Page 84 of Where Darkness Bloomed
Her face burning, she tried to recall what he had asked. “A dream,” she managed, breathless. “It was... a dream.”
His head tilted slightly. A slow, predatory motion. “What did you dream of?”
The question was a slow, velvet drag down her spine, and she froze.
The memory of her dreams rushed back with searing clarity. His mouth against her skin. His weight above her, pressing down. Their bodies tangled in the fever of want and need.
Shame lit through her like wildfire. She buried her face in her hands, mortified.
A low chuckle rolled from his chest, rich and dark. Then his hands found hers. Firm but gentle, he peeled her hands from her face, cradling her wrists between them. His gaze swept over her, reading every emotion, every thought.
He already knew.
“You dreamed of me. Of us.”
His voice was deep and silken, threaded with certainty. But there was no mockery in it, no teasing—only heat. Desire so unmistakable it threatened to ignite the air between them like flame.
Denial crumbled in her throat. Her pulse betrayed her, hammering wild beneath his touch. The way he looked at her—gilded in warmth, heavy with hunger—intoxicated her, muddling every thought.
“Yes,” she whispered. The confession was fragile.
A sound stirred low in his chest, primal and deep. His hands guided hers to his chest, pressing her palms flat against muscle. An invitation. An encouragement.
Her fingertips lingered over the slow, powerful drum of his heart. Then they wandered downward—tracing the ridges of muscles, over the sculpted curves of his ribs, lower, along the carved lines of his abdomen.
Without haste, his hands slid up her back, drawing her flush against him. The blanket pooled, forgotten, leaving nothing between bare skin. His body pressed to hers, immense and unyielding, and his lips brushed her jaw.
“You needn’t fear desire, Persephone.” Teeth grazed her neck in a gentle, wicked nip. “Not when I am here, only too willing to oblige you.”
His hands curved at her waist. In a breath, he lifted her, settling her between his thighs with effortless command. Her back met the wall of his chest, his arms bracketing her, his thighs caging her in place. Lower, he was hard as stone against her back.
“Shall I show you?”
A sharp thrill licked up her spine. She couldn’t speak, could scarcely draw breath.
But he didn’t wait. His hands drifted lower, brushing the skin of her thighs with featherlight strokes that made her tremble.
Then—almost idly—his heel hooked behind her ankle. With one smooth pull, he parted her legs.
A sharp grasp broke from her.
Laid open against him, cradled between muscular thighs, the tension coiled tight and hot inside her. Anticipation sang in her blood, sweet and sharp, warring with the shyness that suddenly heated her skin.
She turned her face into the curve of his neck, unable to watch what was coming. His fingers traced languid caresses along her inner thighs. Touches that lingered with maddening patience, just shy of where they were most needed.
At last, his fingers slid higher, an indulgent stroke through the center of her wetness, and she nearly wept.
“You tremble,” he murmured.
It was the same thing he had said to her before. But now his voice was impossibly deep, shaped by pleasure, dark with promise.
His lips skimmed her neck, nuzzling the tender hollow beneath her ear. “Tell me, Persephone...” A pause, his breath curling against her skin. “Are you frightened—or simply impatient?”
Another stroke, bold and devastatingly slow, sent her hips arching instinctively into his hand. But his touch withdrew immediately.
“Impatient, then,” he murmured, voice rich with amusement as his mouth trailed along her shoulder, warm and unhurried.
His hands resumed their slow exploration—wandering without urgency, stroking her apart with unbearable slowness. Every brush of his fingers turned the tension tighter, finer, until her whole body quaked.
