Page 2 of Shattered & Returned

I should have kicked him, or shoved him away with the heel of my palm before this had gotten so far. I could still grab his silky, thick hair and pull him away from my moist sex.

But I didn’t.

I wasn’t aggressive by nature.

Maybe the ecstasy weakened my will. I cleared my throat, intending to snap, “Stop,” but what escaped was a breathless,“More. Please, more.”

Fine.One more minute. Then I’d put a stop to this and make him explain himself.

The stranger lifted his head. His eyes, somewhere between emerald and winter frost, burned with hunger.

He felt oddly familiar, like a lover from a past life. Absurd. This was my first.

I’d never even dated. Once a month, I traded herbs and potions in town, lingering by the library window to watch the crowded streets. Never had I seen a man like him. No mortal could look like this. If I didn’t know better, I’d have thought him a god forged in shadow.

His grin sharpened, and my blood ignited like a struck match. Lust scorched through me, but worse was the reverence in his eyes, as if he’d worshipped me this way a thousand times and still hungered.

My heart stuttered at his sheer beauty, the cruel curve of his smirk, the way his heated gaze devoured me.

Another moan departed my lips, sounding like I was in heat, while the stranger’s sinful tongue lapped at my sensitivebud, turning my bundle of nerves into a throbbing pebble and reducing me to a shuddering mess.

Pleasure crested, and I arched against him with a cry.

Hunger roared up from my depths, primal and insatiable. My core burned, every nerve alight. If he didn’t stop, if this pleasure didn’t end, it would destroy me.

“Who are you?” I asked and let out another moan.

“Remember, baby. Remember us.” His voice was dark silk, raw with longing and pain.

I blinked. Remember what? Remember how he’d wrecked me like this? Gods, yes—any woman would. I’d carve this into my bones if it meant he’d return.

“Remember, or all will be lost.”

Pain flared through me, so hot that I screamed.

Fuck, he bit me!

I’d thought he was a gentleman, but he was a barbarian!

Before I could kick him (seriously, who bites a woman's clit?), immense pleasure exploded through me, twisting with the pain until I couldn’t tell them apart. My screams turned ragged, desperate, as fire surged through every dormant nerve.

A jet of heat simmered, searing my tender flesh and bursting from my molten core. Before I knew it, my first orgasm arrived in a tsunami—unstoppable, mind-shattering, and shocking the hell out of me.

My roars turned to hiccups as the orgasm overwhelmed my fragile body.

Don’t black out. Breathe, damn it.I begged some unseen force.Not the inhaler, not now. Not in front of him.

I arched my back, my legs kicking involuntarily, as wave after wave of pleasure still rippled through me, gripping me.

Then I plunged.

Not through air—but into icy, suffocating blackness. Saltwater crushed my ribs, flooding my nose and throat. Hishand, which had been curled possessively around my neck, now tangled in my hair as the current tore me away.

My cry of pleasure turned into a scream, then silence as the ocean forced itself down into my lungs.

Something heavy wrenched at my ankle, dragging me deeper. Pressure mounted, throbbing against my skull. My limbs went slack, strength bleeding away. My crimson hair fanned out around my face, swirling like red smoke in the water.

His fingers stretched toward me. Reaching? Pushing? I couldn’t tell. My chest was fire, my vision fracturing. Instinct betrayed me: I gasped. Water, thick and bitter, filled me.

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