Page 220 of Anathema

An ache struck my jaw when I widened my mouth to accommodate his girth and I lifted my gaze in search of his approval.

Staring down at me, he ran his thumb along my cheek, a look of pained ecstasy creasing his brows as I slid my lips further, over the thick ridge of his tip. “Godsteeth,” he said, his jaw clenched tight. “Seeing you like this …” He threw his head back, stretching the wires of tension in his neck. “Fuck.”

The sight of his rapture goaded me to take more of him, deeper, until the tip hit the back of my throat, and I gagged against him, quickly dislodging myself. Pressing the back of my hand to my mouth, I fought to swallow down the acids that shot up into my nose.

“I’m sorry,” I said in a choked voice. “It’s so big.”

He tugged at my arm. “Come here.”

Abandoning my exploration, I slithered up the length of his body and lay beside him, where he wound me in a tight embrace. “I wish I was a bit more experienced with these things.”

“Whether you’re experienced, or not, makes no difference. You’re the only one who makes me feel something.” He threaded his fingers in mine and kissed the back of my hand. “Your scent, your lips, your touch. It’s all I think about. Incessantly.” A kiss to my jaw. “The way you’ve crawled inside my head …” Fist tangled in my hair, he tugged my head back and dragged his teeth across my throat, the threat of a bite quickening my pulse. “I crave every part of you with an ungodly voracity.”

I smiled as he planted kisses along my neck. “It seems such an appetite would make you a dangerous predator.”

“It seems it would.” The devilish amusement in his voice roused a flare of goosebumps across my skin.

“Show me how to reciprocate,” I whispered. “I want to give you pleasure.”

He stilled and lifted his head, wearing a guarded expression. “To what end?"

"What do you mean? Your pleasure, and nothing more."

The furrow in his brow deepened as he stared back at me, not saying a word, as though my response had jarred him into silence.

I rested my hand against his cheek. “I want to show you the way you make me feel.”

Keeping his eyes on me, he turned just enough to kiss my palm. “A man should not long for madness with such enthusiasm as I feel right now.”

“You’re calling me mad now?” I asked with a smile.

“I’m calling you mine.” His lips found the curve of my neck, and he crawled over me, taking hold of what must’ve been a painfully stiff erection, given the hardness I’d felt. “Lift your shirt,” he commanded, and with a nervous nod, I slowly raised it up, until my breasts lay bared to him. Eyes shimmering with gratitude, he fell back on his heels, staring at me in a way that had my stomach fluttering. “By gods, you will be my undoing.” He leaned forward, laying a gentle kiss to my stomach. “Put your hands above your head. Grip the headboard.”

Without question, I curled my fingers around the wooden spindles of the headboard. A thrilling sense of vulnerability moved through me, as his big body loomed over mine, every inch of him a threat—from his broad muscled shoulders to his powerful legs that could crush me in one hard flex of his thighs. I surrendered myself as his prisoner, completely at his mercy.

He gave a lazy stroke of his cock, and his eyes shuttered closed, teeth clenched.

I lifted my head to watch him, never breaking my grip of the headboard.

His powerful and scarred body, inked in dark magic, virile and damp with sweat, roused a wanton craving to be ravaged by him. To hear the sounds of my clothes being torn by his strong hands, to feel the weight of being pinned beneath him.

Another stroke sent more fluids leaking from his tip, and in rapt fascination, I watched as it dripped onto my exposed belly. He upped the pace of his strokes, his fist planted beside my head, and he bent low, sucking one of my nipples into his mouth.

Like strings pulling at my core, every suck had me arched into him. The sound of pounding flesh beat a rhythm of need into my muscles, so raw and aching, I writhed in the agony of it. A sharp sting zipped across my breast, as he nipped me and groaned, panting through his nose. He stroked himself so fast, it shook the bed.

Switching breasts, he lavished the same attention to my other nipple—licking, sucking, stirring a maddening craving inside of me, but for what? I didn’t know. I ground my bottom into the mattress. Desperate. Needy. My fingers gripped the wooden spindles, so tight, they creaked, as if they’d break.

The tattooed flames across his arms and shoulders shifted and flickered, rousing to life. Black ribbons of fire lashed out at the air, like a serpent’s tongue. The flames danced across the space between us, and the moment it touched my thigh, I arched, thrusting my chest forward on an agonized moan, as pulses of radiant heat shot beneath my skin. The flames snaked and rippled through my veins to my core, sending tiny vibrations of heat to my womb.

Still grinding on the mattress, I bit my lip, mindlessly intoxicated and aching all over again.

“Zevander, please,” I whispered. “Da’haj mihirit dimitszia.” I frowned at the words that’d spilled from my mouth. Even more disturbing was that I knew their meaning. Give me your release.

He let out a long, tormented moan through clenched teeth, his head tipped back to show the veins in his neck protruding, just as before. Hot fluids sprang forth from the tip of his cock, spilling in white jets across my belly. Pulse after pulse shot out of him, coating my skin in his release. Wild fascination claimed his eyes as he stared down at me and ran his palm over my skin, spreading the fluids across my stomach. Marking me. “You are mine, moon witch. For all eternity and whatever lies beyond it. No soul has ever been more intricately woven into mine than yours.”

My heart lurched with his words, the cynical creature inside of me loosening its grip. I ran my fingertips over his cheek and the wretched black scar there. “And you are mine,” I whispered.

The room darkened as night fell. I lay beside Zevander, coiled tightly against his body, watching shadows move outside. The pale creatures with black eyes. In the hours that we’d lay exploring each other, their numbers had increased, the growls and snarling heightening with the rising of the moon. Though none had yet attempted to breach the ward, just knowing so many prowled outside of the small hovel stirred fears of being consumed alive by them.

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