Taking control, I put my hand against the back of the love seat, taking on the weight, and then I lift myself up so I’m just brushing against the tip of his cock. It feels lush and wild and taboo, and I’m still so aware that I should be curled up in the corner and crying, yet everything is making sense. This desire is just the desire to live and the need to be with the one person that makes me feel like I’m alive.
Blaise grabs the base of his cock, the whole length jutting out in front of us, and I meet his eyes.
They aren’t full of the same chaos that surrounds me.
They’re full of something obsessive and singular.
Me.
Because he’s only wanted me.
I hold the couch as I slowly and carefully lower myself onto his cock, knowing he only wants what I’m giving him.
I’ve never felt so free.
His eyes go back in his head as I slide down, pushing on the ridge of his cock.
His lips part.
He moans.
He looks like he’s been transported to another planet.
And then he opens his eyes and fixes them on me, and I know I’m not his version of a drug den.
He sees me.
Every part of me.
He sees me and he wants me. His hands slide down my waist to the curve of my hips, and he holds on tight, moving my body up and down and up and down until there’s a rhythm.
And where there’s rhythm, there’s magic.
And where there’s magic, there’s belief.
Belief that I can escape this night and everything I’ve been feeling, everything that has been torn apart can be put back together again.
With him.
Only with him.
I rock on top of Blaise’s stiff and commanding cock until his fingers find my clit, and his mouth comes up to taste my skin. Then I’m just a swirling mess of emotions, close calls, sins, and renewals, and I know that Blaise isn’t just someone who will make me forget everything that happened now and before now and forever.
He will remind me that it happened.
And he will remind me of who we are in the midst of chaos.
This is my chaos.
This is my Blaise.
This is me, coming so hard that I can’t speak, that I’m bucking and I’m feeling, and no matter what has happened, I know I’m alive.
I’m alive.
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
BLAISE
I wake up on the love seat, naked, with one leg on the floor. Seraphine is lying on top of me, her head on my chest, her black hair spilled around her like silk. My coat lies on top of both of us.
The air is cold, and I can see my breath when I stir, yet the heat between the two of us is palpable. I lean my head back toward the window and see the sun just starting to rise above the buildings of the 18th arrondissement, filling the cold, empty, stark room with a warm glow.
Seraphine begins to stir, and I run my palms down the naked planes of her back, feeling the dip and rise of her curves. My dick is already hard as a rock and pushed up against her. I fight the urge to just start fucking her again, because now that we’re in the clear light of day—in an abandoned apartment, no less—all the dangers and worries and fucking craziness of the night before come flooding back. The sex was something I’d dreamed about, and it was better than my dreams, but while we gave in last night, those wants and needs have to be shoved aside for now.
This is a matter of life and death.
And I need to keep my promise.
To never let her feel alone. To protect her and keep her safe.
To keep loving her.
I close my eyes and drift off a little, warmed by my thoughts, until she stirs again and lifts her head.
I open my eyes and stare right into hers.
“Good morning,” I say softly, pushing her bangs behind her ears.
“Good morning.” She gives me a small smile. “I honestly didn’t think we’d make it through the night.”
“But we did,” I tell her. “And naked too.”
Another quick smile, this one fading as she looks at the window and the rising sun that makes her brown skin gleam like gold.
There’s nothing in this world more beautiful than her, not even a million rising and setting suns.
“We should probably get out of here.” She gets off my body as I try to sit up, and she’s quick to pull my coat around her shoulders, shivering. She stares down at me, naked. “Though with you, you wouldn’t know it’s cold out at all.”
I glance at my cock, still hard and throbbing, the hard, thick ridge of it spanning up to my stomach. The more she stares at it, the more I want to grab her and make her ride me, maybe throw her up against the wall and fuck her until she’s crying my name.
God, this is fucking impossible. How can I be around her after this and not want to keep feeling her inch by inch from the inside?
“Blaise,” she says, clearing her throat, looking me in the eye. “We can’t . . .”
“Can’t what?” I challenge, ignoring everything I had decided before she woke up. My willpower has been thrown out the window. “Don’t pretend that you didn’t like what happened last night, that you didn’t want it.” I pause as fear washes over me, the fear that last night was it and won’t ever happen again. At the moment it’s just as powerful as the fear for our lives.
I know that look in her eyes. She’s trying to find a way to argue because arguing with me is what she loves to do best, perhaps even more than fucking me.
“Speechless?” I ask, getting to my feet.
I walk over to her, my cock bobbing in front of me, not minding the cold, and I grab her gently by the back of the head. “Just because you’re not talking doesn’t mean I don’t know what you’re saying,” I say gruffly, pulling her lips to mine.
The coat slips off her shoulders to the floor, and I press my body against hers, her soft skin against my hard torso, my erection against her hip. I kiss her softly at first, but that quickly turns to hunger, a ravenous, wild sort of hunger not unlike last night.
That feeling that each moment we have with each other might be the last moment we ever have.
I know she feels it too.
I can tell by the way she kisses me back, matching me with wild abandon.
Her hands disappear into my hair, making a fist, and I bring my mouth to her neck, biting and licking and kissing down to her shoulders until her head is back and she’s moaning breathlessly.
We don’t have a lot of time.
All we have is now.
I reach down and shrug her plump ass into my hands and then pick her up, spinning her around until she’s pressed up against the wall. Her legs wrap around my waist, and I grab my cock, guiding it into her.
She’s slick as sleet, and I slide into her with one hard push, the breath leaving my lungs as I fill her to the hilt.
“Fuck,” I swear hoarsely, pushing her up against the wall as I slowly pull out. I glance at her face, our noses rubbing against each other as we succumb to every note of pleasure.
She stares at me through her long lashes, mouth wet and open. Even though danger lurks outside these walls and our lives have been forever changed, what we have right now between us is more powerful, more raw, more primal than anything. It’s overriding the fear and replacing it with connection, that deep-seated need we have for each other, that tells us we belong.
I belong with her.