Page 22 of Shattered & Returned

When I pushed up on trembling arms, moonlight gilded the sharp angles of his gorgeous face. His eyes were dark with barely leashed hunger. My gaze dropped to the unmistakable strain against his trousers, the fabric stretched taut over what could only be a massive erection.

Was he going to fuck me next?

My body burned at the thought.Him.Inside me. Filling the emptiness his tongue had only teased.

Yet in the haze of lust, reason pushed through. Once crossed, that threshold couldn’t be uncrossed. Even if no other man would ever compare. Even if every fiber of me ached to give in to this moment.

“Always sweeter than I remember,” he murmured, his voice rough as he lifted his head. The words hung between us. Anintimacy that suggested centuries of stolen moments, though this was our first true meeting.

A sudden gust tore through the silent forest, sending dead leaves skittering across the stone table.

Then—

Caw!

The raven’s cry shattered the stillness, its wings cutting through the trees. Distant wails rose in response, that same ghostly chorus from my dream. His body went rigid against my thighs, his head cocking toward the sound.

The last sunlight had vanished hours ago, leaving only the pallid moon to slither past Ravencrux Tower’s peak. A sudden dread pierced through the haze of my lust.

I’d let this go too far. Even now I anticipated him bending me over, driving his massive cock into me, and fucking me like his whore.

Face flaming, I steeled my spine.

“I’ll keep you safe,” he said as if it was a simple fact.

“But who’ll keep me safe from you?” I blurted out.

He smirked. “No one, baby.”

Ice slithered up my spine, yet beneath it,my skin still burned.

“I don’t sleep with strangers.”I yanked my gown down.“It endsnow.”

“Dismiss me so soon?”Winter-green eyes glinted, cruel and amused.A predator toying with trapped prey. “Right after you came so hard on my tongue?”

“You’re ruining this,”I accused.

“I wasn’t planning to fuck you today, little flower,” he crooned. “Next time, when I taste you, it’ll be you who begs me to bend you over, spank you, and fuck you so hard you won’t walk straight for a month.”

My face flushed in anger as I hid the desire and thrill in my eyes. “This was a one-time mistake.” The lie tasted sour even asI said it. I involuntarily licked my lips as nervous energy coursed through me, and a sudden ache rose at the prospect of never seeing him again.

“My little pale flower.” He let out a dark, low chuckle, a calloused finger tracing my jaw. “You were mine the second I saw you. Now?” His breath scorched the shell of my ear. “I’d ruin worlds just to keep you.” The threat pulsed beneath the promise. “This won’t be a one-time thing. This will be a forever thing, and you’ll be mine to play with and to taste and to fuck. You’ll come when I call. You’ll take what I give. And you’ll carry this secret like a dagger between your ribs.”

Lust and fury warred in my veins, equally potent. I wanted to punch his teeth, and I wanted to drag him back between my thighs.

“You don’t scare me.” The words tasted hollow even to me.

A slow, dangerous smile curved his lips. “Oh, I will.” His thumb brushed my lower lip, the touch deceptively gentle. “When you know who the fuck I am.”

My mouth opened—questions about names, about threats—but he silenced me with a look.

“Too late for bargains now.” His fingers tightened in my hair, tilting my head back. “If you value the lives of your new friends—and you’ll make a few in this school—you’ll come running when I summon you. Men will be drawn to you, but no one is allowed to touch you.” His teeth grazed my earlobe, the bite just shy of drawing blood. “Because you, little flower, were made for my hands alone.”

I drew breath to tell him exactly where he could shove his threats—crude words foreign to my tongue, but he dragged them from me like poison from a wound when his hands framed my face. My palm flew up to strike his wrist, but the blow never landed.

Then his mouth was on mine.

His lips tasted of mint and formidable male, his scent of sandalwood and flame wrapping around me like a spell. My fingers, meant to push him away, tangled in his hair instead.

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