Page 229 of Nightshade

The hem of my nightgown tickled my legs as he hiked it up to my belly. Fingers lodged into the hem of my panties, and he viciously ripped the fabric away, tossing it off to the side. His shoulders bunched beneath my hands, muscles shaking with tension. He tore the towel away from his lower half and pressed his length against my bare sex like a threat. Up and down, he rubbed his shaft across my seam, trembling with what I could only surmise as bottled-up rage. Toward me?

The current dancing over his shaft created a delectable tingle over my too-sensitive flesh with every long and tormenting drag. Weak and lust-drunk, I ground my ass against the wall, desperate to feel him inside of me.

The prod of his tip was the only warning before he impaled me on a hard thrust, and I let out a hearty gasp. I could’ve reminded him that I was pregnant with his child, to be gentler, softer.

But I didn’t want gentle, or soft. The world could treat me like I was frail and fragile, but I’d be damned if I let him treat me that way. Because I was angry, too. Angry at the time I’d lost with him. The tears I’d cried. The worry and sleepless nights and hopelessness and pain. As he drove up into me without restraint, I curled my fingers into his flesh, and bit down hard into his shoulder. Like ribbons and steel, I was pliant, and he was rigid.

On a growl, he clamped my throat with his teeth and drove even deeper. So deep, I swore he’d tear right through me.

Oh, God, it hurt, but I didn’t care. I wanted it. Him. Even if I had to take his fury and rage, I didn’t give a damn in that moment. I missed him. His touch. His scent. Everything.

Face buried in my neck, he wrapped his arms around me, so tight, I could scarcely draw in a breath, and he fucked me against the wall like a rutting stag.

It didn’t take long for my arousal to lubricate his every glide. I must’ve been sick for allowing him to take me that way.

For enjoying it.

And I did. I enjoyed every inch that he was willing to give.

Palm to my throat, he squeezed just enough to part my lips. “Who translated it?” He growled the words, still thrusting into me. He was sadly mistaken if he thought I’d actually come clean with the name.

“No one,” I rasped.

“Who. Fucking. Translated it?” He squeezed tighter, one hand at my throat, the other hiking my thigh up onto his hip. The fullness of his cock buried deep inside of me, coupled to the dizzying lack of oxygen, made for a deliciously toxic concoction.

“It doesn’t …” My breath hitched in my chest with the merciless thrust of his hips. “Matter …” Another thrust. “Now.”

At my first moan, he shuddered around me, and upped his pace.

“Fuck. Fuck!” Releasing my throat, he wrapped my legs around his waist and held me pinned to the wall as he drove into me with furious determination. “Stubborn,” he gritted out.

I tipped my head back, focusing on the tiny sparks of electricity that warmed me from the inside out, the intense vibrations that tickled my core. It felt deliriously good. Lip between my teeth, I rolled my head against the wall and moaned again. My thighs trembled around him, every muscle wound tight. I slipped into mindless, exquisite pleasure, my body enslaved to his every whim. Fingers digging between his shoulder blades, I felt his muscles flex beneath my palms. The electricity where his wing slits must’ve been pulsed into me, the current heightening my sense of touch.

He took hold of my wrist, pinning it hard against the wall. Hot breath beat against my skin. The anger trapped inside of him pummeled through me with every punishing drive, until my belly curled, and I was soaking wet.

I jerked against him as the orgasm pounded through me, wave after wave of climax that shattered inside of me. He tensed and shuddered and squeezed my hair so hard, I thought he’d rip it from my scalp. Hot jets of cum shot up with me and dribbled down my thigh.

He remained motionless inside me. Just breathing. Deep and heavy breaths, a testament that we were both still very much alive.

“Tell me I didn’t hurt you.” Even through the ragged drag of his voice, the remorse carried thick in his tone. “Fucking hell, if I hurt you, I’d—"

“You didn’t hurt me.” As if anything could ever hurt me again. What I felt in that moment was far from pain. It was relief. The kind of relief that had me sagging against him.

He stroked a hand down my hair and gripped tight, tipping my head back for a kiss. Nothing more than a simple kiss, and yet, my stomach fluttered as if he’d shot a cannon of butterflies into me. “Why did you do it?”

The answer was simple enough, but his question left me in a state of perplexing emotion. I didn’t know how to feel. I wanted to be tough and tell him to go to hell for asking such a stupid question, but both of us had already been there and back. “What do you mean, why?”

“You damned your own soul to bring me back.”

“And you wouldn’t have done the same?”

He lifted his head from my neck and snarled, gripping my chin. “You know I would’ve. But this is you. Not me.” When he pulled out of me, I felt the cold disconnection frost over my skin. The intimacy and touch I longed for, ripped away from me like a winter storm. The hem of my nightgown fell back down my body. Cupping his exposed flesh with both hands, he nodded toward my stomach and frowned. “The moment that child is born, you will become cambion. And you will be hunted.”

Something cold and dark stirred inside of me. A bitterness that had no place here in this moment, but I couldn’t swallow it back. I couldn’t tamp it down. Too many pent-up emotions clashed inside my head at the same time. “I’ve been hunted my whole life. And you know what? You’re not the only one who gets to sacrifice.”

He rubbed his hand down his face, drawing my attention to the muscles in his arms. How badly I wanted, needed, to be wrapped in them. To feel that reassuring embrace. “I chose my fate.”

“Yeah. So I heard. Well, I chose mine, too.” At that annoyingly unyielding stare that he’d apparently perfected, even in death, I shook my head. “I can’t begin to imagine what you’ve suffered since that night. I don’t want to think about the loneliness, the fear, the hopelessness. But I’ve suffered, too. And though mine was in broad daylight, surrounded by constant noise and life, it was no less crippling.”