His palms clasp her cheeks and force her to meet his gaze, which is contorted with fury. It’s not a denial. But his visage is a broken seal, exposing the truth. There’s no shame in his status, yet he detests losing this leverage, detests admitting it to her, detests that it’s a visible fact.
That he’s never done anything, with anyone.
He’s ready to pounce on her reaction. His taut lips warn her not to pity him, nor consider this an advantage. But behind the expression is a quaver of the eyebrows, a sliver of timidity.
That’s the boy he used to be.
Wonder’s heart compresses, because the sight of him putting up a front while at her mercy is too much. She might faint, but she’ll take the chance. So she does what she’s been dreaming about for decades.
She cups his face and leans in. “Malice, I want your mouth.”
His lips part. Again, he’s stupefied—not by the request, but by its inflection. Has no one ever lavished him with tenderness?
Certainly not. Why would they?
Gripping her shoulders, his thumbs slide under the nightgown straps, those saber nails sneaking into the garment and grazing her breasts, stopping just shy of her budding nipples. The sensation is a tad sharp, the titillating point of a knife.
She’s dizzy, falling against him, brushing his lips with hers. It’s madness, and it’s rapture. “I want your mouth,” she repeats. “Give it to me. Take it from me.”
The disorganization of that request is not lost on her, but it’s the best her foggy stream of consciousness can do. Because Malice doesn’t protest, she shows him what a fine guide she can be, and what an apt pupil he can be.
It starts when she pecks the crook of his mouth, then the other, planting two caresses at the edges of the world. “Now you,” she breathes.
His mouth quirks, commas digging into his face. Oh, so he likes being told what to do.
Malice follows her lead, sweeping the corners of her mouth while their hands roam over each other. Skin prickling, Wonder entreats, “Yes, dearest. Just like that.”
It continues with another exploration. She instructs him to part wider for her. Once he complies, she sketches the bow of that upper lip with her own, then nibbles on it.
His waist bucks, the solid evidence of success thrusting against her. The result is a flood of her own, which pools for him.
Although she’s been dominating this seduction, Malice takes a turn licking the seam of her lips. He learns quickly, because a sob of want streams out of her.
When she spreads her lips for him, their ivories nick and fight for the lead. His incisors skim her, which is too much to endure.
Wonder veers backward. “Give me your tongue,” she instructs, which might have come out like an overwhelmed, overeager purr.
Malice fulfills her request. His tongue pokes out, and their combined strokes nudge her to the ends of the earth. He dabs at her, and she coils against him, and they tease one another.
Their bodies tangle, humming from within. He measures her hips, and she races her fingers up his fletching-and-quill tattoo. The barbs of his nipples shave hers, and what’s left of Wonder’s restraint fractures. She cinches around that blushing tongue and sucks hard.
He shudders. So does she.
Her eyes moisten, and she’s going to cry, and her heart is going to wail, because he’s that boy, and he’s not that boy. He’s Malice and Not Malice. And this is sublime, and it’s severe, and it’s not about to end.
“Kiss me,” she chokes, breaking away.
“Wildflower,” he says hoarsely.
“Kiss me like you hate me. Kiss me like you love me—”
On a growl, his mouth slams on to hers.
She gasps. His lips are saturated like the rest of him, and they’re pliant, and they’re pleats of silk. They slant over her, swooping in and fitting. He folds his mouth with hers, whisking them together at a livid pace.
Malice opens and closes, sloping widely and deeply, so deeply that Wonder’s toes curl. Delirious, she mewls into his mouth. Her arms hook over his shoulders, her fingers scrubbing through his hair.
His own palms scoop the back of Wonder’s skull, trapping her in place while his tongue flexes into her, flicking moans from her like scattered pebbles. The texture of his groan ripples down her throat. She pries away in order to nip his lips, making indentations there, because yes, yes—
“Fuck, yes,” Malice rasps, snatching her mouth again.
His hands surge to her buttocks, hoisting her against his naked body. The kiss erupts into a frenzy. He takes her mouth hectically, like he knows her mouth, like he hates her mouth, like he loves her mouth.
Wonder spreads beneath his kiss, his tongue whipping into her, the contact tingling her spine. It’s the motion of consummation, with its drenched intrusion and chasing rhythm. Each synchronized thrust penetrates the apex of her limbs.
He’s soaking her. And his nudity magnifies his stiffness, and she wants it inside that dark, blooming place of hers, filling that channel to the brink. She wants him pounding into her with no end in sight.
She’s going to shatter, but she can’t stop, and he’s not stopping. He releases her backside, their intentions synchronizing, their digits threading. Wonder exerts pressure, taking control and pinning his wrists to the wall above his head.
Then their heads bank as they destroy this kiss from a new angle. Her tongue undulates beneath his, their mouths elastic, revolving into one another with fluid motions. The kiss seals in their moans, inaudible to an outsider but detonating like a star from within.
Only when a raindrop cuts down his profile and seeps into her flesh, only when oxygen becomes a struggle, do they wrench apart.
Their mouths dislodge on a collective wheeze.
They slump, his forehead landing atop hers. She’s hungover and swollen and damp for him. And after a few great pulls of air, she seeks his lips again with a needy whine, loathe to be away from him.
Malice rumbles, his head tilting for hers. They brush, this time languid and exhausted, on the ledge of something poignant and patient.
Therefore, perilous.
And it’s so dear, and he’s so dear, and this is so dear.
Just before they connect, she whispers an endearment. And it isn’t until she encounters the absence of him that she registers the error—what she’d said.
What she’d called him.
Malice tenses. She has a second to glimpse his stricken features, a single moment before those features corrode.
He pushes her away. The force of it sends her careening, stumbling until a bookshelf across the aisle catches her, breaking her fall.
“What did you say?” he asks through bared teeth.
Wonder straightens. She clamps a hand over her mouth, wanting to take it back, but she cannot. The sight of his wounded expression causes her palm to leave her lips. “I…I…didn’t…”
But she did. She’d recited from the letter she’d taken from him, the letter she’d written to him, back when he was somebody else.
Dearest Wayward Star
That’s what she had called him.
Is that whom she’d been kissing? Malice, or his ghost?
Raking his hands through his sodden hair, Malice glowers at her like she’s a stranger, or like he’s been waiting for this. He stalks up to Wonder, and he plants his hands on either side of her, bracketing her in. “Who are you?”