Chapter 19 #2
My palm, still touching the book spine, felt like it no longer belonged to me. It was too heavy to move, as if the blood had thickened inside it. My heartbeat turned violent, ramming against my ribcage.
Not loud. Not fast.
Violent.
“Slow down,” he whispered, voice as dark as the hour before death. “I can feel your heartbeat.” His breath brushed the shell of my ear.
I closed my eyes. Just for a second. Just to feel him.
It was foolish, how my knees wanted to buckle. How I wanted to sink into him like he was the only gravity I knew.
But no.
No, no, no. He didn’t get to do this.
Not after vanishing all day. Not after leaving me alone in the wake of a near-death. What kind of human left a girl with questions concerning her safety, vanished for the whole day, then came back to corner her like he was entitled to her body, her space, her air?
Hot and brittle rage trembled beneath my skin. Strength found me, and I moved to shove my elbow backward at his stomach, but it was like striking a wall.
He didn’t move.
I tried again, harder. “You don’t get to come back like this,” I hissed, my voice barely louder than a breath.
“You think I ever left?” His words rasped too close as his breath inched towards the column of my neck, his body pressing deeper into my back, fitting so tightly it felt like a lock clicking into place.
I bit down hard on my lip, trying to tether the anger, because if I didn’t, I would crumble into him like ash.
I shoved my elbow into his stomach, hoping it’d knock some sense back into both of us.
But he didn’t budge. Not even an inch. His body was iron and stone and the exact weight of every thought I’d tried to banish since this morning.
Gritting my teeth, I drew my arm forward and shoved it back again, harder this time.
“One second.” He caught my elbow, his fingers locking around it an inch from impact. The contact sent a ripple through my skin, goosebumps breaking out, scattering over my body like panicking ants.
My heart stalled at the sound of that tone, then stuttered into motion, beating too fast and loud.
“Please,” he whispered again, softer this time, so soft it nearly broke something in me. “Just give me a moment.”
His face dropped into the crook of my neck.
And I—
I didn’t move.
I couldn’t.
I didn’t know if I was frozen from shock or because some part of me didn’t want to stir him.
His breath warmed my skin. His body, once predatory, felt desperate now, like he was seeking and reaching for something. But why? Why was he suddenly acting like this? Why did it feel like his entire world was breaking and he needed to catch a breath before going back to the ruin?
I closed my eyes, shutting out my curiosity. I didn’t want more questions. I already had a bucket full of them. So I let my other hand drop from the shelf and tilted my head just enough to make him lift his face.
“What do you mean you never left?” I murmured. “Why are you here? Why are you doing this?” I turned my head forward, facing the spines of the books as I added, “How did you find me? And don’t you dare say I’m easy to predict.”
“One question at a time, yeah?” His voice was groggy and strained. He sounded like a man who hadn’t slept in years, like he wanted to bury himself in a corner and never move again.
I exhaled slowly as I picked one question. “How did you find me? This morning. And right now.”
“You really want to know?” he asked, and this time, his voice dipped into a sinful whisper, dragging along the rim of my sanity.
I nodded, staring at the row of books in front of me.
Suddenly, his hand moved from where it had been resting beside my hip, gliding around until it settled flat against my stomach. I sucked in a sharp breath, my body going tense under his hot touch.
He straightened behind me, towering, heat pressing against every inch of my back. And then his hand began to move.
From my navel, he dragged two long fingers upward, slow as molten honey, setting my nerves on fire in their wake.
Up.
And up.
Until he hovered an inch below my breasts.
I wet my lips before parting them. “Hey—”
“Shhh.”
I couldn’t breathe.
He kept going, dragging his fingers higher, slipping between my breasts with infuriating patience. He paused there—just for a second—before tracing a path to where my heart pounded.
When he reached the frantic thrum of it beneath my ribs, he began to circle it slowly.
“Your thoughts control your emotions, your emotions control your heartbeat,” he said softly, “and your heart leads me to wherever you are. That’s how I always find you.”
His finger circled continuously right above my heart in a cruel tease.
I clenched my jaw, trying to hold on to my unstable sanity. “Am I supposed to believe you can feel what I feel?” I asked, barely keeping my voice even.
“You believe I might kill you,” he said against my skin. “How is this harder to believe?”
I blinked.
He had no point. Murder was easy to believe because it could be carried out by any human. Even by a child. We were capable of it. But feeling someone’s emotions? That was absurd.
But then, he wasn’t totally human. I was yet to know what he was. I swallowed hard. “Fine. Then prove it. What do I feel right now?”
He didn’t speak.
Instead, his hand shifted.
One finger dipped down again, sliding with maddening grace to the centre of my breasts.
Then, like an unhinged man, he began to draw slow, hot circles around my right breast.
From the centre, he trailed a line with the heat of his finger to the top of my breast, then to the side, to under, and back to the centre. With each revolution, he spiralled inward, moving inch by inch closer to my nipple in a path that sent tremors licking up my spine.
My knees buckled, heat bloomed under my skin, sinking into my nerves and curling my toes in my boots.
Even though my bra and tank top were enough turn off and obstruction, I still couldn’t breathe. Air was a thin thread I clung to while my mind turned to static.
Each motion of his finger was wicked, and I realised he was fucking with me with his hot touch, not for pleasure, but for control.
And gods help me, it was working.
My fingers spasmed against the wooden shelf, but they felt boneless, too weak to push him off and too addicted to his heat to try.
My thighs pressed together on instinct. Each inch his finger travelled, each breath that caught in my throat, tightened the pull between my legs as he awakened a hunger inside me that made my body ache with the desperation to be touched.
He was almost there—almost at the centre, at the softest part of me—and my heart was beating like it wanted to escape, knowing it wouldn’t survive the impact of his touch.
He leaned in again, his breath trailing down my ear. “You’re burning hotter than usual, Sanora,” he said teasingly, almost mockingly, his dark smile reflecting in his voice.
I closed my eyes. I hated that he was right.
When was the last time I had sex? Maybe if my body wasn’t too on edge these days, I wouldn’t find this act so arousing and aching, it made my body feel too full and too empty all at once.
His fingertip grazed the delicate edge of my areola, the touch so slight it sent a shiver darting through my chest. My teeth sank into my bottom lip, trapping the gasp that wanted to break free.
“Stop playing,” I whispered.
We were in the library—tucked away in the back, yes, but still in plain enough for someone to wander upon us. and I knew if he continued teasing me and went deeper into it, I wouldn’t be able to keep the sound in.
What the hell was wrong with me? I was letting a man—practically a stranger— touch me here.
A man I still wasn’t sure I could trust. I didn’t know if his constant rescue of me from death’s doorstep was just him biding his time before he decided to be it.
His pattern didn’t fit the mould of an assassin waiting for a perfect strike…
but I wasn’t na?ve enough to discard the possibility.
Not when he’d proven what lengths he’d go.
Like the time he bought every accommodation in Nimorran, making sure I had nowhere else to run to, and then doubled my rent so he could move in.
I tried to pull myself together and parted my lips to tell him off when I saw his other hand rise.
The sharp glint of his dagger caught the light before its tip kissed the hollow of my throat.
His other hand, the one that had been circling my nipple, left its slow orbit to wrap around my neck, the blade hovering directly above his grip.
My heart stuttered in my chest. My stomach dropped, and something warm unfurled low in my belly.
His palm burned against my skin, branding my throat, and every word I might have shouted dissolved before they could form.
And he wasn’t even wearing his black gloves, so his touch scorched like it’d been drawn out from hell a minute ago.
“What…what are you doing?”
He bent down, his breath grazing the shell of my ear. “Are you scared?”
Of course. But my fingers only dug into the edge of the shelf, my gaze sharpening until it was a weapon of its own.
Any sane arousal should have withered the moment that blade touched the base of my chin…
yet I believed he wouldn’t end me. And since he wasn’t, the knowledge made my thighs press together.
Fear thudded in my chest, heat coiling low at the thought of him playing this dangerous game with me.
“Don’t be ridiculous,” I managed.
Thrax’s grip tightened just enough to make me swallow. The tip of the knife dipped until it hovered over my pounding heart. I could hear the smile in his voice when he murmured, “Liar.”
Gods, his voice. That low, velvety rasp slid into my ear and bled into my bloodstream, each word stoking the heat in my skin until my breath came uneven. Arousal gripped the base of my stomach like a fist, my thighs clenching tighter and, without thinking, I rubbed myself against him.