Chapter 5
The book sat untouched on the counter while we ate dinner.
My gaze flicked over it often, magic stirring, my focus drawn back to it with both curiosity and fear.
Nox curled himself around Ivan’s shoulders while he ate, and Peanut Butter took his place in my lap.
Both cats purred like tiny engines, sleepy and happy all at once.
I picked at the food, hungry, but anxiety making me semi-nauseous. Was I ready to embrace a gift I’d never really wanted?
Angel set a slice of cake down in front of me. “Eat.”
I stared at him.
“You need the sugar.”
I cut off a bite and swallowed it, surprised that it settled the churning of my stomach, and after devouring half the slice, some of the raging anxiety began to fade.
Maybe the fear coincided with low blood sugar, but the apartment buzzed with energy, as if the arrival of the book added something biting and metallic to the space.
Heavy. Did the other two sense it? They said nothing.
“I’m gonna crash,” Ivan said with a yawn. He carried Nox and vanished into his room.
“Do you need more?” Angel asked as I finished my slice of cake.
I thought about it for a long minute. “No? Maybe. Sorry, I’m a little scattered.”
“Is it the book or something else?”
It was us. Him. And fear. But how did I tell him that?
He slid his hand into mine, gaze meeting mine, and my eyes blurred, stinging with tears I fought back. A lifetime of rejection left internal scars that would never fade. “Please don’t hate me.”
He blinked. “Why would I?” He glanced back at the book, then got up, put the plates in the sink, and tugged me out of my seat. “Bedroom,” he said gruffly.
I moved automatically, half in fear of him tearing my heart apart and half in hope.
The bedroom door clicked shut behind us, sealing out the rest of the apartment.
Both cats had followed Ivan to his room, the book remained on the counter, and the unanswered questions tainted the living area, though I worried they’d seep through my bedroom door.
Angel turned me to face him as he traced his thumbs over the bare skin under my shirt at my waist. “Can we make a new rule?”
I flinched. “Okay?”
He leaned into me, hands tugging me forward by my hips so he could lean his forehead against mine. “Communication. Whatever we’re feeling, either way, we talk about it. Don’t bottle it up.”
“Okay,” I agreed. He raised a brow as if waiting. “I’m scared,” I said.
“Of?”
“Me. This power. You hating me.”
“That’s not going to happen.”
“I accidentally controlled Victor. You said that was a myth.”
“Rumor, never proven fact, and he broke out of it pretty fast. Might not have happened at all if he wasn’t injured.”
“Angel,” I said, uncertain how to convey everything without sounding like a maniac.
He breathed out a long, breathy sigh that sounded more like delight than fear. “I love the way you say my name.”
“Huh?”
“It’s like a sigh. You convey a lot of emotions with the tone of your words.”
“You mean my snark?”
He laughed lightly. “Partially, but also when you’re angry or happy, or really like something.” He caressed my cheek, gaze focused on me as if all he wanted to see was me. It was weirdly consuming and blissful all at once. “Say ‘cake.’”
“Cake,” I said.
He grinned. “Now my name.”
“Angel,” I said. “They don’t sound the same at all.”
“They do. Like happy sighs.”
“You’re a romantic, aren’t you?”
“And you’re not, but that’s okay. You’re still mine.
” Angel’s mouth found mine. I opened my lips for him, breathing him in as he kissed me like nothing else mattered.
His fingers tangled in my hair, tugging a gasp out of me, and I melted into him, desperate for his touch.
“Funny how no one knows your secret. I’m not certain I would have caught it if not for Ivan. ”
“What secret?”
He let my hair fall through his fingers. “Everyone thinks you’re this gothic platinum blond, but you’re really a redhead.”
I blinked at him. “Not really. Strawberry blond at most.”
“Mhmm,” he said as he pushed me back onto the mattress. “You don’t like being a ginger?”
“Bane of my childhood,” I said. “The teasing was endless. But really, I only lighten my hair a little.”
“And shave...” he said, gaze flicking to my crotch.
Heat flooded my cheeks. “I’ve had people complain.”
“About body hair?” he asked incredulously.
“Yeah.”
“Well, I like hair, wherever it’s supposed to grow. Don’t do anything special for me.” He shoved my T-shirt up, gaze going hooded over the minimal treasure trail left. “That’s one of my favorites.”
I swallowed hard, fantasizing about his mouth on me.
“Do you want me to shave?” Angel asked, startling me out of a runaway imagination.
“What?”
“I’m not super hairy in general, but if you want me to shave, I will,” Angel offered.
“Angel, you are the hottest fucking man I’ve ever met.
I don’t care what hair you do or don’t have.
” Wait, that wasn’t right, because I loved his long hair.
I loved running my fingers through it while he sucked me off or having it fall in my face when he glided inside me and kissed me breathless.
“I love your long hair. Could we talk less and get more naked?”
He laughed and tugged me up to strip off my shirt and cast it aside, his own with it. I tugged at his sweatpants, needing him naked, skin to skin, his body over mine. The man was a delight of muscle, fine skin with delicately scrawled artwork dancing over it, and heat.
Angel traced his fingers down my chest as he stripped us bare, his hands running a possessive sweep over me as though reclaiming what the shadows tried to steal.
I couldn’t stop my sighs and the sounds falling from my lips as his mouth followed his fingers, hot and demanding, kissing, nipping, sucking, and exploring my skin as though he could drink away any remnants of my worry.
I tugged the tie out of his hair, letting it fall and tickle my skin, and tangled my fingers into it, tugging hard enough to make him groan. He rewarded me by latching onto my nipple and nipping at it until I bucked against him, desperate for friction.
“Angel, fuck, please.”
He cupped my cock, then gave me a teasing tug.
“No,” I groaned.
He licked up my chest to nip my chin. “Yeah? What do you want, love?”
Again, he said that as if he meant it. But he couldn’t, could he?
Not yet? I trembled, wanting to ask, but fearing the answer might not be what I wanted.
He pulled the tube of lube out of the side table and squirted it into his palm, coating his fingers, the sound dirty and making me rock hard as I knew what was coming.
“Is this what you want?” Angel asked as he slid a finger in me, the digit going smooth and deep, hitting my prostate. I lost all sense of thought beyond needing him in me.
“Angel—” I’d beg if I had to.
“Say it again,” he said, his voice husky and filled with need.
He added a second slicked finger and I choked on his name.
I gripped his hair, forcing his lips to meet mine and swallow the demand.
He gripped my hips, sliding me back on the bed, and spreading me wide, teasing my hole for a few seconds before sliding a pillow under my hips and adding a third finger.
“Fuck. Angel, fuck me, now,” I demanded, trying to keep my voice down. I squeezed his fingers, my ass desperate for something harder, longer, and hotter. “Please.”
He nipped my lower lip, then hooked my knees over his shoulder, added slick to his cock, and sank into me in one long, slow dive.
I saw stars as he buried himself to my core, his hips not stopping until he was balls to ass, nestled as if we were meant to be joined this way.
And maybe we were. I’d never trusted anyone enough to give up the condoms before, but we’d both tested and come up clean, and nothing rivaled the feeling of him, every hot, hard, veined inch of him, sliding into me.
“Slow?” he asked as he began a torturously relaxed retreat.
“No,” I whined.
He slammed back in, making me grumble an incoherent mash of yes and more. “That?”
“Yes,” I demanded.
Angel tugged us both up against the headboard until I was bent in half and stretched nearly to my limit, then he began a grueling pace, fucking into me with a frenzy.
Every thrust renewed his claim, even as he gnawed at my lips and I clung to him, my body clenching to hold him deep.
It didn’t matter that we were both sweaty, or how his abs caressed my dick until I saw stars and the world vanished beneath the rising pleasure, heat, and him.
I came with his name on my lips, his cock buried deep, and his hands gripping my hips hard enough to bruise.
He drove himself home twice more before emptying his release in me.
Tiny tremors racked my body as the heat cooled and he slid my legs off his shoulders.
I’d probably ache tomorrow, but that was okay.
Sex with Angel surpassed anything I’d ever experienced in my life.
Because of our mate bond or something else?
I didn’t care. He never came before I did.
Even when I initiated by trying to give him a blow job or something.
Perfect man? Maybe. All that mattered was that he was mine.
I sighed as he slipped out of me and darted into the bathroom to grab a washcloth.
He wiped me down as I sank into the mattress, sleep tugging at me.
He knew I hated sleeping naked, mostly because I worried about Ivan or having to jump to a case in the middle of the night.
But I barely felt him tug a pair of boxer briefs on me.
And the last hesitation to rest vanished as Angel curled himself at my back and hauled the blanket over us.
There was no safer place than asleep in Angel’s arms, and for a long minute between that last edge of sleep and wakefulness, I debated uttering the words I love you, but left them unspoken as sleep took me.