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“I just wanna see you.”
“See me make an arse outta myself.”
“Look at me.”
“No.”
“Clo …”
“Mm-mm.”
Lifting her chin, I waited for her to make eye contact with me. And she did, but only after pressing her lips between her teeth to squash her smile.
I shook my head with a chuckle as I pulled her bottom lip free with my thumb. “Don’t.”
“Don’t what?” she asked innocently, dropping her eyes again as that smile returned.
“Don’t hide. Not from me. This smile … this face …” I leaned forward and pressed my lips to hers again, reveling in the sharp gasp that passed through them the moment I was done. “You are the most beautiful thing I’ve ever fuckin’ seen.”
I kissed her again, lingering this time, and in that space, I felt the entire fucking universe hold its breath. Time seemed fluid when I was with Clover. Like a dark sea where the current moved more slowly the farther out you drifted. I hadn’t sorted out how to stop it completely, but as soon as I did, I would. I’d stay like this, with her, until the last star in the sky imploded, and then I’d float with her in the stagnant abyss.
Pressing her forehead to mine, Clover’s smile disappeared as she placed her hands on the sides of my face.
Then, she tilted her head and kissed me back.
CHAPTER 23
CLOVER
Stunned tears stung my eyes as I tried to absorb Damien’s words. Tried to make sense of the way he was touching me, looking at me. I didn’t want to believe him. Boys had told me things like that before, when no one was around, but their rough lips and punishing, impatient hands had always revealed the truth.
But not Damien’s. His kisses were sweet and slow and saturated with emotion. They made me feel cherished, seen. They gave instead of took. And they turned my blood into tingly, silvery moonlight—the same color as his eyes.
Pressing my forehead to his, I tried to process what was happening between us, tried to slow my racing heart and savor the connection I felt, pulsing just beneath my skin. I didn’t trust his words—I didn’t trust anyone, not entirely—but I trusted that feeling. And I wanted more.
So, I did what I should have done the second his lips first met mine—I tilted my head, and I kissed him back.
Damien held perfectly still as I sealed my mouth over his, but the moment my tongue slid along the parted seam of his lips, he thrust his hand into my hair and devoured me with a hunger that made it clear that food had not been the sustenance he was craving.
Lightning arced across my skin as his commanding tongue swirled and sucked, licked and teased. He tasted like vanilla and chocolate and cinnamon-dusted apple tarts, but the rest of him was anything but sweet. His body felt like hot stone—chiseled and solid. I wanted to wrap myself around it, cling to it until the storm of emotion and desire I was feeling passed.
Pushing up onto my knees, I straddled Damien’s outstretched legs, but he grabbed my hips before I could sit. I froze mid-kiss, the heat of rejection slithering up my neck as he held me still. Then, releasing me with one hand, Damien unbuckled his belt and slid the leather strap and holstered gun out of his belt loops in one fluid motion. He set the deadly accessory on the floor beside us. Then, he guided me to sit.
With the contraption gone, my thighs slid into place around his hips, and I gasped into his mouth as his erection pressed against my exposed clit. A rush of fizzy tingles cascaded over my body, and it reminded me of our first night in the cave, when I’d given him mouth-to-mouth. There was something about this man’s touch that affected me like no one else’s. Some magical spark that chased away the darkness. And I wanted to feel it everywhere.
Reaching up with trembling fingers, I unbuttoned Damien’s blazer and let it slide off my shoulders and pool on the floor. I expected to feel the vulnerable caress of cool air on my skin, but instead, all I felt was the welcoming heat of Damien’s body, beckoning me closer, like a crackling fire. Pressing his forehead against mine, Damien gazed down the length of my naked body and swallowed hard.
“Touch me,” I whispered.
“Thank God,” he replied.
Sealing his mouth over mine in another dizzying kiss, Damien let his hands roam up my tender ribs to cup the swell of my breasts. The warmth and weight of his palms sliding over my skin soothed everything in their path, including my heart. I felt grounded. I felt safe. And when his thumbs rolled over the tight, sensitive peaks of my nipples, I felt an incredible, insatiable need begin to build.
Tearing his mouth away from mine, Damien kissed his way down my neck and along my collarbone as I dropped my head and peered into the shadow between our rolling bodies.
“Am I hurting you?” I rasped, realizing that his bullet wound was probably only a few centimeters above my thigh.
Ignoring my question, Damien pulled one straining nipple into his mouth, and I threw my head back on a silent gasp. Hands kneading, tongue swirling, teeth grazing, Damien reduced me to a mindless, writhing, ravenous thing. I wanted to lose myself in that connection, sink to the bottom of it and never come up for air. As I reached for the button of Damien’s trousers, I let my fingers slide along the length of him, just below the fabric. And Damien followed my lead. Dragging a massive hand down my back, over my arse, and between my legs, he traced the tender seam of me with two thick fingers, and suddenly, I wasn’t in the bakery anymore.
