Chapter 2 Cinerator #2
Gwen turned toward me, lifting her head to stare into my eyes. “I was going to thank you, but I don’t even know your name.”
“Cin,” I answered with a smirk, knowing she’d jump to the wrong spelling.
“Sin?” Her gaze took me in, roaming over as much of me as she could see in the moonlight.
My black clothes hid most of my skin and the dark ink that covered my upper body.
Since my night vision was far better than hers, I noticed the slight flush rising into her cheeks.
How sweet. A woman who still blushed. Unlike the club girls who filled the bar inside the Devil’s Wood every night.
Her reaction sparked something to life inside me—a renewal of the fiery lust that briefly flashed through me when I first saw her.
“Short for Cinerator.”
“Oh.” She glanced at her hands as if holding my gaze was too difficult.
“Like Cin with a ‘C’?” She appeared uncomfortable, trying to decide if she wanted to move away from me slowly or just bolt.
Her heartbeat fluttered in her neck, and I nearly circled her throat with my palm just to feel it pulse beneath my skin.
“Yeah, Angel Face.” I tilted my head, studying her. The name didn’t quite fit. “Bambi.” That was better.
“Bambi?”
She appeared confused or mildly insulted. I couldn’t read her. Not yet. But something told me I’d get to know her better. And soon.
“Cute and sweet. Curious. Skittish. Describes you perfectly.” I almost laughed when she seemed at a loss for words.
“Wait.” Her brow furrowed. “You’re named after a furnace?”
A chuckle escaped my lips. She obviously didn’t have a clue what a road name was or why I would have one. “You could say that.”
Her curiosity got the better of her again. “Why?”
“Because I reduce my enemies to ashes, Bambi.”
It was a half-truth. Someday, I might reveal more.
Her body jolted with the explanation. Maybe I shocked her. “My name is Gwen,” she reminded me, bravely lifting her chin higher.
“I heard you the first time,” I responded with a grin. “What’s wrong with Bambi?”
“It makes me sound like, you know.”
I had an idea, but I wanted her to tell me. I frowned. “No. Tell me.”
She looked flustered. “Like a stripper or, uh,” she paused.
“Like a whore?” I was teasing her. Testing her. Seeing how far I could push little Bambi.
“That’s not funny.”
The wind decided to pick up at that moment and latch onto Gwen’s essence. It wasn’t a perfume. Or a musk. I could smell both. This was something more primal. An almost sweet undertone, but also decadent. Rich. Exotic.
I nearly snarled as my cock instantly hardened.
And then that scent was joined by a ferocious wave of increasing desire—an intoxicating elixir of lust, need, and curiosity. My brain became saturated with it, sucking in the feeling as I lost coherent thought and gripped her arms, forcing her back against the closed gate.
A whimper was her only response.
My head lowered, and I pressed my nose to her skin, dragging in more of that addictive scent, gathering up the slurry of her wild emotions. That underlying sweetness. More of her.
I had to taste her. Didn’t matter that she hadn’t consented to my touch. I wasn’t invading anything but her immediate space. My tongue flicked out, and I slid it along the smooth column of her throat, indulging in the need to be closer as she lightly moaned. Such complex flavor.
I grew hungry for more than her feelings and the way they fed my insatiable appetite. I wanted her. The dew of her pussy on my lips. The clenching of her thighs around my shoulders.
With the bulge in my pants, I pressed into Gwen, needing her to know how she affected me.
Strangers be damned. This was no accidental meeting.
Somewhere, in the past, in this life or the one before it, I fucking knew her.
Gwen locked her knees together, unable to hide her arousal. I could sense the wetness gathering between her sexy, thick thighs. How the heat bloomed there.
Fuck.
I had to let her go. This wasn’t the time or place to explore our connection. It took all the will I possessed to make my body obey. Stepping back, I released her, studying the way her pulse thrummed in her neck. “Time to go home, Bambi.”
“Wh-what?”
Was she that dazed by my hands and mouth on her body?
“You need to leave. It’s almost the witching hour. Not a safe place for little deer to play.”
Only devils, demons, and ghosts walked among the graves at this hour. And those tasked with protecting these hallowed grounds.
Gwen pushed away from the gate. Her chin lifted in defiance.
I hid my smile and opened the exit for her.
Gwen stepped through and rushed toward her vehicle.
She paused when she reached for the driver’s side door, looking back at the closed gate, but I had already stepped into the shadows.
Hidden from her view, I scanned her license plate number and the make and model of her truck. She’d be easy to find.
With a frown and a brief look of possible disappointment, she slid behind the wheel.
In less than a minute, her taillights were fading into the darkness.
Only then did I turn around, heading back up the hill to find out which grave had caused Gwen such heart-wrenching grief.
I had to know what sorrow brought her to me this night and called the monster within.
Because he was now snared.