Page 110 of The Girl Who Should Be Dead

She shudders at the graze to her chest, all of her skin wanting more of his hands there.

“Unstable magical experimentation,” she replies, her own voice high and airy from the desire, and he crooks a smile at her reaction. “You can ignore it.”

“Hmm, no,” he says, then shifts, pressing a kiss where it starts along her rib cage, and she shivers. “It’s a part of you, I don’t need to ignore it.”

Unable to do anything else, she twists her hands in his pale hair, and he smiles against her skin.

It’s a breathtaking image, of his lips against her scar, ofthe soft, almost reverent worship of her skin, of the soft places on her body. Of the attention he pays to every small part of her, of the meticulous focus on her reactions, every small twitch recorded away.

“You are beautiful,” he murmurs, and she shivers again, the compliment somehow unwarranted. “All of these,” his other hand moves to the scar left on her stomach, from the injury at the bar, caressing it, “are a part of that.”

She opens her mouth, but no words come out, like he’s stolen them away.

His hand reaches up, cradling her breast, and she jerks from the sudden shock of the intensity. “Okay?” He checks, gentling the touch, rubbing his thumb along the underside, sending another shudder down her back. “Too much?”

“No,” she squeaks out, and he grins at her again. The only physical contact she’s had there has been clinical or violent, and this, this is far from that.

But before she can verbalize it, before she can think otherwise or change her actions or anything, he kisses the skin right above her nipple, and she jerks again.

She wants more of that. More of the touches, more contact, more anything, and she scrabbles at the hem of his shirt until he pulls it up over his head, thoroughly messing his hair.

There’s a smattering of freckles across his chest, belying curiously strong muscles underneath the skin, and Ambra lets herself see it in a blink before she grabs him, jerking him towards her into a kiss. Until her entire body is against him, all lean long lines and his arms twist around her back.

This time, he kisses like he did while drunk. Like all semblance of self-control is gone, like she has snapped a central part of him, and she’s in his crosshairs. His tongueswipes against hers, hitching her breath, like he could taste all of her in just that greedy motion.

And she wants more of that.

He makes a small sound in the back of his throat, and she wants to hear him do that again. Wants to hear more of those noises, more of the unconscious, uncontrolled sounds, anything she’s able to wrench from him.

Anything.

His hand falls to the waistband of her pajama pants, tugging them down, and she kicks them off, her breath hitching one more. Pulling back, he glances down at her, at the body before him, at the scars and the marred skin and the small tuft of reddish hair between her legs.

Gentle, he strokes along her hip, and a shiver sends goosebumps up her arms and tightens her nipples, completely new.

“Oh, you like that,” he murmurs, trailing his hand up and thumbing over her nipple, sending sparks behind her eyes.

“Yes,” she squeaks out, and again he smiles, something almost mischievous in his face, and he does it again, watching her reaction as she twists underneath his hand.

“You’re so very sensitive, aren’t you?” he asks, like it’s something good about her and not a liability. “So when I do this—”

He pinches her nipple, just hard enough, and she just about levitates off the bed, a gasp wrenched from her throat.

“—it gets a reaction,” he finishes smugly. “So beautifully.”

“Fuck,” she mumbles, and he soothes it over with a swipe of his thumb, the brief moment of intensity trailing into an all too pleasant tingle. “How…”

“Some people are like that,” he says, pressing a kissagainst her breast, and her breath hitches once more. “Some people need more, some people need less.”

“And you?” She breathes out, and surprise briefly flickers over his face, before he kisses her lips so sweetly, teasing out another little gasp from her. “What do you need?”

“This is good,” he murmurs, before turning his attention lower to her body, resting a hand between her thighs, before he pauses, as if waiting for some sort of permission.

Heat coils inside her, at the touch and everything it suggests.

She stares down at him, swallowing, and he grins at her expression, winding his hand between her thighs.

“See the good thing about this, though,” he says, running a finger along the seam between her legs, parting her and wringing another little gasp from her. “Is that when people are sensitive like this, it’s so much more fun.”

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