Page 47 of For the Love of the Gods

I caught a glimpse of his eyes for a second before he crashed his mouth back down to mine, the unfiltered desire I saw there sending a shiver from the top of my head to my toes. If he moved one of the hands kneading my ass under my dress and between my legs, he would find me desperately ready for him. It would only take a few brushes of his fingers to send me over the edge.

I reached behind me and placed a hand over his to direct him where I needed him when he pulled away, breaking this kiss.

Air fell from my lips in a heaving breath. I was about to fall off the back of this couch, I was so dizzy from the kiss.

“You started this,” Dominic said, steadying me with two broad hands on my hips. His voice was gravelly and deep, I could feel it scraping against my skin. “Deal with the consequences.”

“And those would be?” My own voice was breathless and weak. There was no hiding how turned on I was.

Dominic’s eyes were half-lidded, but locked on mine. “You were all talk, weren’t you? It was you who couldn’t handle this.”

The slamming of a door behind Dominic sent us breaking apart, the lack of contact leaving me cold and wanting. Raiden rounded the corner into the sitting room, and I swore a knowing smile tugged at his mouth before he forced it back down.

“I step out for one,onesecond and come back to find you two gone,” Raiden accused.

“We were busy,” Dominic explained.

Great, now he definitely knew what we were doing.

“I can see that,” Raiden said, nodding to me. My hair was probably a tangled mess from Dominic’s hands. “Glad to see you are working through your differences.”

Dominic’s back tensed, remembering exactly what those differences were. I was not about to stand there and watch his face contort with regret. I had goaded him into it and then melted into a puddle under his touch.

“Oh, don’t worry, Raiden, those differences are still firmly intact.” I stepped around Dominic, tugging on my dress to re-center it and involuntarily cringed at the scrape against my burns. I’d forgotten they were there. Moments prior, all I could feel was my nerve endings lighting on fire on my lips and in between my legs.

“Well, I’m beat,” I declared, looking at no one in particular. Certainly not Dominic. “See you two in the morning. Pancakes!”

Raiden looked like he wanted to say something, but wisely kept his mouth shut and let me leave. I made it to the staircase before I heard Dominic’s voice behind me.

“Rose, wait.”

I turned, and my stomach dropped when I saw the anguish on his face. Oh, he was beating himself up for his lack of restraint.

“See you in the morning, Dominic.”

I ran up the stairs, fleeing before he could say he regretted it or asked me to forget it. Because as much as I hated him, as much as he frustrated me, I knew in the back of my mind that he could repent for those sins. There was no undoing what I’d done, not yet anyway.

Chapter 13

Dominic

I changed my mind. Rose was dead.

No.

Not dead. And we had to stay married too.

But something.Somethingso that she would pay for the way she burrowed herself into my brain like a fucking beetle.

Rose. Rose.Rose.

Her name was on repeat in my head, branded there and forming a permanent scar. There would be no forgetting her, no dislodging her from my brain now.

She occupied more of my thoughts than I cared to admit before last night, weaseling her way into my home and my space and my every fucking thought.

But now that I knew what she tasted like, how she responded to my mouth on her neck and my hands in her hair, I was as good as dead. I wouldn’t be satisfied with a quick release by my own hand in the shower, her face breaking through and pinning itself in my mind right as I finished.

No. Now, I needed to feel her for myself.

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