Page 84 of Carnal Wagers

“Where do you think you’re going?” I growled in her ear and pinched her chin.

She chose to come here. Now I got to choose when it ended, and we weren’t done.

This feeling she evoked, it needed to be bottled and stored, only to be cracked open once it aged to perfection, like a full-bodied whiskey. But there was no time for it to ripen when LK always lurked, ready to snatch away any sign an O’Leary thrived.

I could take Alice now, spread her legs, and enjoy an hour’s pleasure as our bodies melted into one another. Then wait for LK to do her work and snuff out the brightest spark in my life. Or I gave her up, only spying on her from the shadows to keep her safe the best I could until I finally caught and killed the Love Knot Killer.

“I need to freshen up. You can’t see me puffy-eyed and snot-covered.”

“Don’t you dare hide from me. Don’t give me something real only to take it away.”

She froze. “What?”

“You’re stunning because of your imperfections, not in spite of them.”

“Y-you cannot say stuff like that.”

“I just did, sweetheart. Now fucking kiss me and make it worth my while.”

“Prick.”

I rolled her on top of me. Her hair tickled my cheek, and her weight hugged me as her breaths stuttered over my skin. My nerves sparked alive with the need for one more moment together.

“Say that again.”

“Prriiic—”

I swallowed the end of the word with my mouth on hers.

Chapter 23

Composure and indifference were my shields against the world, and she broke through them as if they were paper-thin. Every moment with her gave me a high I longed to cling to forever. I was the moth to her flame, and I willingly flew closer to her heat, fully aware how this ended.

An inferno rushed through my veins with every breath, every touch, every kiss I coaxed from my emotional síbhean. She sucked my tongue. I nipped her lip. She humped my leg. I shoved her back on the bed and ground my erection against her, from thigh to hip bone, my piercing stimulating the start of a high. Her nails scratched up and down my back, and one of her legs wound around my thighs.

“Ruin me, Cillian. Please, I need it.”

Ruin me. The words echoed. Ruin me, Cillian.

I recoiled, pushing up over her. She might as well have said “Kill me, Cillian,” because it wasn’t the shadows of rapture I saw on her face but traces of vomit from digoxin and helleborin poisoning, and a motherhood knot branded along her cheek and over a singed eyebrow.

I swept a hand down my face.

“What’s wrong?”

Her fingers wrapped around my bicep. The touch burned, and I twisted away. The room spun as I hyperventilated. The sheets swished behind me, the mattress dipped, and the warmth of her body crowded me.

“Tout va bien,” she soothed in my ear. “It’s alright. You’re alright. Why didn’t you tell me you get attacks too?”

Numbness crept up from my extremities, the best defense I had, as her fingers slipped into my hair, but I caught her wrist.

“Don’t.”

“Trust me. Let me. You’ll feel better.”

Eyes scrunched shut, I bobbed my head because I was a fucking masochist. This had to end, but I wasn’t ready for it to.

Her nails scraped over my cranium in circles. Every pass stole another ounce of tension. Two minutes in, she had me in the palm of her hand. She could’ve taken a gun to my head, and I would’ve happily let her. Her nails ran down to my nape, the touch turning to soft pressure. Rougher and rougher, the lower her fingers went, then full hands kneaded down my spine. Her lips ghosted over my shoulder blades, and I drowned in her scent. My cock strained against my boxers.