The bed dipped beside her and she closed her eyes. Mael’s scent, the almost addictive essence of his skin washed over her. She drew in a deepened breath and her heart pounded. Her hands fisted the sheets.
“I must be thorough, you understand?” His voice was too close. “There is magic in sex, Felix. In touch and taste.” He teased back a loose strand of her hair and she almost flinched. Something else people didn’t do. They didn’t touch her. “You must come.”
The memory of his touch was still in her flesh, but he’d just given her an order. And the command he’d issued chilled her flesh.
His large hand brushed her jaw and this time she did flinch.
“Felix…”
Mael was closer, the press of his bare, hot skin over her breasts, strange and tantalising. A hand shaped her hip, his thumb stroking its hollow in slow, easy movements.
Warmth spiralled, her skin shivering and her mouth dried. He was a darkness, a shadow beneath the heavy bedclothes, all muscle and heat and her old, deeply hidden fantasies bubbled dangerously to the surface. For all his change, for all his scars there was something about Zacharias Mael that simply…pulsed. And she could no more resist it, resist him than any other woman.
A feather-light touch stole across her shoulder and she gasped. His deadly wings. They wouldn’t devour. No, they promised nothing but pleasure. Addictive pleasure…for a man who would never want her.
“Look at me.”
Mael’s voice was deep, soft, a command wrapped in velvet. His eyes. A warm darkness in which she could lose herself. Eyes with no hint of amber. His demon-half. “This will change everything for you.” His mouth moved over hers, a slow tasting, innocent, sweet. He paused. “No one has kissed you before?”
Her lips parted in reply and found the sharp edge of his teeth grazing her lower lip. His tongue teased her, the tip briefly tasting her own.
“Never?”
The strange heat of him pressed against the length of her bared flesh, one hand on her hip, the other somehow tangled in her hair. It all seemed too fast…and not fast enough for the dull throb beating low in her belly.
“Tell me. Am I the very first?”
“Yes.”
He groaned against her mouth. Was that the Bringer in him enjoying, feasting on her innocence? The hard length of him pushed against her stomach. Gods below, he was big.
“Did you wait for me, Felix?”
His voice was sin, weaving around her, teasing her senses. Was this a game to him? Because she had waited. Before he…changed, she’d adored him. And after…
She met his open mouth, wanting more of his kisses, a soft moan escaping her as his lips took hers, his tongue clever and sure.
“So sweet…”
Felix placed a tentative hand on his arm, the muscles a rock beneath the warm, smooth skin. Something surged between them. Magic and not. Her thoughts scrambled to analyse it, but Mael’s hand had slipped over the curve of her belly. A long finger drew circles above her sex as he stroked his cock in a slow rhythm against her skin.
“Hook your leg over mine.”
With her heart in her mouth, she did, opening herself to him. Her smooth thigh quivered as it brushed up against the haired roughness of his leg.
“Have you ever touched yourself?”
Why was he talking? Why was he asking such personal questions, ones that made her face burn?
“Did your little fingers steal down into your knickers in the dead of night? Just like this?” His voice was pure sex. Rich and dark and hot. The tip of one long finger strummed and Felix bucked against him, clutching at his arms. A half-strangled grunt escaped her. So much worse—or better—than how he’d driven her to bliss before. Skin on skin, in every way and place. Her heart drummed. And she wanted more. So much more.
“Untouched. Even by yourself.”
“I wanted…” How could she hand over that power to him? Admit that she’d always wanted him to touch her, to draw pleasure from her as she gave it to him—
“You wanted me?” His laughter was soft, but strangely possessive. “Did you imagine my fingers, my tongue, my cock? Tell me, Felix.” Her name was drawn out, hot, impossible. “I want to know your fantasies.”
Another finger joined the first, finding that tight little nub, strumming and stroking, spiralling heat she didn’t know how to name, up through her flesh. Fuller than the thin threads of magic, but just as wild, just as fast. “Mael…”
“Zacharias. Say it.”
Her thoughts spun. “Zacharias...”
“I will make you come again.” His lips burned against hers, his breath ragged as if he wanted this. Wanted her. “Then I will fuck you.” He growled and his wings brushed her spine, almost enfolding her. “My cock will take your innocence, your virgin’s blood.”
His gaze held her. Dark, shining, almost the mirror of a Bringer’s gaze with not one sliver of his gleaming amber. She shivered the unwanted memory pushing at her from four years before. The demon that took him had wanted her. And Zacharias would devour her, as the Bringer that night had devoured him.
But she couldn’t resist. Didn’t want to. “Yes.” Her mouth found his, a hand tunnelling though his loose, black hair. Her other hand—her heart raced—ran over the ivory curve of his horn. Stroking, tracing its smooth coolness, the life that throbbed within, her magic mirroring its pulse, as if recognising something shared.
“You crave this?”
Zacharias’ impossible tail slipped between her skin and the mattress and flickered against her backside. She couldn’t stop her surprised squeak. His laughter rolled over her, dark and delicious. From somewhere, she found a breath. “For too long.” The spark of his touch mixed with the illicit stoke of his tail and the rapture of his wings… “Please. Please, Zacharias…”
“What do you want from me, little one?”
“Everything…” The admission was out, but she didn’t care. Not in that moment. Her flesh cried out, aching, desperate. He had to satisfy that need.
“Oh, I will give you that.” His low, deep promise fired through her already straining flesh. “Come for me, Felix. Open for me. Give me—”
Her magic surged. Heavy and brilliant. Felix lost the rest of his words to the blazing white burst of pure joy that swept over her flesh. She arched against him. Cried out. Flailed. Maybe called his name…but all higher thought was lost to bliss. And he held her in tight arms, his wings folded around her, his tail caught around her waist and it was…beautiful. Simply beautiful.
She sobbed against his shoulder, unable to contain the tears, her heart twisting, aching as he slowly stroked her hair, soft words of desire warming her skin.
“Felix… The sun will soon set.”
She wiped at her eyes, embarrassment coiling in her belly. “I’m…”
“You were delicious.” His teeth caught her bottom lip. “That I could devote hours to your sweet little body.” His hips rolled against hers, his cock pushing over her sex and playing with the shivery echoes of her release. “But…”
Felix bit her lip as his knuckles brushed against her. He’d grasped himself, the blunt head wide, strange…and right. She couldn’t help herself. She moved with him, wanting him inside her.