Page 86 of Decimation

“I want to taste all of you,” he says, and the words vibrate against my skin. “Every inch, every secret place. I want to learn your body so well I could draw it from memory in the dark.”

“Then do it.”

The command comes out breathless. Desperate. But I don’t care.

He lifts his head and looks at me with those eyes that have seen too much and done too much, and still, somehow look at me like I’m the answer to every question he’s ever asked.

“Roll over.”

I do.

He pulls the shift off completely, and the silk pools somewhere on the floor. I’m naked now, face-down on sheets that smell like lavender and something else, something darker, something that might be him.

His hands find my shoulders. He kneads the tension from them with slow, deliberate pressure. His thumbs work circles into the knotted muscle, and I moan into the pillow, not caring how wanton I must sound, not caring about anything except the way his touch completely unravels me.

“You’ve been carrying so much,” he says. “So much fear, so much pain. Let me take it from you. Let me carry it for a while.”

His lips press to the nape of my neck.

I shudder.

He works his way down my spine. Kiss by kiss. Vertebra by vertebra. His tongue traces the curve of each bone, and I feel like I’m being opened up, like he’s reading the story of my body and memorizing every word. His hands follow his mouth, stroking my sides, my hips, the swell of my ass.

When he reaches the small of my back he pauses, and I know he must see it; the scars, the marks Ezekiel literally carved into me.

“You’re so beautiful.” The words are muffled against my skin. “Do you know that? Do you understand what you are?”

“A whore,” I whisper. “That’s what the world made me. A thing to be used.”

“No.” His teeth graze my hip. “You’re a miracle. Proof that God exists, and that he wanted me to have something worth fighting for.”

He spreads my legs.

His mouth finds the back of my knee, the sensitive skin there. I gasp and try to close my legs, but his shoulders are already between them, and he laughs. Low, dark, and full of promise.

“I told you. Every inch.”

He works his way up my inner thigh with agonizing slowness. Tongue. Teeth. The soft brush of his lips. He leaves marks on my skin, little bruises that will bloom purple by morning, and I want them. I want the evidence of this. I want to look in the mirror tomorrow and see proof that I am wanted, that I am devoured, that I am more than just a mere copy of a dead woman.

“Lazarus, please.”

“Please what?”

“Please...”

I can’t say it. The words stick in my throat.

He turns me over and positions me how he wants me; legs spread, knees bent, completely exposed. The lamp light catches the angles of his face, the sharp cut of his cheekbones, the dark hunger in his eyes.

“Tell me what you want.”

His colours are wild now. I can feel them pulsing around me, can see them reflecting in his eyes. Pink, red, and deep, molten gold. Desire so pure it’s almost pain.

“You,” I manage. “I want you. All of you. I want to stop thinking, I want to stop being afraid. I want...”

He lowers himself between my thighs.

“Then stop thinking,” he says. “And let me fuck you.”