Page 31 of Unholy Nights

She takes a sip of her hot chocolate, her body gravitating toward mine like she can't help herself. "Why are you doing all this for me?"

I set my cup aside and cup her face in my hands, my thumbs stroking her cheeks as snowflakes melt against her skin. "Because you deserve to know what it feels like when someone puts you first," I say, watching a blush spread beneath my touch in the faint golden light from the Hills below. "Because I want to give you everything."

She goes still at my words, and those pretty green eyes search mine like she's trying to read the secrets in them. "Everything?" she whispers, and the way she says it—soft and wondering and a little afraid—stokes the obsession I've been feeding since the moment I first saw her.

The air between us crackles with raw electricity, with everything I've been starving for. Her lips part, and my carefully constructed walls shatter like glass—all that control, all that fucking patience I've tortured myself with, obliterated in an instant. For two years, I've caged the beast inside me, forced it into submission while I waited for the right moment to strike. But now, watching those delicate snowflakes melt in her hair, seeing that perfect trust in her eyes, the predator breaks free. No more chains. No more cage. Just hunger.

My hands tremble with the need to touch her, to take what’s been haunting me since that first night. Her breath quickens as I lift a hand, brushing my thumb across the bottom lip she’s been driving me insane with all night. Her small gasp is soft, barely there, but it hits me like gasoline on a flame.

“Cohen?” Her voice is quiet, trembling with uncertainty, with a want she doesn’t understand.

Slowly, so slowly it feels like torture, I slide my hand into her hair, the strands soft and cool against my fingers. I tilt her face up to mine, our breath clouding in the frigid air between us, giving her time to pull away even though I know it'll destroy me if she does. But she doesn't move. She watches me with those impossibly wide eyes, and when my lips finally meet hers, every plan, every careful move I've made burns to ash.

Her mouth is hesitant, soft, unpracticed. Exactly as I knew it would be.

She tastes like hot chocolate and purity, sweet enough to drive me mad. For a heartbeat, she's frozen, her body stiff, and then instinct takes over. Her fingers dig into my shoulders, nails biting through my jacket, and the softest whimper escapes her throat. The sound shatters what's left of my control—now I’ve had a taste of forbidden flesh that feeds the darkness inside me.

And then I'm devouring her.

My hand fists in her hair, holding her tight as I ravage her mouth, stealing every sweet, innocent gasp for my own. I bite her soft bottom lip, and the way her breath hitches makes me hard as fucking granite.

She tastes like hot chocolate and purity, sweet enough to drive me mad.

No one will ever satisfy me again. Not after stealing her virginity. Not after tasting her. Not after having her willingly in my hands. My obsession has found a home in her and I'll never be able to leave it.

I tilt her head back, my tongue slipping into her mouth, and when she tentatively touches hers to mine, I nearly lose my fucking grip on the world.

This is it. This is what I've been waiting for. What's been tormenting me in the deepest, darkest hours of the night, taunting me, driving me to the brink of madness. Her. Emerald.

Mine.

She's soft, warm, perfect. Her mouth surrendering to mine as she melts against me. The hand in her hair loosens, and I slide it down her spine. She shivers, her body arching into me, all that heat and going straight to the ache in my cock. I'm torn between savoring every second of her innocence and pinning her down and rutting her until she's a shattered wreck beneath me.

Below us, a sudden cheer erupts as the massive Christmas tree in the middle of town blazes to life, its colorful glow flooding the snow-covered hills. Emerald startles, breaking the kiss with a soft gasp, but she doesn’t pull away. Instead, she buries her face against my neck, her breath warm and unsteady against my skin as the cheers echo up from the town below.

I tighten my arms around her, holding her close while the world celebrates something far less monumental than this—the moment she gave herself to me.

"That was..." She trails off, her breath a soft whisper against my chest. "I didn't know it could feel like that."

"Like what, little one?" I murmur, stroking her hair. Her face is still buried against my neck, hiding from me. From the truth.

"Fire," she whispers, her voice barely audible. "Like burning from the inside out."

Hearing the need in her voice makes my entire body go taut. "That's because we're meant to burn for each other," I say, my fingers sliding beneath her chin and forcing her to meet my gaze. "It's going to consume us both, and when it does, we'll rise from the ashes as something new."

I watch her throat work as she swallows, her eyes searching mine. "What if I'm not ready to burn?"

My thumb traces her lips, still swollen from my kiss. "I'll help you spread your wings, little phoenix," I say softly. "And I'll be right there beside you when you soar."

As we sit there, the lights of Emerald Hills a thousand colors sparkling in the snow, I know that this moment is just the beginning. Soon, very soon, Emerald will be mine completely. And nothing—not Madeline, not Emmitt—will stand in my way.

Because Emerald isn't just a wildfire anymore. She's become the air I breathe, the blood in my veins, the very essence of my existence. And I'll raze the fucking world to keep her.

She was made for me, sculpted by some divine hand to be the missing piece of my soul.

The thought should terrify me—I've never been one for sentimentality or romantic notions—but instead, it fills me with a fierce, possessive joy.

"What are you thinking about?" Emerald's soft voice breaks through the silence, her breath a puff of smoke in the winter air.

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