Chapter 16 #2
“No.” His voice was gravelly and wild. The violence thrumming off him was like lighter fluid, ready to ignite a single spark with the gnash of his teeth or the friction of his clothes against my bare skin. My hand clutched the doorknob, my lids closing, trying to keep myself above water.
Whirling around, I faced him. He jerked at my sudden proximity.
“You don’t get to do this,” I seethed. “You don’t walk away from me, kicking me to the side like a broken toy, and then act possessive when someone else wants to play with me.”
Inhaling noisily, he vibrated with anger, his face getting barely an inch from mine.
“Who the fuck is trying to play with you?”
I snorted derisively. “Whomever I want.”
The hand on the door shot to my chin, his fingers clutching, forcing me to look at him. “If you say Killian . . .”
Rage and annoyance buckled through me, my hands shoving hard at his chest. The fact I couldn’t move him an inch, that I was no longer on equal footing, was like acid in my bloodstream, spurting a storm through me.
“Get the hell away from me.” I shoved at him again. He stood watching me, only making me more frenzied. “We have nothing to say to each other, so leave me alone.”
His hands slapped the wood on either side of my head, leaning in. “I won’t play these little girl games with you. I said to be clear about what you wanted. You told me to walk. So I did.”
Chagrin raced through me, burning my face and rolling my fists at his statement. In truth, I had told him to go and was mad when he did. It was immature. I rolled the dice on a hand I could lose.
But logic and anger so rarely cooperate.
“And you practically ran out.” I seethed. “I don’t want to be with anyone who doesn’t want to be there.”
His non-response, like I hit the nail on the head, seared through my lungs. The need to get away from him crawled over my muscles like bugs. My brain understood I wouldn’t beat him with brute strength. I would need to cut deep.
“You have no say in who I’m with. I can fuck Killian right now . . . or I can go curl up with Ash.” I twisted for the door. “Again.”
I knew what I was doing, playing more of those little girl games, seeing how he’d react, but I just didn’t give a shit. I wanted him to hurt like he hurt me. He walked away. Left me when I needed him the most. So screw him; he could watch me snuggle in with Ash and deal with his choices.
“The fuck you will,” he snarled, wrapping his hands around my arms. He moved me away from the exit, ramming me back into the wall.
A spark flared up my spine, starting a bonfire in my chest.
Pain exploded through my hand as my fist struck his throat.
He barely reacted, but his hands released me in favor of his neck.
Slipping away, I made it two steps before he barreled into me, flattening me into the opposite wall, my cheek flattened to the wood.
His frame pressed into me, pinning me in place.
“You are not sleeping with anyone else,” he growled in my ear.
“Fuck you.” I spat. “I can do whatever I want.”
“Can you?’
“Yes. I told you to go that night, but let’s be honest, you’ve wanted an excuse to go way before then.
You pretended to sleep with my friend to keep me away.
Who is the one playing games here? You can’t have it both ways.
You wanted freedom? You got it. The link is broken.
” My nipples ground into the surface, his frame heavy against mine.
It was an excruciating teeter-totter of pain and pleasure.
Nothing outside hurt, it was all inside.
“Leave me alone and let me be with someone who wants to be with me.”
With a snarl, he flipped me around, pressing my arms back into the wall, his eyes blazing like a ferocious sea.
“You don’t think I want to be with you?”
“No.” I held up my chin in defiance. “Maybe as a possession, or when I had magic, but not the real me.” Deep pain snapped through my teeth. “That fan club you loved to tease me about, well guess what, it wasn’t real. They were only attracted to my power . . . to Aneira’s magic.” I spat her name.
“Aneira?” Warwick blinked.
“Come to find out, all the magic funneling into my tiny baby body was from her.” And my mother, using black magic. “The reason the fae book was open to me was that it thought I was part of her lineage. That’s why the nectar was so powerful—it absorbed all her magic plus the barrier’s power.”
He shook his head as if he didn’t want to believe it.
“The magic that saved you, brought you back to life, is because of her.”
“No,” he seethed, his grip on me tightening.
“What’s wrong? You don’t like knowing you fucked someone who used to hold the power of a sadistic evil queen?”
“Shut up,” he growled.
“It’s the truth.” I retorted. “Tad can see my aura now, and the one person in the world he saw with a similar one, at least a sliver of it, was Aneira. She could lure men in, make them bend at the knee, do anything she wanted.” I tried to keep my emotions back. “It was never me you wanted.”
“Lófasz!” He bellowed, punching his hand into the wall.
“Don’t you get it? It’s all you, Brexley.
” My name thundered through me, not with magic, but with the way he used it.
The way it sounded on his lips, curling over his tongue with power.
“Look around you.” He motioned to the door.
“With or without the magic, every man here is willing to fight for you, stand next to you, die for you.” He put his hands near my head, caging me in.
“And it’s not the bitch’s power which makes us bend.
It’s all you.” Ire strained his features.
“I won’t lie; I had hoped it was the magic, something that could be broken.
Terminated. I tried to tell myself that with every step I took away from you, every hour I stayed away.
But fuck . . .” He leaned his head down, his mouth barely an inch from mine, his form entirely encompassing mine.
“It wasn’t. Now the link is gone, and I got what I thought I wanted .
. . my life back, to carry on like I always had.
” He lifted his lip with a snarl I could feel flutter through me.
“Seeing you tonight made it extremely clear.”
“What?”
“Before you, nothing I ate had any taste.” His mouth almost grazed mine. “All I could smell was death. Nothing but killing made me feel anything. Then you walked into my life.” His hand slid under my jaw. “And I don’t see just gray. I feel, smell, taste, and want to fuck you in every color.”
There was a small gasp of my breath before his mouth crashed down on mine, hungry and untamed.
A single touch of his lips and he lit the match.
He kissed me so intensely, my entire body felt it shudder through, dipping through my pussy as if he still had the ability to touch me inside and out, switching me from defensive to aggressive.
Feral. Vicious. My deep-seated starvation for this man ignited me.
Our mouths clashed, nipping, biting, and sucking, trying to devour to the bone.
“Fuck.” He lifted me up, my legs wrapping around him as my mouth claimed his over and over, our bodies slamming back into the wall.
“I went insane when Ash told me you were gone. The fact I couldn’t reach you .
. . find you.” He growled, his fingers tearing at the towel, ripping it from my body.
A noise came up his throat as his eyes feasted on me, his mouth covering my breast, flicking at my nipple.
A groan knocked my head back into the wall, my back arching with need.
“I was already walking a thin line of sanity.” He knotted his hands through my hair, tugging hard. My naked body rubbed against his clothed one, needing him more than air. “And when I saw you tonight, I realized something.”
“What?” His thumb slid over my lips, tracing them roughly.
“The wolf isn’t leashed . . . and yet it still runs back to you.”
His words burst through me, penetrating so violently all logic ceased. My hands ripped at his pants, yanking his shirt fiercely over his head, our mouths cruel in our claim. We had no need for foreplay here, for coy seduction. With us, there never seemed to be. Maybe we were built that way.
We were carnal and brutal.
He yanked me off the wall, tossing me onto the sink, spreading my legs.
“This is mine.” His fingers slipped easily into my wetness, stroking my pussy, sparking fire.
I no longer cared about my voice carrying or who could hear the desperation in my moans as he lowered to his knees, his hands running up my thighs, opening me for him.
His mouth closed on me, sucking and licking deep into me, ripping any air from my lungs.
“Fuck,” he groaned. “I forgot how good you taste.” He clutched my hips, pulling me closer, his mouth devouring me. “Like every fuckin’ color.”
“Oh gods!” I bowed, my hands clawing at his head, my hips bucking ruthlessly against his assault. I felt every nerve he hit as his fingers thrust in, jackknifing me almost off the counter, my orgasm already burning my spine. “Warwick . . .” I needed more.
I wanted all.
Wild sounds rolled in my throat as he devoured me. The reverberation of him licking through my wetness had my body begging to be touched everywhere.
“Brexley.” His moan vibrated deep inside me, my name tearing everything away. Every nerve thrummed like music, tripping over the wire. I heard myself cry out, my body convulsing as he continued to consume me, leaving me panting and sagging against the mirror.
He grinned wolfishly up at me, his tongue flat and licking through me one last time as he rose. Breathing heavily, we watched each other for a moment, his eyes hungry and primal.
Sitting up, I yanked on his pants, shoving them down. “I need more.” I would never have enough, my body already craving him. I wanted him to lose control. To be so far gone, there was no way back.