Reaching out slowly, I stroke the curve of his bare shoulder before my touch turns molten. Despite the coolness of the night, the heat beneath his skin is like a banked furnace.
He shivers into my touch, turning his face into my hand.
“What’s wrong?” I go to my knees, cupping the back of his neck. “Look at me, curse you. Have you slept?”
He slowly lifts his head, though his eyes remain shut. “I don’t think you want to see me right now. I can’t hold it in. I thought I could, but the look on their faces—”
I brush featherlight touches across his eyelids. “I want to see every inch of you. I want to see through all your secrets.” Leaning forward, I brush my mouth to his. “I fell in love with every piece of you, even the Darkness. And I’m not afraid of it.”
Still quivering, he opens his eyes. “You should be.”
Black eyes, tattoos painted starkly up his throat….
In that moment, he’s not the prince I love, but a stranger.
There is no kindness in his eyes. No hint of the husband I know.
Hunger. Rage. Fury.
It glints within him like the honed edge of obsidian.
But I promised that I would love every part of him.
I kiss him as lightning flashes in the sky, highlighting the shadows of our bedchambers behind us. The storm is finally here. Thick, fat raindrops spatter on my skin.
“Inside,” I whisper, and he sweeps me up into his arms and carries me inside.
The second our lips touch, his mouth turns ravenous. Hands slide through my hair, tangling there as he sets me on the bed. He’s always been gentle. Always exquisitely careful of me. But that was when he was trying to woo a reluctant princess who didn’t remember how much she loved him.
It’s like he’s finally shaken free of his traces. Nothing restrains him anymore, and as his tongue slides against mine, I bite his lip, reminding him that he’s not the only one who’s angry.
We need this.
I need this.
I want to wipe the memory of the past two days from my mind.
He kisses my throat, beneath the jaw and the sides of my neck. And then he’s claiming my mouth again. Raw, openmouthed kisses that bruise my flesh and taste of salt and heat. I go to my knees on the bed before him, stroking the glossy black of his wings as I kiss his chest through his damp shirt.
“Off,” I tell him, because I have no idea how the shirt works with his wings.
He tears it loose, throwing the remnants of it aside with a wet slap.
Thiago pauses, shuddering as he kneels on the bed and rests his forehead against mine. “Last chance, Vi. If you stay here tonight, then you won’t be dealing with your husband. You’ll be dealing with the darker side of me.”
“Good,” I whisper against his lips. “I want to know every inch of you.”
His fingers dig into my ass. It’s not quite enough to be painful, but the edge is there. A promise that although he won’t hurt me, he won’t be my usual patient, gentle lover.
“Vi….”
“Every. Inch.”
Lifting me, he wraps my thighs around his hips, and then he’s tumbling me back on the bed, and hasn’t allowed my mouth a moment’s respite.
We crash down on the mattress, lost in a tangle of arms and legs and heated breaths. I catch a glimpse of his black eyes as lightning flashes once more. The shock of his body is painted against the back of my eyelids as we’re plunged back into darkness. Taut jaw, aquiline nose, dangerous mouth….
And it’s that mouth that ruins me as he claims me again, and again, and again.
He taunts me, soft little brushes of his fingers against my inner thigh, stirring the fabric of my nightgown higher. My robe’s fallen open, and he tears the wet silk with claws that spring from nowhere.
I meet his mouth hungrily, the fury in me turning to lust. A gasp steals loose, and I tug my hands free and drag his mouth down, trapping it against mine. His body is so hot against mine, his skin feverish. It takes away some of the chill that kisses my skin. I want to rub myself against that heat, to pretend, just for a moment, that nothing will ever take it from me.
Thiago puts a hand to my hips and tugs me close. Every inch of his firm body presses against mine, and I rub myself against him, moaning deep in my throat. Through the window, thunder rolls in the night sky, and I gasp, head thrown back in pleasure as his teeth skate down my throat. His lips are on my skin, his hands on my nightgown. He tears it open, the wet silk shredding in his hands.
“Yes!” I arch my spine, grinding against the firm press of his cock.
Then his hands are on my wet skin, cupping my breasts, his mouth like a burning brand on my throat. I drag his head lower, feeling the white-hot flare of his lips closing over my pebbled nipple through the silk. I want more, I want to be naked beneath him, skin slick against skin.
I dig my nails into his shoulders. Thiago hisses between his teeth and then his hips rock against mine. He bites my nipple and I cry out, my body driving into his. My thighs are milky wet, my sex throbbing. Each hard little thrust of his hips takes me one step closer to the edge.
As if he senses it, his hand is suddenly between us, exactly where I want it. I drag my hands up his back, drowning in feathers. We kiss angrily, desperately, bordering on violence… I can feel pleasure building like the coming storm, feel my body cresting as his fingers thrust inside me. Lightning flashes, too close this time, and I explode.
I scream, digging my nails in. Thiago fucks me with his fingers, pushing me into a furnace of desire. Again and
