Page 171 of Daughter of No Worlds

When his hand ran up my side and settled over my breast, his whole body shuddered. So did mine. Desire burned in my core. Suddenly, I was unbearably conscious of his weight between my thighs. Of the touch of his fingertips as they ran up the insides of my legs. Not as high as I wanted them to be.

Not enough. Never enough.

I yanked at the button of my breeches. Max sat up, straightened, helped me pull them off. Captured my leg and planted a kiss on the inside of my knee. Then further up, on the inside of my thigh, this one punctuated with a gentle close of his teeth, a rough curse beneath his breath.

Need, new and unfamiliar and utterly consuming, overtook me.

Then he sat up, straightened. The world suspended for one long moment, silent save for the quiet cracking of the lantern wicks. I felt his gaze sweep over my body, slowly, as if drinking in each inch. Felt it, not saw it, because I turned my face, self-conscious for reasons I couldn’t totally understand.

My body had always been one of my most valuable commodities, and I used it as such. It had never bothered me to be looked at.

But then again, Max wasn’t justlooking atme. He never had. This was beingseen, barer than I ever had been before. No counted dancing steps. No costumes. No false confidence.

“I wish I was better with words,” he murmured. And when I could finally bring myself to turn back to him, the sight of him caught in my chest and squeezed — that face, the gaze that met me with such bare, raw honesty.

I was in love with him.

The thought floated through my mind, simple and unshakeable. Undeniably true, even though I couldn’t bring myself to say it. Even if maybe, in the end, I wouldn’t be able to keep him.

“You do not need them,” I whispered back. A truth we both understood for fact. Especially when I looked at him and saw my silent confession reflected back at me.

My fingers ran down Max’s sides, settling at narrow, muscular hips and running along the waistband of his trousers. Unbuttoning. He let out the most beautiful sound I had ever heard, a heavy exhale that dragged its claws over me with the hint of a groan.

That one movement broke the thread of tension as we fell upon each other again. I tasted every inch of him, every expanse of skin, and relished the way he unraveled as I traveled down his chest, over the cords of his abdomen, and lower and lower, until he grabbed my shoulders and dragged me back up to his face. “Not now,” he murmured, the words muffled by an impatient kiss as he flipped me beneath him.

I hardly had time to prepare myself before his fingertips slid between us. Slid into me. My back arched. The world went white.

Gods below.

“Not now,” I whispered, and his hands didn’t stop as the breath of his chuckle unfurled against my mouth.

“Maybe I want to take my time with you.”

“Just like you.” I had to focus very, very hard on forming each word. “It always takes you so long to do things.”

My breath hitched. I heard the smile in his voice as he responded, “And you’re always so demanding.”

Demanding!

I dragged my fingernails down his arm, shifting my hips lower. And then I finally hooked my legs around him — finally felt him settle at my entrance. I pulled away from him enough to meet his gaze.

“I win,” I whispered.

“My ego will never recover.”

The smile faded, and he smoothed tangled hair back from my face.

“You’re sure?”

I was sure of nothing anymore, except for this.

My teeth skimmed his ear as I answered, “Yes.”

He gave me one long, passionate kiss, and pushed into me.

And my whole world unraveled, expanded, narrowed. My back arched. Awareness was limited only to this. To the places where we were connected. Where he was inside me, yes, but also every inch where my arms wrapped around him, my legs, our stomachs. For a moment, he just held himself like that, pressed within me, and I could feel him trembling. Our lips were against each other’s, sharing ragged breath.

Nothing —nothing— could ever feel this good. This right.

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