CHAPTER 23 #2
He shook his head, no doubt catching the worry in my tone. Reagan made a move to step forward but hesitated, letting his hands settle on the doorframe instead. “They’re fine. Everyone is back in their homes, and the wards are up.”
But there was no relief in his words, only a sense of caution, a quiet readiness. His eyes lingered on me, as if he were making sure I was fine. Safe.
Maybe he had noticed that my eyes had returned to their normal hue.
Gods. As if that should even matter right now.
“I need to go,” Reagan said. “I need to figure out how to handle the chaos and the fallout from today.”
My legs tensed, aching to move, to step over the threshold, but I forced myself to stay still. The urge to reach for him was strong. Despite everything that had happened, I wanted to feel him. I needed the weight of his body on top of mine.
That was not the velmoria flowers anymore.
“Right. You should,” I forced myself to say. “I’m glad everyone is safe.”
The strain and danger of the day had been too much. It likely reached that place of guilt in him.
Yet he didn’t move. He stared at me, his eyes a deep shade of blue, flecked with reflections from the candlelight. It was all I could do to lean against the door, to stop myself from getting closer.
I thought I heard the wood in the frame creak under his grip before he pushed himself off and stepped back.
“Go back to sleep,” Reagan said finally. “Don’t open your door for now.”
I bit the inside of my cheek. “Right.”
He trudged away, and I watched him leave, closing the door after he vanished.
I returned to the window. A few flakes of snow fluttered down.
I wouldn’t sleep. Maybe I could take another bath and—
A knock.
My heartbeat surged in response.
When I opened the door, Reagan stood there, his expression tight, hands gripping the doorframe. Saying nothing, just staring. But the intensity in his gaze, the furrow in his strong brow—they might as well have made the floor shake.
An attack had just happened. The estate may have been rattled. And here we were.
My lips curved, and I pushed the door open wider, stepping back.
His shoulders relaxed, and Reagan crossed the threshold. One, two strides. A hand landed on the nape of my neck, the other on the small of my back. His mouth crashed onto mine, his powerful grip nearly stealing my balance.
I moaned into the kiss, unable to stop it, my fingers digging into his muscled back, clutching tightly.
“I’m selfish . . . so irredeemably selfish,” Reagan murmured roughly against my mouth. “But you were looking at me with that fire in your eyes, and I couldn’t walk away.”
He gripped a fistful of my hair, pulling it back gently before lowering his lips to my neck. Kissing. Nipping. Tasting my skin.
“Don’t,” I breathed.
He let out a low groan in response, his hand sliding down my lower back to grip my bottom, pulling me tighter against him. And I felt him against my stomach—hardening, banishing every coherent thought from my mind. Banishing the voice that whispered prisoner inside my head.
But I couldn’t deny myself anymore. I moved my hips, grinding against his trousers, craving the friction. I started unbuttoning his shirt, my eyes roaming over the lean muscles of his stomach and the gleaming heartstone in his chest, bathed in candlelight.
This felt natural, easy.
Reagan pulled the cord of my robe, and the garment slipped to the floor, his mouth finding mine again as I tore his shirt off each shoulder.
His thigh moved between my legs as he stepped forward, the touch sending sparks of fire up my spine, drawing me with him until the backs of my knees met the edge of the bed. He pulled back, fingers curling beneath the hem of my nightgown and lifting it over my head.
Reagan’s gaze held me in a searing, all-consuming thrall as he drank in my bare skin. I was reminded of who he was by the way he lowered us onto the bed, guiding us together, pinning my wrists beside my head. A leader. A lord.
His mouth found mine, hands roaming my body as if determined to know every inch. He traced a path along my neck until my back arched, unwilling for it to end. Or afraid it would. But Reagan only smiled, gripping my waist as he captured the peak of my breast between his lips.
My breath came ragged, and I bit my lower lip to stifle the moan.
“So beautiful when you gasp for me. What other sounds will you make, Jane?”
He gave me that look that made my knees weak, but I tried not to seem as eager as I felt.
“Keep kissing me, and you’ll find out.”
Reagan obliged, his mouth trailing over my other breast. Down my stomach and across my navel, as if he were mapping a path with his tongue. He didn’t leave a single inch untouched, and I felt as if I might burn from the heat inside me, wishing he would never stop.
By the time he reached my waistband, my thighs ached with desire. He removed the final scrap of clothing left on me, skimming it down my legs.
My lungs tightened as he kissed my knees, parting them until my legs fell open against the bed. Reagan gazed down at me, at every inch laid bare.
He traced a slow, torturous stroke with his thumb near my centre, groaning at what he found, dragging a ragged breath from my lips.
He pulled me forward, dropping to his knees on the floor and spreading my ankles apart. The sight of him there, so close to my pleasure—
“Jane.” He placed a kiss on my inner thigh, and I shuddered.
Another kiss, as if he were tasting my name on his lips along with my skin. My heartbeat thundered as his arms hooked around my legs, and he kissed between my thighs.
“Caedmon,” I gasped, my fingers clutching the sheets.
He blinked, a flash of silver flickering through Reagan’s eyes, like a bolt of lightning, like his power rose to the surface, before the blue settled into place.
His given name. I didn’t know why I said it, but as I gazed down at my bare body, at where he licked and branded me as if laying a territorial claim, perhaps the name was my own claim on him.
His smirk deepened, cocky, his fingers splaying wide on my inner thigh. And then he decided to be merciless, slanting his mouth in every possible way, pulling louder, needier cries from me.
“Say it again,” he told me, his voice thick. Lordly.
A deep pulse throbbed at my core, answering him instinctively. With the next long drag of his tongue, his name slipped from my lips.
“Caedmon.”
His groan echoed deep within me, making me clench and arch again. My release throbbed and tugged.
Reagan trailed his hands up my belly, over my breasts, then back to my hips. He pinned them down as the pressure built, stopping me from pulling away.
His mouth brought me to my climax, and I shattered, unravelling and panting. I was faintly aware of saying his name over and over.
Something stirred behind my eyelids. Brilliant, ancient. Shaped like an animal with a curved beak and feathered wings, like a flash of light. It vanished the moment my eyes opened.
Reagan was back on the bed, pressing a path of kisses over my overheated skin. His smirk dripped with male pride.
“I’ve wanted to eat you since Erisea, and every day since,” he said with a crooked grin.
His words stoked my need. The brilliant shape already gone from my mind as Reagan paused, half above me, his eyes on my mouth.
I didn’t wait, wanting him inside, wanting the weight of his body over me. I slid my palm inside his trousers, cupping him. Reagan pressed himself against my hand.
His hot exhale seared across my neck while my fingers fumbled for his zipper, but in a blink, his trousers, his underwear, they vanished. He settled into the cradle of my thighs, his rigid length nudging me. We were both utterly bare.
“Remind me, Jane Darling,” he murmured in my ear, his voice rough. “What is it that you want from me?”
There was no patience in me for this, or for the suggestive words. Everything, I had said. But now, that word meant too much. Instead, I ground against him, whispering, “I want you to take me. For tonight.”
Muscles flexed beneath my fingers as his eyes roamed my face. Finally, Reagan pressed into me, rolling his hips against the heat between my legs.
He groaned, a beastly sound. I gasped as he claimed me, inch by inch, nipping at his lip, rocking my hips. But he moved slowly inside me, his expression one of pure, maddening control.
I breathed, “Stop holding back. Give me what I want.”
A low, guttural curse slipped from his lips, chased by a wicked grin. That leash snapped, and Reagan drove into me so blissfully hard we slid further up the bed.
His hands kept me anchored as he claimed every inch of space within me, his gaze locked on mine with every unrelenting thrust.
I forgot everything. Who he was. Who I was. The problems waiting outside this room.
Reagan’s voice was a husk as he thrust and thrust inside me. “Is this how you want me, my beautiful, darling Jane?”
His eyes were bright blue, hooded, and etched with need. I let my answering moan speak for me.
He grinned against my mouth.
We stayed like that, tangled together, moving and panting. Until he slid a hand between us, his fingers stroking, sending me shattering once more.
Blinding pleasure exploded behind my eyes as I tumbled into the next wave of release. His mouth was on mine, swallowing my desperate sounds, and then his face was against my throat, and I heard the only thing anchoring me—the deep, ragged groan of my name.