Chapter 18 #2
“Look at it, Dervla.”
Her eyes drop to the carving on my arm, and her breath hitches. “You’re unhinged.”
“You’re not stopping me.”
She licks her lips, knowing I’ve got her.
I finish up carving her name into my arm, the scratches light but still bleeding, and I drop her hand.
Her chest is heaving. Not from fear. From something she can’t categorise, and that’s what’s scaring her more than the blood or the blade or the man standing in front of her with his veins open and her name etched into his flesh.
“Why?”
“Because I killed for you and I’d do it again.”
“I’m not thanking you,” she says stiffly.
“I’m not asking you to. That was a provocation.”
“I hate you,” she whispers.
“No, you don’t. You want to, but you can’t.” I tilt her chin up, so she is staring into my eyes again. I lean in closer to whisper next to her ear. “This is what you want, Dervla. You want a man, or three, who will do anything to keep you safe.”
“I can look after myself.”
“Doesn’t mean you have to.”
“I don’t trust you.” It’s barely a murmur.
“Even now?”
“Especially now.”
“Then why aren’t you pushing me away?”
“Because I don’t want to.”
I slam my lips to hers. I don’t need anything other than words from her to take what I want, to give her what she needs. Her mouth opens under mine on a sharp inhale, and that is all the permission I need to lose what little restraint I came upstairs with.
I kiss her hard. No softness. No caution. Her back hits the door with a dull thud, and she makes a furious, wrecked sound into my mouth that goes straight to my cock. Blood trickles warm down my forearm.
She kisses just like she fights. Angry. Proud. Like every second is an argument she intends to win.
I tighten my grip on her wrist, pushing her hand above her head and drag my free hand down her side, over the thin cotton of her shirt, over the curve of her waist, down to her thigh. Bare skin. Hot. She shivers, and I feel it everywhere.
When I bite her lower lip, she gasps and turns her face just enough to breathe as the blade clatters to the floor.
“Cormac,” she says, and my name in her mouth sounds like a warning and a plea all at once.
“Yeah,” I murmur against her lips. “That’s right.”
Her left hand fists in my hair so hard it stings. I want more of that. I want every violent little reaction she has. I want to hear her stop thinking for one second and just feel.
My hand slides under the hem of her shirt and finds warm skin at her waist, just above the waistband of those tiny shorts. She jerks at the contact, not away. Into it. Her hips shift against mine, and the friction nearly undoes me on the spot.
I kiss her again, harder, and she gives it back with interest, biting at my lip, her fingers still twisted in my hair. Blood from my arm smears against her thigh where my forearm brushes her bare skin. The scent of it gets between us. Sharp. Real. It makes everything hotter.
My mouth breaks from hers and goes to her jaw, her throat. I suck at the spot beneath her ear just to feel her pulse jump under my lips.
“Cormac,” she says again, and this time it sounds less like a warning and more like she’s trying to hold onto something.
My hand moves between her thighs, and I squeeze. Her head tips back against the door with a soft knock.
I let go of her wrist long enough to grip both sides of her hips and pin her there with my body. Her hands go to my chest, flat for one second, then curl into me. Not to push. To hold.
Then she shoves me down to my knees in front of her, and I nearly come on the spot as my cock throbs against my joggers. I pull her shorts down, and she spreads her legs enough for me to suck her clit into my mouth.
She tastes fucking incredible.
I grip the backs of her thighs and drag her closer, opening her bare pussy for me while I work my tongue over her in slow, brutal strokes.
Her fingers tangle harder in my hair, yanking without mercy, and I groan into her because she is already soaked, already shaking, already giving me exactly what I wanted the second I came up those stairs.
“Fuck,” she breathes.
I look up.
Her hair is a mess around her face. Her lips are swollen from my mouth. Her chest rises fast under that thin sleep shirt, and her eyes are on me with a kind of fury that has nowhere to go now except straight through me.
“Keep looking at me,” I say.
She glares down at me like she wants to kill me for the command.
Then she obeys it.
That does something filthy to my head.
I flatten my tongue and lick up through her folds, then close my mouth around her clit again and suck, hard enough to make her jolt. Her knee nearly clips my ear. Good. I want every bit of her control broken open. I want all that pride stripped down until all she can do is feel.
My cut arm throbs where her name is fresh in my skin. Blood drips down over my wrist and onto the floorboards, but I don’t care. If anything, it keeps me locked in the moment. Keeps me sharp. Keeps her eyes on me.
I push two fingers inside her.
She swears, and her hips jerk. Tight. Hot. She clamps around me hard enough to make my jaw tense, and I fuck her with my hand while I keep my mouth on her clit, working her until her breathing turns ragged and uneven.
“That’s it,” I mutter against her. “Give it to me.”
Her hand leaves my hair for half a second just to slap over her own mouth, like she’s trying to keep quiet. Like everyone in this house doesn’t already know exactly what’s happening.
I pull back just enough to look up at her. “No.”
Her eyes flash. “No, what?”
I hook my arm under one of her legs and haul it over my shoulder before I remember the word, because I can’t even think straight when she’s dripping on my mouth. I settle for bracing her thigh harder against me. “No hiding.”
I take her wrist and drag her hand away from her mouth. Then I go back down on her before she can argue, and this time I don’t hold anything back. I lick and suck and use my fingers until her whole body goes taut, and I feel the exact second she breaks.
A strangled sound tears out of her, and she tries to twist away from the intensity, but I’ve got her exactly where I want her. My fingers keep driving into her, my mouth stays on her clit, and I take everything she gives me until her orgasm hits hard enough to make her legs shake.
She comes with my name in her mouth.
Not loud. Not screamed. Dragged out of her like it costs her something.
That does it for me.
I ease my fingers out and kiss my way back up her stomach, pushing to my feet while she’s still breathing in broken bursts, still staring at me with fury and heat before I pull her shirt over her head.
I grip her jaw. “Tell me again you hate me.”
“Fuck you,” she whispers.
I grin. “That’s not an answer.”
Her hand slides down between us and palms me through the joggers. Hard. My head drops for a second, and I swear under my breath because she never does anything halfway. Even wrecked, she’s vicious.
“Better?” she asks.
“No.”
I catch her wrist and pin it to the door again, then drag the waistband of my joggers down enough to free my cock. I’m hard enough that it aches. Her eyes drop and stay there for one second before she drops to her knees and takes me deep in her mouth.