Chapter 14 #2
Her overtired, overanxious brain ticked through the list of ways demons could die.
Their thick, smooth skin was essentially impermeable, and they were immune to disease.
They’d eventually perish of old age, however.
And before then—if she remembered correctly, and she wasn’t sure she did—they could be killed by extreme cold, drowning, or asphyxiation.
His murder might require more effort than hers, but he wasn’t invulnerable. And how much did his half-human biology decrease his survival odds?
“—him tomorrow.” Hugh was still speaking, still rubbing her stiff neck, even as she agonized over his possible death.
“That said, I don’t have official leave to share the information with anyone outside my office.
With the exception of Boucher, please keep everything I’ve told you between the two of us, Gwen. ”
Despite her gut-clenching fear, she brightened at that.
He trusted her to keep his secrets? And cared about her continued survival enough to risk his job and flout the very strict rules of government confidentiality?
Hugh squeezed her nape gently. “Gwen?”
“Of course,” she managed belatedly. “I won’t tell anyone but him. I promise.”
“Thank you.” His warm lips rested for a moment on the crown of her head, his kiss an island of heat blooming atop her hair.
“I’m sorry to discuss something so troubling when you’re already struggling to rest. I simply worried that you might sleep past my departure for my meeting with Councilor Beech tomorrow, and I wanted you to exercise caution in my absence.
If you leave the apartment, please ask Kip, Lorrie, Max, or Sabrina to accompany you. ”
New realms of anxiety: hereby unlocked. “No problem.”
He kissed her hair again, the gesture tender and lamentably chaste.
She needed more.
And as long as they might both perish at any minute, shouldn’t she carpe diem? Especially if her particular diem included Hugh’s tempting mouth, which Thora’s arrival had so disappointingly stopped Gwen from seizing mere hours ago?
Just punch-drunk enough to be brave, she raised her head from his shoulder and met his molten-amber gaze. She held her breath and leaned forward, her heartbeat echoing in her eyes—and when he didn’t move away, she closed that final inch of distance between them.
Her eyelashes fluttered shut as her lips brushed against his, butterfly soft, in yearning, tentative exploration. Once, then again, before she let herself press harder. Let her mouth part. Let her tongue flick across the smooth surface of his lower lip.
His breathing halted, his body flaming hot and utterly still.
Then he jerked as if in startlement before turning his head away from hers, and she regretted every single one of her life choices.
Oh, gods, he didn’t want her. Not like she wanted him.
When she tried to put distance between them, though, he held her tightly against him, unwilling to let her squirm away in abject humiliation.
Giving up, she hid her red-hot face against his equally hot shoulder and waited in miserable silence for what would no doubt be a crushing response to her presumption.
He took a minute to speak. When he did, his voice was hoarse.
“Never doubt that I want you.” He spoke quietly into her flaming ear, and her toes curled at the bolt of sensation. “Far too much, given the circumstances.”
Her heart actually fluttered in her foolish chest.
The joy of the improbable revelation trickled through her veins like warm honey, turning her languid against him. Only…wait.
“ ‘Far too much’? What does that mean?” Her head popped up, and if he hadn’t jerked away just in time, her skull would have broken his nose. “What circumstances?”
“Gwen, I insisted that you come home with me.” The strained patience in his tone didn’t seem directed at her.
More their current state of affairs. “You’re relying on my assistance for both your immediate and long-term survival.
I don’t want you to feel obligated to allow unwanted intimacy, and I don’t want to take advantage of a very fraught situation in which you have so few options and so little control. ”
That was a very honorable answer to her question. Which shouldn’t surprise her, given what she knew of his ethical code, but somehow it still did. In her experience, powerful beings didn’t fret much about the concerns of someone like her.
And if he genuinely wanted her too…if the qualms he’d mentioned were the only things holding him back…
Draping herself more fully over him, she propped her chin atop her stacked hands on his chest. “So…you want me to have choices? That’s why you pulled away from me?”
Her breasts had flattened—as much as they could, anyway—against his firm chest. No matter how thick his skin might be, he couldn’t possibly miss the poke of her stiff nipples. Just in case he needed another hint, though, she slid her leg between his.
Against her hip, she was pretty sure she now had some firsthand knowledge of male demon anatomy. The newfound information seemed very promising.
Her smile widened. So did his pupils.
“Essentially, yes,” he said after a long, lust-laden pause. Those smoked-honey eyes had gone hazy, his voice husky. “Choices unconstrained by obligation or forced proximity.”
With a subtle, frustrated shake of his head, he loosened his hold on her. Fought his own instincts, even as she undermined his control.
For a demon councilor with a stick up his very fine ass, he was surprisingly endearing.
“In that case…” Bracing herself with a hand on the mattress, she rose above him. “I choose you. Freely. For no other reason than my own desires.”
She kissed him again. Softly. Slowly. Because his determination to preserve her self-sovereignty deserved tenderness, and she wanted to savor this moment of intoxicating sweetness.
He tasted like quince paste. Smelled like a crackling campfire on a chilly night with friends. Cradled her in his arms like she—of all people!—was precious.
His beard brushed against her overheated skin like raw silk, and the satiny pads of his fingertips settled on her jaw, five distinct spots of tingling heat.
They directed the angle of her head with the faintest possible pressure so their mouths aligned more fully, and she gladly acquiesced. The more closeness, the better.
Their leisurely kisses stretched out like taffy in the hushed night.
She had no idea how long his lips clung to hers, all heady warmth and controlled yearning and soft sips, until she lost patience.
Until the shift of her thighs against his turned restless.
Until her tongue skimmed along his bottom lip once more and flicked inside to taste him, devour him, because she didn’t want control.
Not his, not hers. And if that meant they rushed, so be it.
His breath hitched, and that iron control of his melted in the sudden conflagration.
With startling ease, he flipped them both over.
Settled firmly between her parted thighs on the mattress, bracing himself on both elbows, and reclaimed her mouth with shocking fierceness.
His tongue was hot and agile, twirling around hers until dizzy bursts of pleasure detonated between her legs, and—
It was definitely, definitely forked. How had she never realized that before?