Leaning forward, he opened his mouth over the pulse throbbing like a snare drum at the base of her throat as he slowly buried three fingers inside her. She bucked her hips, twisting like a wild thing on his lap. Jesus, she was gorgeous in passion—sexy, uninhibited and burning like a blue flame. Her desire scorched him.
Grinding out a curse, he lifted her off his thighs and set her beside him. Ignoring her disappointed cry, he shed her of the underwear, leaving her bare before him. With his gaze fixed on her lovely nakedness, he removed his wallet from his pants. Then he snatched out a condom and shoved his pants down his legs, too desperate to be inside her to completely strip them off.
With hands he prayed were gentler than the maelstrom of greed tearing at him, he repositioned her over him. He couldn’t prevent the shiver that worked its way through him as he fisted the base of his cock, notching the tip at the entrance to her body. Perspiration trickled down his skin as he slowly—so damn slowly—lowered her over him.
God. Every muscle in his body tightened, with the control it required not to plunge himself inside exacting its toll.
Hot.
Tight.
Ecstasy.
Fire raced up and down his spine, snapping and crackling. It rolled and thundered through his veins, transforming his blood to pure, undiluted pleasure. Already she consumed him, and he hadn’t even seated himself fully inside her. And though razor-sharp need sliced at him, he didn’t rush it. He’d rather suffer before hurting Isobel. Even now those tiny muscles rippled and fluttered over his flesh, adjusting to his penetration. Tremors quaked through her petite frame, and whimpers slipped past her lips.
“Shh,” he soothed, pausing. Keeping one hand braced on her hip, he cupped her cheek with the other, tipping her head down. “Your pace, sweetheart. Tell me what you need, and it’s yours,” he said against her lips.
“Kiss me.”
She tilted her head, opening for him, and he twisted his tongue with hers, sucking on it. She joined in the duel, thrusting and parrying. Pursuing and eluding. It turned wild, raw.
Before the kiss ended, she sat fully and firmly on his cock.
With a snarl, he tore away from her, tipping his head back against the couch. She was...perfect.
“Isobel,” he growled, raising his head again, unable tonotsee what she did to him. How she took him.
Cradling her hips, he lifted her, stared in rapt fascination as she unsheathed him, leaving his length glistening with the evidence of her desire. Then when just the head remained inside her, he eased her back down, still watching as she parted for him, claiming him.
Branding him.
“After that night in the hallway,” he gritted out, pulling free again. “I regretted not taking you. Not knowing how it felt to bury myself inside you. But now,” he rasped, lowering her. “Now I’m glad I didn’t. Because then I would’ve missing seeing how you so sweetly spread for me. And that, sweetheart...that would’ve been a crime.”
“Darius,” she whispered, and the sound of his name on her lips tattered the remnants of his control.
He drove inside her, snatching her down to him. Not that he needed to. She rode him, fierce and powerful, and in that moment, she was the one doing the claiming. And he surrendered, letting her incinerate him. And he held on, thrusting, giving, willingly being rendered to ash.
“Please,” she begged, her body quaking. She clung to him even as she surged and writhed against him. “Please, Darius.”
He didn’t need her to complete the thought; he already knew what she wanted. Reaching between them, he stroked a path down her belly and between her legs. Murmuring, he rubbed the pad of his thumb over her swollen clit. Once. Twice...
Before he could reach three, her sex clamped down on him, a strangling, muscular vise that dragged a grunt out of him. She exploded, seizing his cock, spasming and pulsing around him as she flew apart in his arms.
He rode her through it, thrusting hard and quick, ensuring she received every measure of the release that gripped her. Only when the quakes eased into shivering did he let go.
Pleasure—powerful, intense and brutal—plowed into him. His brain shorted, his vision grayed as he threw himself into an orgasm like a willing sacrifice, wanting to be consumed, obliterated, reshaped.
But into what? The unknown terrified him.
Then, as the darkness submerged and swamped him, he didn’t think.
Couldn’t think.
Could only feel.
And then, not even that.
Nine
