Page 49 of Bend & Break
Chapter 17
Blake
Mads kisses me like he needs it to stay alive, hands framing my face with enough pressure to leave me dizzy, bracing himself even as he comes undone. His mouth moves against mine with unflinching focus, every brush of his lips demanding more. I’m breathless, weightless, still tasting him on my tongue, every nerve lit by how much it turned me on to watch him fall apart for me, and by how impossible it feels not to beg for the same in return.
“You have no idea what you do to me,” he mutters, voice uneven between desperate kisses. “Been thinking about this for weeks. Every time you look at me like you might finally give in to us. Every time you didn’t.”
His lips move to the corner of my mouth, then trail down my jaw, a burn racing just under my skin. He presses one more kiss below my ear, and it’s slower, rougher, sucking hungrily at the spot. Leaving his mark.
“Gonna ruin you,” he whispers, not for the sake of filling the silence, but seemingly because it’s been his plan all along. “Slow if you let me… fast if you beg for it.”
I can’t tell what’s more nerve-racking—the fact that anyone could find us here like this, or that I believe and desperatelywantevery single thing he’s saying.
“C’mon,” he says, grabbing my hand. His palm is warm, firm, a tether against the storm that’s been churning in my head all night. “I’m not risking getting us walked in on by someone wearing a demon mask. Not when I’m about to worship you properly. I’ll be damned if anyone else ever sees you the way I’m about to.”
He doesn’t stop to consider whether we could go back to the apartment. Just leads me past a half-built set that’s covered in sawdust and drags me behind a crooked plywood wall painted to look like peeling concrete.
He’s a man possessed.
He looks over his shoulder with a grin that’s all teeth and intent, and says, “Hope you’re not too attached to standing upright, Blue.”
I let him pull me toward the back of the set, weaving through half-finished projects here and there. There’s a supply closet with the door cracked just enough. He nudges it open with his boot.
The second the door clicks shut, darkness folds around us, broken only by the thin strip of red emergency light bleeding in through the gap at the bottom. Then his mouth is back on mine.
It’s hot, urgent, shameless.
He kisses me like he’s staking a claim he’s had all along. His hands bracket my hips, steering me backward until my spine meets the edge of a shelf with a muted thud. Something rattles loose and clatters to the floor.
He kisses down the side of my neck. “Stop me if you need to,” he whispers. “Because I need you too damn much to stop on my own.”
As if I ever would.
He steadies me even as everything else spins.
“You’re shaking,” he murmurs, palms warm through the fabric of my jeans. His thumbs move to stroke just under the waistband. “Cold or excited?”
“Cold, but you’re fixing that fast.”
He grins, pleased, entirely too sexy. “Perfect.” He crushes his mouth to mine, then eases back, voice washing over me as rough as the kiss. “I’d worship you the way I’m about to every night if you’d let me.”
I barely have time to take my next breath, let alone respond, before he’s dropping to his knees in front of me.
His hands skim up the backs of my thighs with deliberate intent, denim pressing tight beneath his fingers, and somehow it feels like he’s touching bare skin.
His fingers fumble with the button, then the zipper, careful and quick. He tugs at the waistband, and I squirm, letting him work them down just enough. My jeans catch just below my knees, bunch around my calves, but neither of us cares.
Not when his hands find me again.
One curves around the back of my leg, anchoring me, while the other finds the top of my thong and drags it down in one slow, agonizing movement. He looks up at me once, pupils blown wide, dark swallowing every trace of color. The rest of the room falls out of focus. I have to remind myself to breathe.
When he leans in, I forget everything—where we are,whowe are.
His breath is hot against my skin as he speaks, and the sound of his voice alone makes my knees wobble. “You have no idea what you do to me, do you?” His words scrape right down my spine. “You think I’m walking out of here tonight without my mouth on you, you’re out of your fucking mind, Blue.”
I somehow manage to say, “I wouldn't dream of depriving you.”
His fingers press harder, rough. I feel the insistence in every nerve, and I’m seconds from collapsing under the weight of his attention.
