Page 65 of A Lady’s Guide to Witchcraft

Chapter Twenty

If Briar had thought the siren and her grimsong would be the deadliest part of her evening, she had underestimated the force of Ethan’s fury.

They went back to the cottage, pulling the wooden shutters closed, locking the doors. Inside, the tearoom was cozy and dark.

Until it wasn’t.

Ethan sauntered toward Briar, eyes blazing. “You put yourself in danger,” he said with a lethal kind of softness that she already knew to ignore at her own peril. The treacherous sea was in his eyes. A storm brewed on the horizon outside the cottage in reply.

She swallowed as he bent closer, invading her space. She inched backward. “You’re welcome?”

Wrong thing to say.

He closed his hand around her throat, gently but inexorably, halting her escape. “You do not put yourself in danger. Not for me.”

Her body was a riot of conflicting feeling: weary from the battle but also oddly revitalized, as if she had drunk an entire carafe of coffee or eaten all of the rock candy in the jar. She was aware of every single thing—the wind pushing the roses against the shutters, the thinness of her chemise, the soft touch of Ethan’s breath on her cheek, making her skin tingle all the way down to her knees. The feeling of being prey to Ethan’s predator and liking it.

Loving it.

Stern, silent Ethan with his scars and tattoos and lethal black eyes that saw everything. Every part of her, yearning and desperate. His usual control was chipped, something more than fierceness in those eyes. There was a growl in his throat. She was wet with only his fingers at her neck. But she knew what it was to be touched by him now.

“Are you listening, little thorn?”

She nodded, or tried to.

“I don’t think you were.” His voice was quiet but hard. His accent thickened.

“I…”

“You. Don’t. Put. Yourself. In. Danger.”

Oh. That.

He waited, eyebrow raised. “Say it.”

She felt mutinous. So desperate for him to touch her. A little bit more cowed than she’d like. But also so tempted to push, just to see how serious he was.

“Don’t,” he said pleasantly, as if reading her mind. “I’d like to let you come tonight.” His mouth brushed her ear, a nip at her lobe, a devious smile against her skin. “You want to come again, don’t you, sweetheart? And again?”

She gasped when he pulled up her skirts, her thighs already parting for him. With the fingers of one hand still clasped around her throat, he plunged the others rhythmically in and out of her quim until she was quaking. Heat raced up and down her legs.

He slowed his ministrations until she whimpered. And still he gave no quarter, only tsked as if disappointed. “A shame.” His fingers stilled, palm against her bud adding pressure but nothing else. Sweat dampened the top of her spine. “And you’re so close, aren’t you?”

“Ethan, please.”

His grip on her throat was the only thing holding her up. She felt feverish. Feral. He stayed silent, demanding. A ship’s captain through and through. Orders had been given.

She swallowed again, whispering, “I don’t put myself in danger for you.”

“Good girl,” he said, as inevitable as the churn of a whirlpool.

And then his fingers stroked deep inside, dragged out to circle her bud, in that steady, patient pattern that made her toes curl. “Give me your pleasure,” he urged. “It’s mine.”

He kissed her, capturing her cries when she came, hard and fast as a lightning strike. The bedroom was full of shadows and the heavy perfume of mint and the white roses swallowing the cottage. The waves of her climax seemed endless, receding like the tide, only to crash over her again when Ethan fit his cock against her. She pushed down to draw him in, too far gone to be embarrassed at her eagerness. He swore, but it was low and soft, like a prayer.

“I knew you’d feel like this,” he said, then groaned. “Perfect.”

He slid into her only a little and with excruciating slowness. She bit his shoulder, impatient, demanding. He grinned softly, but the tendons in his neck were in sharp relief.