Chapter 13 #2
Heat pools in her cheeks, and she sinks farther into the switchboard. “Oh.”
“Do you have any idea how much it kills me to see you so scared? Today at the chapel, I thought you were seriously hurt, and I—” He swallows his words.
“You take up so much space inside my brain I’d need an exorcism to get you out.
Do you happen to have the number of a good priest, Jules?
Know some Catholic prayer? Are you carrying holy water in this little bag by chance? ”
He tugs on the strap and her purse falls to the floor between them.
She should storm out. Should tell him to fuck off. Should never talk to him again.
Should let him ruin her right back.
“You’re haunted?” Ezra leans close enough that she can nearly taste his next words. “I’m possessed.”
The silence that follows rings in her ears, static filled and blistering.
She has no idea which one of them moves first.
Ezra fists the hem of her sweater while her hands fly to his collar. Mallory’s boots skid on the floor, spine peeling away from the switchboard as they collide, his mouth crashing against hers.
The kiss is infused with anger and defeat, warfare and surrender. Ezra’s teeth sink into her lower lip, guiding her open, and the first brush of his tongue feels like it’s laced with every lie he’s told her.
“I hate you,” she breathes into his mouth.
“Show me how much,” he says roughly.
Ezra’s fist closes in her hair as he kisses her harder.
His other hand dips to her waist, traversing higher, palming the full curve of her breast through her sweater.
All while his tongue sweeps hers in slow, teasing strokes.
Like he’s holding himself back. Like he could devour her whole if he isn’t careful.
Rage and desire crash inside her, and Mallory yields to the intoxicating dissonance, arching into his firm grip. The movement sends her hip into the switchboard, and a flood of opal bursts below.
“The lights—”
“Shh.” Ezra reaches until he finds the switch. His hands move to her hips, coaxing her onto the counter, buttons digging into her thighs.
He leans in again, just as another swell of silver white flashes from behind the booth.
Ezra’s breath is warm against her cheek. “Can you reach the—just unplug it.”
Mallory twists toward the switchboard. She yanks the thick plug, and the theater plunges nearly to black. The only light remaining is a pale glow from the ghost light, and the burning crimson from the exit sign over Ezra’s shoulder.
Turning the entire lighting booth a blood-soaked red.
Pulse racing, she draws Ezra’s mouth back to hers. The rusty shadows spark her confidence, and she tugs on his belt to bring him as close as possible. He wastes no time nudging her knees around his hips, and heat coils in her stomach at the hard press of him against her.
“Do you feel what you do to me?” he asks. His words trigger the softest moan from her, and his breath rushes out at the sound. “I’m going to need to hear that again. Louder.” He ghosts his knuckles over the skin above her knit thigh highs. “Can I touch you?”
She stares up through her lashes. She shouldn’t let him—shouldn’t let him find out just how much she doesn’t hate him at all.
Instead, she nods and whispers, “Higher.”
Ezra’s hand slips beneath her skirt, fingers grazing the inside of her thigh. Right at the edge of her underwear. “So…here, then?”
“Close,” she says, smiling slightly, her mouth hovering over his. “Keep going.”
He releases a low sound of approval and slides his palm over the black fabric between her legs, the dampness fully giving her away.
“Fuck,” he exhales. “Are you always this wet for me?”
She just sinks into his hand in defeat. But Ezra only traces her softly through her underwear, his movements painfully slow. Featherlight. Maddening. His thumb slowly slides back and forth, barely touching where she wants him most.
She’s certain she’ll shatter to pieces when he does.
As if he can read her thoughts, Ezra’s fingers slip beneath the fabric. She sucks in a breath as he moves over her smooth skin in deliberate, languid strokes. Carefully sliding along her center, dipping so briefly inside.
“You’re soaking,” he grinds out. “Tell me, were you like this in the confessional booth?”
“What if I was?” Mallory challenges, defiant, rolling her hips.
He looks at her in mock disapproval. “Then I think you’ve sinned, Jules.”
“I—” Her response spirals into a mewl as he sinks two fingers all the way inside her.
Ezra’s lips cover hers again, keeping his fingers impossibly still for a moment before slowly stroking his way out. Taking his time, feeling every inch of her.
And then, he drags his fingertips, slick with her desire, right over her clit. Firmly. Purposefully. Coaxing her toward surrender.
Heat rages inside her, and Mallory rocks against his hand, moaning freely into his mouth, the pressure finally as rough as she wants it. He’s barely touched her and she’s seconds, fucking seconds, away from coming apart in his palm.
“I could tell,” he breathes, “how turned on you were earlier. And you know what I wanted to do about it? Right there in that fucking church?”
“What?” she pants, clenching around his hand.
Ezra pulls back and she practically whimpers.
But her frustration slips into surprise when he kneels before her, reaching under her skirt to tug her underwear down her thighs.
She barely has time to gasp before he’s guiding her backward and arranging her legs over his shoulders.
His pupils are blown at the sight of her, bare and spread open for him beneath her skirt.
He raises his gaze to hers in the crimson glow. “I wanted to worship you.”
Mallory’s breath rushes out as he pushes the fabric up toward her hips and leans in.
Ezra groans at the first taste of her, and she drifts somewhere else at the rough, hungry sound.
Levitating closer to the moon, the stars, to another fucking dimension as he kisses between her thighs just as desperately as he kissed her mouth.
Rolling his tongue forward and back, grazing her with his teeth.
Mallory’s spine arches above the switchboard, buttons scraping at her skin, but she doesn’t care, doesn’t care about anything other than this.
“Oh god,” she cries as he presses two fingers back inside her, then a third. She can feel the heat building and building as he works her right to the edge—
And pulls back just before she falls.
“Ezra,” she whines as she wriggles onto her elbows. “Please don’t stop.”
His smirk is a blade in the dark as he drags the pad of his thumb through her glistening, swollen skin. Lashes lowered, transfixed. “Look at what I’ve done to you.”
Something unexpected and desperate flares inside her at his words, and she slams upright, swinging her feet to the floor. Ezra’s grin deepens as she shoves him onto the couch in the corner, kneeling above him as she works his belt.
“I’ve never seen you so impatient—”
Mallory presses her palm to his mouth. “No more talking.”
She can feel his smile against her, which turns into soft kisses as she undoes his buckle with her other hand. Mallory tries to ignore the warmth of his tongue trailing her fingers, staying focused on her task until she finally works him free.
Ezra meets her gaze as she tightens her grip.
He settles against the couch, arms confidently spread across the back, but she’s not oblivious to the tiny changes in his face as she starts to stroke him up and down—as slowly and carefully as he teased her.
His smirk vanishes, replaced by a feathering in his jaw, a quickening of his breath.
“Is this all for me?” she asks, sliding her palm more firmly along his length.
He brings one hand up around her rib cage, holding her to him. Fingers clenching slightly. “You know it is.”
Huffing a soft laugh, she leans back to pull off her sweater before reaching down again. His focus slips to her breasts straining against her bra, the rosary beads tucked inside from earlier.
“You’re still wearing these,” Ezra muses, words punctuated by a sharp inhale as she curves her thumb over the silky tip of his arousal.
“I haven’t taken them off. Is doing this while wearing them another sin?”
“Probably,” he chuckles, before clasping a firm grip around her breast. “Would you sin for me, Jules?”
Mallory keeps her eyes locked on his in the reddened glow, pulse whirring as she repositions herself to feel him against her.
“I think I already have,” she whispers.
Ezra groans at the direct contact and she rolls her hips, sliding along his cock, distantly aware of how easy it would be for him to slip inside her.
Of how much she wants to feel every impossibly thick inch of him.
She shouldn’t want it, should hate him, despise him, but the thought only makes her press closer, the edges of her indignation shifting to poisonous lust.