Page 78 of Brazen King

He slowly leans in, his eyes shifting to my lips just moments before he follows through on the silent warning. I tense, my spine going rigid as he kisses me, soft but passionate.

And the fire that erupts through my core is like molten lava. Try as I might to resist, I can’t find it in me. It’s like he’s put me under a spell. My body moves of its own accord. I reach up, ready to shove him back, but instead, my fingers curl around his lapels.

And then I’m pulling him closer, as if all this time, I’ve been starved of oxygen and he’s a fresh breath of air.

“Is that the ‘nothing good’ you were referring to,” he murmurs when he pulls back just far enough to break the kiss.

And his lips are gone all too soon for my liking.

“Yes,” I breathe, my heart doing somersaults in my chest as sweet relief floods my veins.

My resistance quickly crumbles in the wake of his attention, which I’ve been craving desperately all week. That he sought me out right from the beginning—without another girl on his arm—fills me with a possessive kind of satisfaction I wasn’t anticipating. And I know I’m a lost cause.

Killian hums, the sound turning me into a giddy puddle. And he snakes an arm around my waist, pulling me firmly against his powerful chest.

“I’ve been dreaming of your lips,” he growls before stealing another kiss. “How can this not be good when it feels so right?”

I don’t have an answer for that, but I am intensely aware of the fact that this is the first time I’ve kissed him without having tried to kill him first. And suddenly, it hits home that I’m not just following through with the bargain we made. I’m kissing him because I want to.

I want him.

I want Killian with a desperation I can hardly wrap my mind around. And it steals my breath away to realize just how badly I’ve missed him. I can no longer hide behind the thin veneer of duty or blackmail to deny my feelings. And that makes the emotion all the more powerful.

“God, I want you, Natasha. Right here. Right now.”

I gasp, my desire wiping the last drops of rationality from my mind.

And I nod.

Killian snarls, his reaction one of animal desire as his hands find the fabric of my skirt and start to hike it up around my thighs. His fingers curl around the waist of my panties, and he guides them down my legs.

I step willingly out of them as he kneels before me, his green eyes molten as they hold mine. And as I step free of the lacy fabric, he balls them in one palm and shoves them into his pants pocket.

“Panty thief,” I tease, even as it sends a shiver of desire racing up my spine.

“If I had my way, I’d steal them all so you’d have no other option but to go without them,” he growls.

Then his hands are on his belt, unbuckling it, and he swiftly opens the front of his pants.

My core throbs as he pulls out his impressive cock, swollen and rock-hard, and my mouth waters to see the precum weepingfrom his tip. Wrapping one arm around my waist again, Killian hooks my knee over his other elbow, bringing me close even as he opens my legs for easy access.

Then his silken tip presses inside my entrance, filling me as he sends electric pleasure crackling through my veins.

34

KILLIAN

Aweek without Natasha has been nothing short of agony. And after the high of thinking we had finally reached a new level of intimacy, it’s been exceedingly frustrating to go night after night without a glimpse of her. Wondering when—and then if—she might come to see me again.

I came to long for the attempts on my life over this past week, where before, I’d hoped we might get past it. But I would much prefer our lethal foreplay to none at all.

What made Natasha stop coming after me, I don’t know.

But this sudden shift has triggered a desperate need inside me, an anxiety that wasn’t there before. And the devastation in her tone as she pleaded for me to stay away felt worse than if she’d driven a knife into my stomach.

I would prefer that kind of pain to what I would suffer if I lost her.

And I could no sooner stay away from Natasha than I could will my heart to stop beating.

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