Page 26 of Invoking Ruin

It cuts her cheek before she catches my wrist. I stare as golden, opalescent liquid drips from the cut before it seals itself.

My stomach drops, my breath coming short.

“Sandro.” Her voice is patient, no anger present even though I hurt her. “Those clothes are filthy. You need to wash. So do I.”

She’s not wrong. “We have nothing else to wear.”

“Yes, we do.”

It’s then I notice a duffel bag waiting by the door to the bathroom. I don’t remember her carrying it, but I don’t remember much of the journey from the chariot to the hotel room.

I realize my current issues run a little deeper than lost time as a cold reality sinks in. None of this was random chance, not if she brought a change of clothes. “You were prepared for this, you had a plan and a winged horse waiting for you, and everything. You knew you’d have to abduct me one day.”

Vita shakes her head. “I thought I might have to. They’ve been searching for me a long time. For us.”

“Who am I, Vita?”

Her grip on my wrist tightens, and I hiss. She may look delicate, but I have no doubt she can break my arm if she wants to, or even if she doesn’t watch herself. She realizes what she’s doing after a second and lets me go.

“Come on, before we run out of hot water.” She does the most distracting thing she can possibly do—pulls her shirt over her head.

The blouse is splattered in mud and dirt, but the mystery of how those stains came to be is forgotten at the reveal of her perfect, golden skin.

I’ve spent months imagining what she’d look like naked. No wonder she hid her body from me. If I’d seen her without her clothes on before right now, I’d have questioned how she could possibly be human.

Now, I know better, know that the sight before me is literally divine. I drag my eyes up from her rounded stomach to her breasts, each one a perfect handful, dusky nipples tipping upward. She doesn’t wear a bra. She doesn’t need one.

Her green eyes glint, knowing she has me in her grip, now. She undoes her jeans, next, peeling them down her curving hips and shapely thighs.

And the juncture between those thighs, covered by a swathe of black lace.

I bite back a groan as my cock goes from completely soft to straining against my trousers in half a second. There are so many questions rolling around in my head, still, but as she hooks her thumbs in that scrap of lace, they all flee.

Truth, identity, deception, none of it matters when I can imagine the way she’ll feel wrapped around me, wet and tight.

It would be a mistake to let her manipulate me this easily.

I’m sure it isn’t my first error, where she’s concerned.

She arches an eyebrow, waiting me out. “It would be good to get clean, Sandro. We don’t have to do anything else in the shower.”

As though she can look like that, right in front of me, and expect nothing else to happen. Am I some celibate god, meant to resist her?

I can’t think of any gods who are that prudish.

Slowly, I rise from my seat. My head pounds, but it’s a distant, meaningless sensation. With my eyes locked on hers, I unbutton my shirt and slide it off. It falls, forgotten as I pull my undershirt off.

Whatever else she may be lying about, Vita’s attraction to me is genuine. It’s obvious from the way her breath catches, her eyes blooming black with arousal. I can practically scent it in the air.

If everything she’s said—and left unsaid—is true, my nude form should be no great surprise for her. But her gaze tracks over me like she’s afraid to miss a single detail. I drag her focus downward as I unhook my belt and unbutton my trousers.

When I’m as naked as she, I close the distance between us, biting back a groan as her pert breasts press against my chest. My hard cock digs into her stomach, and I rock my hips just to feel the silk of her skin against me.

She’s not in control, anymore. Not like this, not with her need so obvious. I could lift her up against the bathroom wall and thrust myself into her, and I’d find no resistance. I've been desired before, but none of them have ever looked at me with the same desperate need as Vita is now.

I’m not entirely sure how I know this, but I do. I feel it the same way I do when I pick the right wine for a customer. A deep certainty.

“We shouldn’t do anything else,” I murmur in her ear, pleased beyond measure when she shivers at my voice. “You won’t tell me who we really are. Not knowing your own identity puts a damper on things.”

---