Page 58 of Claimed In Darkness

Trying to pretend I am not touching her.

"Why didn’t you hesitate?" I murmur, letting my fingers graze the back of her neck.

She inhales. Not much.

But enough.

"You already know," she says.

The same words she spat at me last night.

And she is right.

I do know.

She did not hesitate because she is no longer the girl who would have.

She has already crossed the threshold. I led her here myself.

She followed.

I should tell her to fight it.

To fight me.

To resist. To run. To do anything but stand here, dripping in blood and steam, letting me fucking touch her like she is mine to soothe.

But I can’t.

Instead, I press my lips to her bare shoulder, a slow, deliberate drag of my mouth against salt and heat.

Her breath stutters.

She should pull away.

Instead, she tilts her head just slightly, exposing more of her throat, a silent admission that she is already too far gone.

I do not hesitate.

I bite.

A slow, teasing graze of my teeth against her pulse, enough to make her tense beneath me, enough to make her know?—

There is no going back now.

She moans, a sound that makes something dark and unholy snap inside me.

She loathes me.

She wants me.

She doesn’t know how to choose between the two.

So I choose for her.

I turn her in my grip, forcing her to face me, to see the hunger burning in my fucking chest, to know?—

This is her fate now.

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