Page 76 of Velvet Betrayal
Not just want.
Need.
Starved for her. Starved for this. Starved for the chance that maybe, maybe this time I wouldn’t lose her again.
She made a noise—half whimper, half warning—and then bit my lip hard enough to jolt me back into my body. Kitchen. Boston. I was supposed to be taking it easy, doctor’s orders, but my hands had already found her waist, the curve of her back, and I wasn’t about to let go.
She walked me backward, one awkward step at a time, until my ass hit the fridge and a hailstorm of magnets and takeout menus crashed to the floor. We both laughed, the sound sharp and giddy, and then she grabbed my jaw with a kind of greedy certainty, like she had to check—again and again—that I was real, that I was the thing she wanted to fuck and not destroy.
She pressed in, chest to chest, just breathing, and for a moment we stood there, burning off all the adrenaline and leftover terror that should’ve killed us both hours, days, a lifetime ago.
I closed my eyes to memorize it—her fingers on my skin, her wild pulse, the way our mouths tasted of old citrus and unspoken hurt. It was so alive it almost hurt.
She was walking into dangertomorrow.She was doing her job despite the people who wanted her dead. She was fucking terrifying and gorgeous and deadly and the only thing I’d ever wanted.
When I opened my eyes, she was studying my face, tracing every old scar and new bruise. Her thumb brushed the swelling on my cheekbone. “Does it hurt?” she whispered.
I shook my head. She didn’t buy it.
I pushed her hair out of her eyes and kissed her, long and slow, then let her take the lead—her hips grinding into mine, her heartbeat a drum under my hands. She smelled like city sweatand cheap suit fabric and the stubbornness of women who never gave up. She tasted like black tea and regret and the sugar-dust of sleepless nights.
“You never change,” she said, voice rough and raw from effort. “You come into my house and ruin everything.”
“Not everything,” I said.
I wanted to argue, but she’d already worked her hands under my shirt, nails raking down my ribs—she knew every old break, every place to press. I groaned, couldn’t help it. She found the bandage at my side and paused, slowing us down for just a second.
If she was going to run, it’d be now. If she was going to tell me to fuck off, it’d be with a slap, not a kiss.
But she didn’t. She pulled back just enough to keep her hand where it was, gentle as a bruise. “That’s going to tear if we keep going.”
“Don’t care,” I said. And I meant it.
“I do,” she said, voice shaking, which only made me want her more. She bent me backwards, careful but determined, and lifted my shirt to see the dressing, her knuckles ghosting over the spot like she could feel the wound through her skin.
“God, you’re a mess. You’re always a fucking mess.”
“But I’m your mess,” I said. Then, lower: “You want it.”
“Every stupid, self-destructive inch.” She locked onto my shoulders, using me for leverage as she kicked off her shoes—and the instant she was barefoot, she pressed in, her body lining up with mine like it was made to fit. I could feel every twitch, every shiver, every calculation she failed to make. I gripped her hips, just to make her gasp.
She did gasp—not soft, not staged—and that was the hinge moment, the tipping point into don’t stop. I caught her by the hips, lifted her onto the kitchen counter—crap flying, a mugshattering on the tile with a sound that would haunt me for weeks—and she wrapped her legs around my waist like a vise.
I bit her neck, heard her moan, and she arched back, hair spilling across the marble like a halo. She was already working my belt, one hand on the buckle, the other digging into my arm to anchor herself. I fumbled to help, and then she pulled me in, tight enough that it felt like we were trying to fuse bone.
She moved like she was in pain, or maybe in the grip of something worse—a need that hurt to be real. Her thighs locked around my hips. I think I whispered “don’t move” as soon as I got both her wrists in one hand, pinning her so the fight had to turn into something else. She shivered, but it was with laughter, with the ridiculousness of being two adults fucking on a freezing counter when there was a bed ten feet away.
“Let go,” she said, but she didn’t mean it. Her fingers clawed at my wrist, not to break free, just to feel the pressure. Her knees left bruises on my ribs. I pushed her down harder.
“You want it?” I asked, teeth at her ear.
“What do you want, you want me to beg?”
“I don’t need you to beg,” I said. “I know how much you want me to fuck you. Bed?”
“No. Here,” she said, sharp and breathless, and I grinned because that was the point.
I let her wrists go and she grabbed my neck, not soft, not sweet, like she was wiring herself to the one thing that might kill her. I slid inside her, and even though I was trying to take my time, she clenched and bucked and rolled her hips so hard I almost missed the sound she made, then the echo of it in my own throat.
