Page 19 of Monsters Wear Crowns
Damn his touch, his voice, the way he left me standing there on that rooftop, shaking,starving.I squeezed my eyes shut. I shouldn’t be thinking about him like this. But I fucking was.
Because if anyone could protect me, if anyone could destroy me, if anyone could drag me into the depths and make meloveit–
It was Rafe.
So I allowed my hand to venture south and fantasize that he had taken me on that fucking roof. And it was his breathy laugh that drove me into another frenzy of pleasure. He was not just any man…heoozeddanger and dominance. He made me feel things that seemed to satisfy what no one else could.Was I fucked up for that?Finding fear and ecstasy exhilarating?
Maybe. But I was annoyingly addicted, and wondered if I’d see him again.
***
RAFE
I closed the door behind me, my breath ragged, my pulse a relentless hammer in my skull.
Fuck.
I’d already done too much. Crossed a line I couldn’t uncross. She knew who I was now. Maybe that would destroy this partnership before we even got into business. But yet–I couldn’t regret it. Not when the scent of her still clung to my skin. Not when the image of her, writhing, breathless,fucking perfectbeneath mytouch, was burned into my mind like a brand.
She had beensoscared, but that fear had twisted into pleasure.She had fought it, her mind resisting what her bodyneeded. But I saw it. Ifeltit. The way she trembled, the way she arched, first away, then against me, chasing what I gave her.
God, I wanted her. No,neededher.
The restraint it had taken not to claim her right then and there had nearly fucking broken me. She was a powerful woman, untouchable to most. But I knew what she craved beneath all that control. She wanted to be fucked–hard. Dominated. To have her power stripped away, to be taken until there was nothing left of her but gasping breaths and desperate cries.
I shoved into my room, locking the door behind me, my body strung so tight I could barely think. I could still feel the heat of her, the slick evidence of how badly she’d needed me, even if her mind wasn’t ready to admit it. She clenched so perfectly around my fingers when she came, crying out into the night over a wild city. I made her feel alive. And honestly? My heart had almost burst from my own chest, too.
I groaned, palming my cock, already rock fucking hard again.
I should leave her alone. Did I really need her this bad? This alliance could endanger her. But fuck, I'd protect her. I'd fucking rip out anyone's throat who even thought about doing something terrible to her.
I wouldn’t leave.
Not when I could still hear her little breathy whimpers echoing in my head, not when I could still feel her thighs shaking beneath my hands, not when I could still picture what it would be like to bury myself inside her, to stretch her out, to hear the way she would cry out when I filled her, wrecked her,ownedher.
I fisted my cock, the pressure nowhere near enough, but fuck, it didn’t matter. I stroked harder, faster, my teeth gritted, my free hand braced against the wall. The memory of her pretty nailsdigging into my shoulders pushed me over the edge. I came hard, so hard I had to slap a hand over my mouth to keep from groaning her name. My release spilled over my fingers, my body wracked with shudders, and still, it wasn’t enough. Nothing ever would be.
Not until she wasmine.
Chapter 4
ADELA
The morning light bled through the floor-to-ceiling windows, streaking golden over silk sheets and the bare skin of my legs. I groaned, rolling onto my side, my body still thrumming from the night before.
I should’ve been furious. At him. At myself. At the way I hadlethim inside me, then left me burning in the aftermath. But instead, I pressed my thighs together, swallowing hard.
Fuck him.
I threw the covers off, my feet hitting the cold marble floor with a quiet hiss. A glass of water. A shower. That’s what I needed. Not to keep replaying the way his hands had felt on my skin. Or remembering the way my stomach had clenched in fear when he held me over that rooftop’s edge…and how I’dliked it.Ugh, and the man’s fingers wereinsane.
I clenched my jaw, pushing the thought down as I padded toward the kitchen. The clock on the oven read 7:42 a.m.–earlier than I needed to be awake. But the idea of lying in bed, drowning in my own head, wasn’t an option.
I reached for a glass, my fingers trembling slightly as I filled it with cold water.
I should get back to work. Focus on what actually matters. Do my best to forget him. Even if it was the most incredible orgasm of mylife.
It had been two weeks of grinding through security reports, refining new AI-driven breach-detection systems, and expanding Sinclair Solutions’ underground firewall network.
