of panic.
Maybe it was all in my head.
Maybe it was real.