Page 118 of Deceived
“What we have is a business arrangement.” I pressed down harder, my whole body trembling. I needed to cut off these lies. Stop him from talking before I started believing them.
“A business arrangement that has turned into something else,” he agreed easily. “What does it matter how this started if I will always choose you, anyway? What does anything matter if this is the only place I want to be? With you?”
I was trying to come up with something pithy when his gaze dropped to my mouth.
I became very aware of how—and where—I was sitting.
Of how his hard, muscled body tensed beneath me—solid, coiled with restrained strength. The slow rise and fall of his chest against mine. The way his fingers tightened on my wrist every time my hips shifted against his, a fire burning in my belly as I realized his cock was pressed against my core.
“This was a mistake,” I muttered, not moving an inch.
“Probably,” his lips tilted, that infuriating almost-smile tugging at the corner.
I hated him.
I wanted to drag his mouth to mine and bite until we both tasted blood.
“Gods,” I groaned, half to myself. “I fucking hate you so much. You are impossible. You make me crazy.”
“So do you,” he said. “Maybe that’s why this works.”
“This doesn’t work,” I snapped. “Look at us. I’m a second away from killing you.”
“Oh, I am.” He held my gaze until I felt like I was falling. Then ever so slowly, his fingers tightened around my wrist, and he eased the blade away from his throat.
And like a coward, I let him.
This is stupid, I told myself.He is dangerous and unpredictable, and feeling like this will only ruin everything.
I leaned down and tossed the knife away.
The first brush of my mouth against his was clumsy and angry, with entirely too much tongue. Dante froze for a second, as if he couldn’t believe what I’d just done, then his free hand came up, tangling in my hair and dragging me back down. His mouth crashed into mine, hot, hard, and messy, teeth and anger and the taste of something forbidden between us.
Heat surged inside me, a small, needy sound slipped out, and Dante swallowed it, tongue sliding against mine with indecent familiarity.
This was a terrible idea.
I kissed him harder.
We rolled, never breaking the kiss, rolled until my back hit the mat, his weight coming down over me like a cage. For one incoherent second, I panicked at the sudden press of all that power, my instincts screaming this was a trap.
Dante felt my shudder of frozen panic, breaking the kiss long enough to breathe against my mouth, “Emberline. Tell me to stop, and I will.”
His blue eyes were heavy and hooded, fangs pricking his lower lip, blood welling around the punctures like prizes, that tantalizing scent winding through my senses like a siren’s song I could never deny.
I shouldn’t trust him.
I didn’t evenknowhim. I needed to guard my heart, to protect myself. My entire life, I’d had rules, rules that kept me safe in this world, and trusting an almost stranger was at the very top of my do-not-do list.
I slid my hands under his shirt instead, palms tracing the hard lines of his stomach and chest, cataloguing every scar and divot, his heated skin gliding soft as velvet against my fingers.
“You’re still an asshole, and I’ll never forgive you for last night,” I muttered.
“Then I’ll spend the rest of my life making it up to you,” he promised, his eyes blazing fiercely enough, I believed him.
He pulled me down and kissed me again, and this time, there was less anger and more heat, more of that slow, dangerous pull that had been building between us since the night he threw me over his shoulder and forged our unholy partnership.
His mouth was sinful, his clever, probing tongue sliding past my lips with enough expertise, another swirl of jealousy hit me out of nowhere. Then I was lost—lost in his taste, in the strength of his muscled body, of being consumed by someone bigger and more powerful, someone who blocked out the light and dragged me into the shadows.
