Page 58 of Taken

Understanding dawns in his eyes, followed by something darker, hungrier. “What are you asking?”

“I don’t know.” I laugh shakily. “I’ve forgotten how to ask for anything.”

He shifts to sit beside me on the couch, his body a line of heat against mine. “You deserve more than stolen moments in a monitored room.”

“I deserve a lot of things. Doesn’t mean I’ll get them.” My voice hardens. “Freedom. My daughter. My life back.”

“No,” he agrees quietly. “And I can’t give you any of those things. Not yet.”

“But you’re here now,” I say softly. “And so am I. For once… just for once, I want to feel something I choose.”

I think of that moment when his lips met mine. How I’d felt truly alive for the first time in far too long.

I’d do anything to feel that again.

His hand lifts to my face, cupping my cheek with surprising gentleness. “If I kiss you right now, is it really choice? Or desperation?”

“Does it matter?”

“Yes.” His thumb traces my lower lip, the touch sending shivers over my skin. “It matters to me.”

I turn my face into his palm, the gesture more vulnerable than I’ve allowed myself in years. “Then let’s call it both.”

Something in him breaks at that, control slipping, the carefully maintained facade cracking around the edges. His lips find mine in the darkness, tentative at first. But the careful restraint shatters moments later as years of isolation and longing surge through me.

I press closer, hands finding the solid warmth of his chest. He makes a sound low in his throat—part growl, part groan—and suddenly there’s nothing tentative about the way he kisses me.

“Lila,” he groans, low in his throat. His arms wrap around me, one hand threading into my hair, the other sliding to the small of my back. He tastes like smoke and secrets, like possibility in a world where I’ve had none. His tongue traces the seam of my lips, and I open to him with a small sound that would embarrass me if I could think clearly.

My fingers dig into his shoulders, feeling the hardness of muscle beneath fabric. The Shard’s lingering magic heightens every sensation: the rasp of his stubble against my skin, the heat of his mouth, the pressure of his hand as it moves from my back to my hip, gripping tightly.

His mouth leaves mine to trace a burning path down my neck, teeth scraping gently against sensitive skin. A gasp hisses from me, raw and needy. His hand slides beneath the hem of my shirt, palm hot against my ribs, thumb brushing the underside of my breast through thin cotton.

“You feel like warm silk,” he whispers against my throat.

I moan, unable to find words, arching into his touch. His palm covers my breast, thumb circling the hardened peak, and pleasure jolts through me with shocking intensity, trembling for reasons that have nothing to do with extraction aftereffects.

His mouth finds mine again, hungry and demanding, as his hand continues its exploration. Every touch feels magnified, overwhelming after nothing but clinical contact. Heat pools low in my belly, a tightening coil of need I’d forgotten how to feel.

When his hand slides between my thighs, pressing against my mound through the thin fabric of my pants, my hips buck involuntarily. He swallows my moan with his kiss, his touch gentle but insistent against the nub of my clit, finding a rhythm that has me clinging to his shoulders, nails digging into muscle.

“Oh, my God,” I choke out, my thoughts reeling. The pleasure builds with alarming speed, my body remembering what my mind had forgotten—the climbing tension, the narrowing of the world to nothing but sensation. His fingers press harder, circle faster, and something inside me explodes.

I bury my face against his neck as release crashes through me, wave after wave of pleasure so intense it borders on pain. His free arm wraps around me, holding me steady as I shudder against him, muffling my cries against his skin.

As the tremors subside, embarrassment floods in. To come apart so easily, so quickly, from such minimal touch… What must he think of me?

“I’m sorry,” I whisper, mortified. “It’s been so long, and the Shard’s magic—”

“Don’t,” he interrupts, voice rough with restraint. “Don’t apologize. That was…” He trails off, pressing his forehead against mine.

I can feel his cock hard against my hip, his breath uneven, control clearly strained. But he makes no move to seek his ownrelease, instead brushing my hair back from my face with gentle fingers.

“We’re out of time,” he says regretfully, glancing at his watch. “The loop resets in a minute.”

Reality crashes back like a bucket of ice water. Monitors will reactivate. Guards will check. The brief reprieve ends.

I straighten my clothes with shaking hands as he moves toward the bathroom doorway—his entry point, I realize.

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